2014 Elgin Award Winners Announced for Book and Chapbook of the Year

The Science Fiction Poetry Association announced that my 2013 book, DEMONSTRA received the 2014 Elgin Award for Book of the Year. Helen Marshall's collection, The Sex Lives of Monsters won first place in the Chapbook category.

This award is given by the Science Fiction Poetry Association to recognize the best full-length book and chapbook of speculative poetry published in the previous year. The Elgin Award is named after the founder of the Science Fiction Poetry Association, Suzette Haden Elgin.

DEMONSTRA was published by Innsmouth Free Press in 2013. The Sex Lives of Monsters was published by Kelp Queen Press. This year 22 publishers had books nominated, including 21 full-length collections and 9 chapbooks.

The second place award for full-length book went to Unexplained Fevers by Jeanine Hall Gailey from New Binary Press. Third place went to Dark Roads by Bruce Boston, published by Dark Renaissance Books. In the Chapbook category, second place went to The Edible Zoo by David C. Kopaska-Merkel, and third place went to Joshua Gage's Inhuman: Haiku from the Zombie Apocalypse, published by The Poet’s Haven.

DEMONSTRA also features the art of Vongduane Manivong. Her art has been exhibited in galleries across country and national events, including the Symposium of Lao History at the University of California-Berkeley, the National Youth Leadership Council’s first Urban Institute, and the Cultural Heritage Exhibition at the Laotian Community Center of Rhode Island. 

Helen Marshall is an award-winning Canadian author, editor, and doctor of medieval studies. Her debut collection of short stories, Hair Side, Flesh Side (ChiZine Publications, 2012), was named one of the top ten books of 2012 by January Magazine. It won the 2013 British Fantasy Award for Best Newcomer and was shortlisted for a 2013 Aurora Award by the Canadian Society of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Her second collection, Gifts for the One Who Comes After,was released in September 2014. She lives in Oxford, England. 

The SFPA was founded in 1978 to bring together poets and readers interested in science fiction poetry. The association has nearly 300 members internationally.

Thank you everyone, for your support!