Locus Award - Fantasy

2011

China Mieville. Kraken

Mieville's cyberpunk novel tells the tale of museum curator Billy Harrow. He is frantically searching for a stolen artifact--a giant squid specimen taken by a mysterious cult. Dark humor with some scary elements and very original characters.

2010

China Mieville. The City & the City

Inspector Tyador Borlú must travel to Ul Qoma to search for answers in the murder of a woman found in the city of Besźel.

2009

Ursula K. Le Guin. Lavinia

In The Aeneid, Vergil's hero fights to claim the king's daughter, Lavinia, with whom he is destined to found an empire. Lavinia herself never speaks a word in the poem. Now, Ursula K. Le Guin gives Lavinia a voice in a novel that takes the reader to the half-wild world of ancient Italy, when Rome was a muddy village near seven hills. It tells the story of her life, and of the love of her life. It is a book of passion and war and the cost of war, generous and austerely beautiful.

2008

Terry Pratchett. Making Money: A Novel of Discworld

Who would not wish to be the man in charge of Ankh-Morpork's Royal Mint and the bank next door? It's a job for life. But, as former conman Moist von Lipwig is learning, life is not necessarily for long.

2007

Ellen Kushner. The Privilege of the Sword

Welcome to Riverside, where the aristocratic and the ambitious battle for power and prestige in the city's labyrinth of streets and ballrooms, theatres and brothels, boudoirs and salons. Into this alluring and alarming world walks a bright young woman ready to take it on and make her fortune. A well-bred country girl, Katherine knows all the rules of conventional society. Her biggest mistake is thinking they apply.

2006

Neil Gaiman. Anansi Boys

Neil Gaiman now gives us a mythology for a modern age -- complete with dark prophecy, family dysfunction, mystical deceptions, and killer birds. Not to mention a lime.

2005

China Miéville. Iron Council

It is a time of wars and revolutions, conflict and intrigue. new Crobuzon is being ripped apart from without and within. War with the shadowy city-state of Tesh and rioting on the streets at home are pushing the teeming city to the brink. A mysterious masked figure spurs strange rebellion, while treachery and violence incubate in unexpected places." "In desperation, a small group of renegades escapes from the city and crosses strange and alien continents in the search for a lsot hope." "In the blood and violence of New Crobuzon's most dangerous hour, there are whispers. It is the time of the Iron Council.

2004

Lois McMaster Bujold. Paladin of Souls

Three years have passed since the widowed Dowager Royina Ista found release from the curse of madness that kept her imprisoned in her family's castle of Valenda. Her newfound freedom is costly, bittersweet with memories, regrets, and guilty secrets - for she knows the truth of what brought her land to the brink of destruction. And now the road - escape - beckons.... A simple pilgrimage, perhaps. Quite fitting for the Dowager Royina of all Chalion.

2003

China Miéville. The Scar

Aboard a vast seafaring vessel, prisoners and slaves are being transported to a fledgling colony of New Crobuzon. When the ship is besieged by pirates, the senior officials are executed, and surviving passengers are brought to a floating city constructed upon the hulls of pirated ships, a place whose leaders harbor a sinister agenda.

2002

Neil Gaiman. American Gods

Shadow is a man with a past and wants nothing more now than to live a quiet life with his wife. When his wife is killed in a terrible accident, Shadow flies home for the funeral. As a raging storm rocks the plane, the strange man in the seat next to Shadow introduces himself as Mr. Wednesday. He knows more about Shadow than is possible--and he warns Shadow an even bigger storm is coming.

2001

George R.R. Martin. A Storm of Swords

The sequel to the bestselling A Clash of Kings continues the story of the Seven Kingdoms. House Lannister has tightened its grip on the Iron Throne, but Tyrion still chafes under the rule of his scheming sister, his brutal father, and his sadistic nephew. While a continent away, Danaerys Stormborn and her dragons grow in power, while each undertakes a single-minded quest for victory and envelops the world in a storm of swords.

2000

J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

During his third year at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry, Harry Potter must confront the devious and dangerous wizard responsible for his parents' deaths.

1999

George R.R. Martin. A Clash of Kings

Transporting readers into a forgotten land of revelry and revenge, wizardry and warfare, Martin weaves a tale in which maidens cavort with madmen, brother plots against brother, and the dead rise to walk in the night.

