STARBURST Magazine, the champion of new and exciting genre media, is pleased to announce that submissions are now open for its ground-breaking Brave New Words award. Now in its third year, The Brave New Words award is made to an individual who produces break-out literature that is New and Bold. We are looking to highlight exciting work that breaks new ground in the field of Cult Entertainment. Editors, writers, publishers, and bloggers can be nominated in respect of work first produced or published in 2019. Previous winners include Tasha Suri, for her ground-breaking novel Empire of Sand, and Margrét Helgadóttir for her work as editor of Pacific Monsters, published by Fox Spirit Books.

This year, STARBURST is pleased to announce that there is a second award for special contributions to the genre literature community. The details of this separate award will be announced later this month.

A ceremony presenting the awards will take place at Edge Lit 9, the UK’s premier annual indie book event. In 2020 the event will be held at the Derby Quad on the 11th and 12th of July. Guests will include John Gwynne and David Quantick.

The panel of judges for the Brave New Words Award includes genre critics and media professionals. The head judge is STARBURST Magazine’s Literary Editor, Ed Fortune. On the panel are Urban Fantasy author Russell Smith, media expert Rebecca Derrick, book podcaster Jane Hanmer and book blogger Matt Cavanagh. Finally, we welcome narrative expert Professor Esther MacCallum-Stewart to the team.

The award is made to an individual, rather than a specific work, so we are looking for examples that most define the creator’s output. We want full works: a complete novel or anthology or an example of the writer’s essays. For editors, we are looking specifically at works the editor has curated. There is no submission fee for the Brave New Words award, nor is there a limit on the number of titles, articles or pieces that can be submitted for consideration. Please bear in in mind that STARBURST is a magazine grounded in the field of Cult Entertainment and we highlight indie and cutting-edge media.

The deadline for submissions is March 12th 2020. A shortlist will be announced in early summer 2020.

The email address for submissions is ed.fortune@starburstmagazine.com (please use “BNW Awards” in the subject line).



The address to send physical publications to is:

BRAVE NEW WORDS AWARD SUBMISSIONS

c/o STARBURST Magazine

PO Box 4508

Manchester

M61 0GY



At submission stage we require one copy of the work in physical or electronic form. We prefer electronic submissions in all cases. If the work makes it to the shortlist, we may require up to five additional copies.Physical submissions must be clearly marked as intended for the award – mark the package and include a note with each copy. Good luck to all of you!