Category: First Novel

Compton, Johnny

Nominations:

The Spite House (Tor Nightfire/Macmillan), First Novel, 2023

BIO: Johnny Compton is a San Antonio based author whose short stories have appeared in several publications since 2006, including Pseudopod, Strange Horizons and The No Sleep Podcast. His fascination with frightening fiction started when his kindergarten teacher played a record of the classic ghost story “The Golden Arm” for her class. The Spite House, his debut novel, was released in 2023. His second book, Devils Kill Devils, will be released in 2024.

Ryan, Lindy

Nominations:

Bless Your Heart (Minotaur Books), First Novel, 2024

Mother Knows Best: Tales of Homemade Horror (A Women in Horror Anthology) (Black Spot Books), Anthology, 2024

Into the Forest: Tales of the Baba Yaga (Black Spot Books), Anthology, 2022

BIO: LINDY MILLER RYAN is a Bram Stoker Awards®-nominated and award-winning editor, author, director, and professor. Prior to her career in academia, Ryan was the co-founder of Radiant Advisors, a business intelligence research and advisory firm, where she led the company’s research and data enablement practice for clients that included 21st Century Fox Films, Warner Bros., and Disney. Ryan is currently a full-time professor at Rutgers University in the Masters of Professional Science program, She is also guest faculty in Western State Connecticut’s MFA program.

In 2017, Ryan founded Black Spot Books, an award-winning independent small press, specializing in horror and dark fantasy, where she maintains her role as President after the company was acquired in 2019 as an imprint of Vesuvian Media Group. Ryan served from 2020 to 2022 on the Board of Directors for the Independent Book Publishers Association and was named one of Publishers Weekly‘s 2020 Star Watch Honorees. Currently, she is the co-chair of the Horror Writers Association Publishers Council. Ryan is a regular contributor at Rue Morgue, the world’s leading horror culture and entertainment brand, Booktrib, and LitReactor. Her guest articles and features include NPR, BBC Culture, Irish Times, Daily Mail, and more. She is an active member of the Horror Writers Association (HWA), the International Thriller Writers (ITW), and the Brothers Grimm Society of North America. In 2022, she was named one of horror’s most masterful anthology curators, alongside Ellen Datlow and Christopher Golden, and has been declared a “champion for women’s voices in horror” by Shelf Awareness (2023).

Ryan grew up cutting her teeth on Goosebumps and universal monsters. She has published numerous academic texts and also writes clean, seasonal romance under the name ​Lindy Miller, where her books have been adapted for screen. Her horror-thriller debut is forthcoming from St. Martin’s Press/Minotaur Books.

​Lindy is represented by Italia Gandolfo at Gandolfo Helin & Fountain Literary Management.

Carmen, Christa

Awards:

The Daughters of Block Island (Thomas & Mercer), First Novel, 2023

Nominations:

“Through the Looking Glass and Straight into Hell” (Orphans of Bliss: Tales of Addiction Horror)(Wicked Run Press), Long Fiction, 2022

BIO: Christa Carmen is the two-time Bram Stoker Award-nominated author of The Daughters of Block Island, Something Borrowed, Something Blood-Soaked, and the forthcoming Beneath the Poet’s House. Additional work can be found in Vastarien, Nightmare, Orphans of Bliss, Year’s Best Hardcore Horror, and the Stoker-nominated anthologies, Not All Monsters and The Streaming of Hill House. She has a BA from the University of Pennsylvania, an MA from Boston College, and an MFA from the University of Southern Maine. Christa lives in Rhode Island with her husband, daughter, and bloodhound-golden retriever mix.

Wilkes, Ally

Nominations:

All the White Spaces (Emily Bestler Books/Atria/Titan Books), First Novel, 2022

BIO: Ally Wilkes grew up in a succession of isolated—possibly haunted—country houses and boarding schools.

After studying law at Oxford, she went on to spend eleven years as a criminal barrister, learning how extreme situations bring out the best (or worst) in human nature.

Ally now lives in Greenwich, London, with an anatomical human skeleton and far too many books about Polar exploration. When she isn’t writing or reading horror, she’s usually to be found hanging upside-down (like a bat) from her aerial silks. You can follow her on Twitter  @UnheimlichManvr or Instagram @av_wilkes.

Nogle, Christi

Awards:

Beulah (Cemetery Gates Media), First Novel, 2022

Nominations:

The Best of Our Past, the Worst of Our Future (Flame Tree Press), Fiction, Collection, 2023

Mother: Tales of Love and Terror (Weird Little Worlds), Anthology, 2022

BIO: Christi Nogle is the author of the Bram Stoker Award® nominated novel Beulah (Cemetery Gates Media, 2022) and co-editor with Willow Dawn Becker of the Bram Stoker Award® nominated anthology Mother: Tales of Love and Terror (Weird Little Worlds, 2022). Christi’s debut short story collection The Best of Our Past, the Worst of Our Future is out now from Flame Tree Press. Her collections Promise and One Eye Opened in That Other Place are coming from Flame Tree Press in 2023 and 2024. Her short stories have appeared in many publications, including PseudoPod, Vastarien, Mooncalves, and Horror Library. Follow her at http://christinogle.com and on Twitter @christinogle