1998

Tim Powers. Earthquake Weather

1997

George R.R. Martin. A Game of Thrones

A tale of court intrigues in the land of Seven Kingdoms, a country "blessed by golden summers that go on for years, and cursed by cruel winters that can last a generation."

1996

Orson Scott Card. Alvin Journeyman

Alvin returns to his family in the town of Vigor Church to share in their isolation, work as a blacksmith, and teach anyone who wishes to learn the secrets of being a maker.

1995

Michael Bishop. Brittle Innings

In 1943, with the country at war, seventeen-year-old shortstop Danny Boles signs with a class C baseball farm club and heads into strange relationships, dramatic escapades, and lessons about life, dreams, and desire.

1994

Peter S. Beagle. The Innkeeper's Song

As Tikat searches for the lover whose death and resurrection he witnessed, he meets three women--each of whom hides a secret, and who respectively each undertake her own impossible mission.

1993

Tim Powers. Last Call

Set in Las Vegas, Last Call concerns the fate of Scott Crane, former professional gambler, recent widower, blind in one eye--and also the lost natural son of the man who is determined to kill him. In this novel, Crane is forced to resume the high-stakes game of a lifetime--and wager it all.

1992

Sheri S. Tepper. Beauty

One of the most popular and provocative new voices in speculative fiction has transformed the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty into a wry look at the real world. Captured by time-travellers just as she is about to fall asleep, Beauty winds up a 90's co-ed and discovers that despite technological changes, beauty is destroyed everywhere.

1991

Ursula K. LeGuin. Tehanu: The Last Book of Earthsea

When Sparrowhawk, the Archmage of Earthsea , returns from the dark land stripped of his magic powers, he finds refuge with the aging widow Tenar and a crippled girl child who carries an unknown destiny.

1990

Orson Scott Card. Prentice Alvin

The saga of Alvin Maker, set in an alternative version of the American frontier country, continues, in a tale full of folklore and magic.

1989

Orson Scott Card. Red Prophet

In this sequel to Seventh Son, Alvin Maker, the seventh son of a seventh son, learns about the land and its chosen people in an America that might have been.

1988

Orson Scott Card. Seventh Son

Using the lore and folk magic of the men and women who helped settle a continent and the beliefs of the tribes who were here before them, Orson Scott Card has created an alternate frontier America where folk magic works, and has colored the entire history of the colonies. It is into this world, amid the deep wood where the Red Man still holds sway, that a very special child is born...

1987

Gene Wolfe. Soldier of the Mist

The story of Latro, an ancient Greek soldier, who has suffered a head wound. Because he cannot remember from day to day, Latro describes events in a scroll. His senses, intensified by his injury, enable him to see many things, including gods circulating among mortals.

1986

Roger Zelazny. Trumps of Doom

Merle Corey is a brilliant young computer designner in San Francisco. But he is also Merlin, son of Corwin, vanished prince of Amber-heir to his father's wonderous powers-and someone is determined to kill him. Now he will begin a desperate race through Shadow to escape the mysterious force that threatens his life... and to protect the deadly secret that could destry both his worlds.

1985

Robert A. Heinlein. Job: A Comedy of Justice

After he firewalked in Polynesia, the world wasn't the same for Alexander Hergensheimer, now called Alec Graham. As natural accidents occurred without cease, Alex knew Armageddon and the Day of Judgement were near. Somehow he had to bring his beloved heathen, Margrethe, to a state of grace, and, while he was at it, save the rest of the world ....

1984

Marion Zimmer Bradley. The Mists of Avalon

Putting a new twist on the Arthurian legends, this beloved book tells the epic story of the women behind the rise and fall of King Arthur.

1983

Gene Wolfe. The Sword of the Lictor

This dramatic adventure follows Severian as he transforms from a ruthless monster to a savior of a world.

1982

Gene Wolfe. The Claw of the Conciliator

The saga centers around an orphan whose lifelong quest transforms him from ruthless monster to savior of a world.

1981

Robert Silverberg. Lord Valentine's Castle

1980

Patricia A. McKillip. Harpist in the Wind

In the midst of conflict and unrest the Prince of Hed solves the puzzle of his future when he learns to harp the wind , discovers who the shape changers are, and understands his own relationship to Deth, harpist of the wizard Ohm.

1979

J.R.R. Tolkien. The Silmarillion

The story of the creation of the world that set the stage for The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.