There are often questions raised about the diversity of shortlists in Fantasy and Science-Fiction awards. When questions such as these arise for awards which are sent a list of books for consideration by the publishers – like the Clarke Awards – the question of whether the young/old, male/female, ethnic minorities (etc, etc) have been turned away at the shortlisting stage by judges or are simply not being submitted by publishers is an important one. In many cases it is impossible for us readers to know, but the Clarke Awards are doing a very good thing in by being as open as possible with their process and thereby allowing us to follow the award at every step of the way – from submission list to shortlist to winners – and make up our own mind as to whether the shortlist is fair and whether the publisher submitted the right titles that particular year.

This year there are 107 titles from 36 publishers. The shortlist will be announced in April and the winners in May – we shall let you know who makes it through and who wins as soon as we know.

THE Arthur C. Clarke Award 2015 SUBMISSION LIST: