Jeff and Ann VanderMeer have announced a new set of awards to be presented in conjunction with the launch at World Fantasy of their charity anthology, Last Drink Bird Head. While some of the categories are what Jeff describes as “playful,” the general principle is very serious and I’m delighted with the short lists. See Jeff’s post for more on the background to the awards, and mine at SFAW for links to some of the many worthy causes mentioned. Meanwhile here are a few comments on the likely winners.

In what might easily have been called the Loving Mallet of Correction category, Tempest is the acknowledged queen of the genre and Nick Mamatas the funniest, but my vote would go to Scalzi because I think he does the best job of actually getting people to change their minds.

In Tireless Energy I’m delighted for my friends Rina and Natania, and looking at what she does I have no doubt that Leslie deserves the prize too.

Promotion of Reading is a really good category and we should do more of this sort of thing.

The Expanding our Vocabulary category is teh awesome and I want all of the nominees to win.

International Activism is another great category and one I one day hope to do something worthy of.

The Special Achievement Award is also an excellent idea, and one that is in the fine tradition of the Doc Weir Award and the Ken Uhland Award.

(Talking of which, huge congratulations to my good friends Kevin Roche and Andrew Trembley who received this year’s Ken Uhland Award on Saturday night at Silicon. They are very worthy winners.)

And finally, Last Drink Bird Head is available for pre-order from Wyrm Publishing who are also the publishers of Clarkesworld Magazine. I’m off to secure my copy before they sell out.