Who do YOU think will win this year's Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel?

Yesterday, the Horror Writers Association released the preliminary ballot for this year’s Bram Stoker Awards, which is the horror genre’s top annual literary awards.

The preliminary ballot is essentially Round One in the award selection process. Over the next few weeks, the HWA’s membership will cast their ballots and then the slate of final nominees for this year’s awards will be announced. One wrinkle this year involves the five finalists in the Graphic Novel category. Only five of them were selected, so they’ll proceed directly to the final ballot.

Without further ado, here’s the initial ballot in four major categories:

Superior Achievement in a Novel:

- “Darkbound” by Michaelbrent Collings

- “The Colony: Genesis” by Michaelbrent Collings

- “The Asylum” by John Harwood

- “NOS4A2” by Joe Hill

- “Doctor Sleep” by Stephen King

- “Malediction” by Lisa Morton

- “Evil and the Mask” by Fuminori Nakamura

- “A Necessary End” by Sarah Pinborough and F. Paul Wilson

- “The Heavens Rise” by Christopher Rice

- “Only the Thunder Knows” by Gord Rollo

Superior Achievement in a First Novel:

- “Pivot” by L.C. Barlow

- “Whisper” by Michael Bray

- “Poe” by J. Lincoln Fenn

- “Cain’s Blood” by Geoffrey Girard

- “Candy House” by Kate Jonez

- “Losing Touch” by Christian A. Larsen

- “The Year of the Storm” by John Mantooth

- “The Evolutionist” by Rena Mason

- “Redheads” by Jonathan Moore

- “Stoker’s Manuscript” by Royce Prouty

Superior Achievement in Nonfiction:

- “Images of the Modern Vampire: The Hip and the Atavistic,” edited by Barbara Brodman and James E. Doan

- “Ramsey Campbell: Critical Essays on the Modern Master of Horror,” edited by Gary William Crawford

- “Nolan on Bradbury: Sixty Years of Writing about the Master of Science Fiction” by William F. Nolan

- “The Intermedial Experience of Horror: Suspended Failures” by Jarkko Toikkanen

- “Lovecraft and Influence: His Predecessors and Successors,” edited by Robert H. Waugh

- “The Works of Tim Burton: Margins to Mainstream,” edited by Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock

Superior Achievement in Graphic Novel:

- “Fatale Book Three: West of Hell” by Ed Brubaker

- “Alabaster: Wolves” by Caitlìn R. Kiernan

- “Witch Doctor, Vol. 2: Mal Practice” by Brandon Seifert

- “Sin Titulo” by Cameron Stewart

- “Colder” by Paul Tobin

Stoker Awards will also be given in six other categories, including Young Adult Novel, Long Fiction, Short Fiction, Anthology, Collection and Poetry. For more information about the works that were on the ballot in those categories, visit the HWA’s website at www.horror.org. The final ballot of nominees will be announced on Feb. 23.

The HWA’s annual Stoker Award for Best Novel is arguably the top honor bestowed by the group each year. What follows is an all-time list of the Best Novel winners.

1987 (tie) – Misery by Stephen King
1987 (tie) – Swan Song by Robert McCammon
1988 – The Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris
1989 – Carrion Comfort by Dan Simmons
1990 – Mine by Robert McCammon
1991 - Boy’s Life by Robert McCammon
1992 – The Blood of the Lamb by Thomas F. Monteleone
1993 – The Throat by Peter Straub (pictured above)
1994 – Dead in the Water by Nancy Holder
1995 – Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates
1996 – The Green Mile by Stephen King
1997 – Children of the Dusk (Madagascar Manifesto Trilogy) by Janet Berliner
1998 – Bag of Bones by Stephen King
1999 – Mr. X by Peter Straub
2000 – The Traveling Vampire Show by Richard Laymon
2001 – American Gods by Neil Gaiman
2002 – The Night Class by Tom Piccirilli
2003 – Lost Boy, Lost Girl by Peter Straub
2004 – In the Night Room by Peter Straub
2005 (tie) – Creepers by David Morrell
2005 (tie) – Dread In the Beast by Charlee Jacob
2006 – Lisey’s Story by Stephen King
2007 – The Missing by Sarah Langan
2008 – Duma Key by Stephen King
2009 – Audrey’s Door by Sarah Langan
2010 – A Dark Matter by Peter Straub
2011 – Flesh Eaters by Joe McKinney
2012 – The Drowning Girl by Caitlin R. Kiernan
 
In the end, which of the works list above do you think will take home the top honors in this year’s round of Bram Stoker Awards? Which have you had the chance to read? Which did you like or dislike? Which would you recommend and why? Let us know in the comments section below.

(Some of you may also be interested in checking out the HWA’s Recommended Reading List. I posted it on April 29, 2010, and you can view it here: http://leepeacock2010.blogspot.com/2010/04/hwas-recommended-reading-list.html.)