Neukom Institute Announces Shortlist of 2020 Literary Arts Awards

The Neukom Institute for Computational Science at Dartmouth College has announced the shortlist of books for its 2020 Neukom Institute Literary Arts Awards, and that this year’s guest judge will be Sam J. Miller, author of black fish town, Destroy all monstersand the next The blade enters.

The awards were first created in 2017, and previous winners include Juan Martinez for best worst americanby Lavie Tidhar Central Station, Peng Berger, The Book of M., and others. The prize winner takes home a $5,000 prize at a roundtable at Dartmouth College.

The award is designed to honor books and speculative fictional pieces that act “as gadflies for good, provocateurs and satirists when the sciences go too far, but also far-sighted prophets of scientific potential.” Neukom Institute director Dan Rockmore says, “It’s also an important moment. The works chosen for the Neukom 2020 shortlist are insightful, provocative and can even guide our thinking as we address the challenges besetting the world today.

This year’s finalists are:

Start Category

• Cold roomDavid Koepp (Ecco, 2019)
• The crying machine, Greg Chivers (Harper Voyager, 2019)
• The imaginary corpseTyler Hayes (Angry Robot, 2019)
• Infinite detailTim Maughan (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2019)
• LessonCadwell Turnbull (Blackstone Editions, 2019)
• Today I am CareyMartin L. Shoemaker (Baen Books, 2019)
• We set fire to the darkness, Tehlor Kay Mejia (Katherine Tegen Books, 2019)

Open category

• A song for a new daySarah Pinsker (Berkley, 2019)
• And go like thisJohn Crowley (Little Beer Press, 2019)
• the Alternate Endings ArchiveLindsey Drager (Dzanc Books, 2019)
• dead astronautsJeff VanderMeer (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2019)
• The divers gameJesse Ball (Ecco, 2019)
• ExhalationTed Chiang (Knopf, 2019)
• NaamahSarah Blake (Riverhead Books, 2020)
• PigsJohanna Stoberock (Red Hen Press, 2019)
• The tears of the truffle pig, Fernando A. Flores (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2019)
• girls of warTochi Onyebuchi (Little Penguin, 2019)
• Zero BombM. T. Hill (Titan Books, 2019)