April 6, 2026

The winners of the 2026 British Science Fiction Association (BSFA) Awards for works published in 2025 have been announced.

Best Novel

• WINNER: When There Are Wolves Again, E.J. Swift (Arcadia) amazon / bookshop

• A Granite Silence, Nina Allan (Riverrun) amazon
• Project Hanuman, Stewart Hotston (Angry Robot) amazon / bookshop
• Edge of Oblivion, Kirk Weddell (Troubador)
• The Salt Oracle, Lorraine Wilson (Solaris)

Best Shorter Fiction (for novelettes and novellas)

• WINNER: “The Apologists“, Tade Thompson (Clarkesworld 11/25)

• Cities Are Forests Waiting to Happen, Cécile Cristofari (Newcon) amazon / bookshop
• The River Has Roots, Amal El-Mohtar (Arcadia) amazon / bookshop
• “The Art of Time Travel”, Teika Marija Smits (One Million Times) amazon / bookshop
• “Descent“, Wole Talabi (Clarkesworld 5/25)

Best Short Fiction

• WINNER: “Godzilla as a Young Man Named Mike“, E.M. Faulds (PodCastle 7/29/25)

• “25 Peppercorns“, Emma Burnett (Mythaxis Fall ’25)
• “One Step at a Time“, Rick Danforth (Vivid Worlds)
• “The Life and Times of Alavira the Great as Written by Titos Pavlou and Reviewed by Two Lifelong Friends“, Eugenia Triantafyllou (Uncanny 3-4/25)
• “Of Seagrass Fins and Slippery Fingers“, A.J. Van Belle (Augur 8.2)

Best Collection (for collections and anthologies)

• WINNER: Blood in the Bricks, Neil Williamson (NewCon)

• The Black Fantastic: 20 Afrofuturist Stories, André M. Carrington, ed. (Luna Press Publishing) amazon/ bookshop
• Uncertain Sons and Other Stories, Thomas Ha (Undertow) amazon / bookshop
• Black Friday, Cheryl S. Ntumy (Flame Tree) amazon / bookshop
• Who Will You Save?, Gareth L. Powell (Titan) amazon / bookshop
• Creative Futures: Beyond and Within, Allen Stroud, ed. (Flame Tree) amazon / bookshop

Best Fiction for Younger Readers

• WINNER: Doctor Who: The Robot Revolution, Una McCormack (Target) amazon

• Sunrise on the Reaping, Suzanne Collins (Scholastic) amazon / bookshop
• “The Ghost Merchant“, Rick Danforth (The Colored Lens Spring ’25)
• The Secret of the Sapphire Sentinel, J. Dianne Dotson (Android) amazon / bookshop
• Doctor Who: Lux, James Goss, narrated by Dan Starkey (Penguin)
• Secrets of the First School, T.L. Huchu (Tor) amazon / bookshop

Best Non-Fiction (Long)

• WINNER: Colourfields: Writing About Writing About Science Fiction, Fiction Paul Kincaid (Briardene) amazon

• Writing the Magic: Essays on Crafting Fantasy Fiction, Dan Coxon & Richard Hirst (Dead Ink)
• Speculation and the Darwinian Method in British Romance Fiction, 1859-1914, Kate Holterhoff (Ohio University Press) amazon / bookshop
• That Very Witch: Fear, Feminism and the American With Film, Payton McCarty-Simas (Luna Press Publishing) amazon / bookshop
• Fantasy: A Short History, Adam Roberts (Bloomsbury Academic) amazon / bookshop
• Dispelling Fantasies: Authors of Colour Re-imagining a Genre, Joy Sanchez-Taylor (Ohio State University Press) amazon / bookshop

Best Non-Fiction (Short)

• WINNER: “Spec Fic and the Politics of Identity: Finding the Self in Other“, Eugen Bacon (Strange Horizons 3/24/25)

• “The Legacy of Discworld“, Rick Danforth (The British Fantasy Society)
• “When People Giggle at Your Name, or the 2025 Hugo Awards Incident“, Grigory Lukin (self-published)
• Review of When There Are Wolves Again, Paul March Russell (Strange Horizons 10/6/25)
• “Comparing colonialisms in Dan Simmons’ novel The Terror and its AMC Adaptation“, Fiona Moore (Foundation 4/1/25)

Best Translated Short Fiction

• WINNER: “Liecraft“, Anita Moskat, tr. Austin Wagner (Apex 10/7/25)

• “Pollen”, Anna Burdenko, tr. Alex Shvartsman (Clarkesworld 3/25)
• “Elasticity”, Andrés González Galante, tr. Lucy Corrie-Tannen (Samovar 10/27/25)
• “Still Water”, Zhang Ran, tr. Andy Dudak (Clarkesworld 4/25)
• “Zephyr”, Sofia Rhei, tr. Marian Womack (Samovar 4/28/25)
• “Bodyhoppers”, Rocio Vega, tr. Sue Burke (Clarkesworld 2/25)
• “Beyond Everything“, Wang Yanzhong, tr. Stella Jiayue-Zhu (Clarkesworld 1/25)

Best Artwork

• WINNER: Nick Wells for the tesselated cover art of The Fractal Series (Flame Tree)

• Jenni Coutts for the cover art of Dark Crescent by Lyndsey Croal (Luna Press Publishing)
• Jenni Coutts for “Mushroom Fairy” (self-published)
• Spencer Fuller for the cover art of The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar (Arcadia)
• Sam Gretton for the cover art of The Salt Oracle (Solaris)
• Tziano Zhou for “Highway Above the Clouds” (self-published)

Best Audio Fiction

• WINNER: The Dex Legacy Series 3, Emily Inkpen (Alternative Stories)

• Just Let Me Help, Tara Campbell (Space Cowboy)
• Five Finger Stories, Rick Danforth (Tall Tale TV)
• Unicorn Spotting, Rick Danforth (The Tiny Bookcase)
• Wasteland: A Dex Legacy Story, Emily Inkpen (Alternative Stories)

The awards were voted on by members of BSFA and the British Annual Science Fiction Convention (Eastercon), except for Translated Short Fiction, which was selected by jury, and announced during Iridescence, this year’s Eastercon, held April 3-6, 2026 at Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel in Birmingham England and online. For more information, see the BSFA website.