The finalists for the 2026 World Fantasy Awards have been announced! Congratulations to DMLA authors Thomas Ha and Elise C. Tober!
Best Long Fiction
Best Short Fiction
Best Collection
Special Award – Non-Professional
Congratulations to DMLA author Neil Sharpson as DON’T TRUST FISH lands at #5 on the NYT Bestseller List!
Illustrated by National Book Award winner Dan Santat, DON’T TRUST FISH is an absurdly laugh-out-loud funny picture book about the villainy of fish.
ONE OF SLATE‘S 25 GREATEST PICTURE BOOKS OF THE PAST 25 YEARS
ONE OF BOOKPAGE‘S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR
A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: New York Magazine, NPR, Chicago Public Library, Smithsonian Magazine, Libby, Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, Publishers Lunch, BookPage, Booklist, School Library Journal, Book Riot, BCCB, Imagination Soup, Parent Map, The Children’s Book Review, EBSCO NoveList
Kirkus: Fancy pants prove no match for madcap ursine rage. On the heels of Don’t Trust Fish (2025), Sharpson and Santat re-create the magic of their previous collaboration. This time our hero is a tan-skinned, dark-haired man with some seriously choice orange cargo pants. After flying from Ireland to Alaska, the man almost immediately comes face-to-face with a bear. The encounter doesn’t go well, culminating (after some seriously Looney Tunes–esque capers) with our hero in the hospital after briefly being devoured (he makes it out alive, but the “FANCY TRAVELING PANTS” are tragically shredded). Fortunately, all turns out well when human and bear are reunited for a surprising literary collaboration. Sharpson packs all manner of verbal jokes into this telling, each one deftly picked up and illustrated with additional flourishes by Santat. (When the protagonist confesses that the bear has been following him everywhere, even virtually, the bear’s online comment reads, “I see you bro.”) At times, the narration drags a bit due to the sheer plethora of wordplay. Still, it’s a small criticism given the enjoyment that this tale will provide; Santat’s silliness more than keeps the energy afloat. A worthy entry in the pantheon of consumed picture-book protagonists, with jokes that come as fast as a furious bear. (Picture book. 4-8)
Kirkus: On the Fair Island, the Idaean people live and thrive. A matriarchal society, the Idaeans value close community bonds and peaceful relations with others, including the People, with whom they trade. They engage in the practice of temporarily fostering children from other societies and sending their own off to strengthen alliances. Former bull dancer turner ambassador Iakinthu’s “given” (foster) child, Rhenthizu, goes through an initiation rite and is officially considered an adult man. Rhenthizu’s given-child status wasn’t acquired through diplomacy—he was kidnapped by pirates from his homeland and then later rescued and taken in by Iakinthu. No one, including Rhenthizu, knows where he was born or who his family of origin is—he was so young when he was stolen that he only has vague memories. Iakinthu, who bears the epithet of “Gephyra” (bridge-between-people), prepares to set sail on her ship, Flying Fish, with the now-adult given child Kilinkizu to reunite her with her mother; Iakinthu brings Rhenthizu along on the journey, hoping to find his family. Along the way, the voyagers encounter a plethora of different societies, from the People, who habitually give away male children to keep their society all-female, to the Egyptians, who are led by a woman pharaoh, to the violent, male-dominated Northerner pirates who have been raising the stolen son of Kilinkizu. McIntyre’s final novel, published posthumously, is a sprawling exploration of gender, community, and family in a historical fantasy setting. The pacing is leisurely and steady, and the characters are all deeply compelling. A few mythical beasts, like the kraken and a gryphon, are even included to add interest. Readers will be enthralled by the author’s worldbuilding, and even more captivated by the lush prose: “Iakinthu stood at the prow; striped porpoises played in the bow wave, riding it as birds ride the wind, hardly moving but for a flick of fin or fluke.”
The 2026 Ignyte Award finalists have been announced, and we’re thrilled to see some DMLA names on the list!
Outstanding Novel: Adult
Outstanding Novelette
The Ember Award
(for unsung contributions to genre)
This world is round. Loving sailors court its waves, bathe in sea currents happily sharing secrets with them, waters telling them where to go and how best to navigate their way. With persistence as gentle and stubborn as worn stones, multiple award winner Vonda N. McIntyre shows us versions of everyday Minoan activities based on common sense and historical research, then flings us outward from that safe harbor into the wildest of adventures. Monsters, volcanoes, pirates, mummy kings—all these dangers must be passed as ambassador and former bull-dancer Iakinthu travels thousands of miles on a mission to return her foster son to his Pacific coast home.
Vonda treats the whole enterprise of bringing her last novel to life with the calm assurance of a favorite aunt taking you shopping in the best sex toy store ever. Sensory delights abound, from the soothing oil massaged into bathers’ skins to the cool mountain breezes buoying up ship-burdened balloons. The most audacious realities rise and ebb beneath her steady yet unobtrusive attention. We readers of The Curve of the World are truly fortunate to have such an elegant inevitability of a story so beautifully unfolded here before us.
On the battlefield, as warring factions deal out death, young Mercutio chances upon the charismatic poet Dante Alighieri. In their desperate stand against the enemy, they inadvertently open a crack between our world and Faerie, literally changing the stars over Mercutio’s head, and creating a mysterious presence who will follow Mercutio for all the days of his life.
With new stars come new destinies for young men who will travel to the ends of the Earth to honour the bonds of love and friendship.
As outcasts and exiles, Mercutio and Dante find family in a band of fighters called the Montecchi, near Verona. With his friends at his side, Mercutio will battle to change his stars, and to free the changeling upon whose fate hangs the future of the human world.
The 2026 Locus Award Finalists were announced and we’re thrilled to see so many DMLA authors included!
SCIENCE FICTION NOVELS
FANTASY NOVELS
HORROR NOVELS
FIRST NOVELS
NOVELLAS
NOVELETTES
SHORT STORIES
COLLECTION
Congratulations to all the DMLA authors whose titles were named a GoodReads Editor’s Top Genre Pick for the past five years!
Fantasy
Horror
Publishers Weekly: A gentle elegiac tone pervades this stunning posthumous historical fantasy from multi–Hugo and Nebula award winner McIntyre (Dreamsnake), who died in 2019. In ancient Crete, Iakinthu, a former bull dancer, is at the apex of her second profession as chief diplomat-trader of her seafaring nation. To fulfill Minoan tradition, she must take her adopted son, Rhenthizu, to meet his birth mother in a faraway land no Minoan has ever visited, after which he will choose which woman to live with. Their epic journey plays out as a feminist odyssey through six distinctive and mostly matriarchal cultures, superbly constructed around permutations of myth and legend. McIntyre’s scene-setting is lush and immersive, and her finely drawn, women-led cast leaps off the page as they confront obstacles with wit and wisdom. This sensitive and captivating voyage of discovery is a fitting capstone to a remarkable career. (May)