First Novel Nominees: 2022 Bram Stoker Awards

Find out more about the nominations for superior first novel in horror fiction.

The Horror Writer’s Association (HWA) has announced the nominees for the 2022 Bram Stoker Awards. Below, find out the nominees in the First Novel category—with info about the nominated books from Erin Adams, Isabel Cañas, KC Jones, Christi Nogle and Ally Wilkes.

Related links:

Christi Nogle on BEULAH: “I am more scared by things when they aren’t fully lit or fully seen.”
More author interviews coming soon!
Great Horror Stories: 2022 Bram Stoker Awards Nominees

You can also check out the the whole list of nominations below.

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Superior Achievement in a First Novel

Jackal by Erin Adams (Bantam Books)

A young Black girl goes missing in the woods outside her white rust belt town. But she’s not the first—and she may not be the last...

It’s watching.

Liz Rocher is coming home—reluctantly. As a Black woman, Liz doesn’t exactly have fond memories of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, a predominantly white town. But her best friend is getting married, so she braces herself for a weekend of awkward, passive-aggressive reunions. Liz has grown, though; she can handle whatever awaits her. But on the day of the wedding, somewhere between dancing and dessert, the couple’s daughter, Caroline, disappears—and the only thing left behind is a piece of white fabric covered in blood.

It’s taking.

As a frantic search begins, with the police combing the trees for Caroline, Liz is the only one who notices a pattern: A summer night. A missing girl. A party in the woods. She’s seen this before. Keisha Woodson, the only other Black girl in Liz’s high school, walked into the woods with a mysterious man and was later found with her chest cavity ripped open and her heart removed. Liz shudders at the thought that it could have been her, and now, with Caroline missing, it can’t be a coincidence. As Liz starts to dig through the town’s history, she uncovers a horrifying secret about the place she once called home. Children have been going missing in these woods for years. All of them Black. All of them girls.

It’s your turn.

With the evil in the forest creeping closer, Liz knows what she must do: find Caroline, or be entirely consumed by the darkness.

Find Jackal at Amazon

The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas (Berkley)

Mexican Gothic meets Rebecca in this debut supernatural suspense novel, set in the aftermath of the Mexican War of Independence, about a remote house, a sinister haunting, and the woman pulled into their clutches...

During the overthrow of the Mexican government, Beatriz’s father was executed and her home destroyed. When handsome Don Rodolfo Solórzano proposes, Beatriz ignores the rumors surrounding his first wife’s sudden demise, choosing instead to seize the security that his estate in the countryside provides. She will have her own home again, no matter the cost.

But Hacienda San Isidro is not the sanctuary she imagined.

When Rodolfo returns to work in the capital, visions and voices invade Beatriz’s sleep. The weight of invisible eyes follows her every move. Rodolfo’s sister, Juana, scoffs at Beatriz’s fears—but why does she refuse to enter the house at night? Why does the cook burn copal incense at the edge of the kitchen and mark the doorway with strange symbols? What really happened to the first Doña Solórzano?

Beatriz only knows two things for certain: Something is wrong with the hacienda. And no one there will save her.

Desperate for help, she clings to the young priest, Padre Andrés, as an ally. No ordinary priest, Andrés will have to rely on his skills as a witch to fight off the malevolent presence haunting the hacienda and protect the woman for whom he feels a powerful, forbidden attraction. But even he might not be enough to battle the darkness.

Far from a refuge, San Isidro may be Beatriz’s doom.

Find The Hacienda at Amazon

Black Tide by KC Jones (Tor Nightfire)

A character-driven science fiction/horror blend, KC Jones’ Black Tide is Stephen King’s The Mist meets A Quiet Place.

It was just another day at the beach. Then the world ended.

Mike and Beth were strangers before the night of the meteor shower. Chance made them neighbors, a bottle of champagne brought them together, and a shared need for human connection sparked something more.

Following their drunken and desperate one-night stand, the two discover the astronomical event has left widespread destruction in its wake. But the cosmic lightshow was only part of something much bigger, and far more terrifying.

When a lost car key leaves them stranded on an empty stretch of Oregon coast and inhuman screams echo from the dunes, when the rising tide reaches for their car and unspeakable horrors close in around them, these two self-destructive souls must fight to survive a nightmare of apocalyptic scale.

Find Black Tide at Amazon

Beulah by Christi Nogle (Cemetery Gates Media)

Beulah is the story of Georgie, an eighteen-year-old with a talent (or affliction) for seeing ghosts.

Georgie and her family have had a hard time since her father died, but she and her mother Gina and sisters Tommy and Stevie are making a new start in the small town of Beulah, Idaho where Gina’s wealthy friend Ellen has set them up to help renovate an old stone schoolhouse.

Georgie experiences a variety of disturbances—the town is familiar from dreams and she seems to be experiencing her mother’s memory of the place, not to mention the creepy ghost in the schoolhouse basement—but she is able to maintain, in her own laconic way, until she notices that her little sister Stevie also has the gift. Stevie is in danger from a malevolent ghost, and Georgie tries to help, but soon Georgie is the one in danger.

Find Beulah at Amazon

All the White Spaces by Ally Wilkes (Emily Bestler Books/Atria/Titan Books)

Something deadly and mysterious stalks the members of an isolated polar expedition in this haunting and spellbinding historical horror novel, perfect for fans of Dan Simmons’s The Terror and Alma Katsu’s The Hunger.

In the wake of the First World War, Jonathan Morgan stows away on an Antarctic expedition, determined to find his rightful place in the world of men. Aboard the expeditionary ship of his hero, the world-famous explorer James “Australis” Randall, Jonathan may live as his true self—and true gender—and have the adventures he has always been denied. But not all is smooth sailing: the war casts its long shadow over them all, and grief, guilt, and mistrust skulk among the explorers.

When disaster strikes in Antarctica’s frozen Weddell Sea, the men must take to the land and overwinter somewhere which immediately seems both eerie and wrong; a place not marked on any of their part-drawn mapsof the vast white continent. Now completely isolated, Randall’s expedition has no ability to contact the outside world. And no one is coming to rescue them.

In the freezing darkness of the Polar night, where the aurora creeps across the sky, something terrible has been waiting to lure them out into its deadly landscape…

As the harsh Antarctic winter descends, this supernatural force will prey on their deepest desires and deepest fears to pick them off one by one. It is up to Jonathan to overcome his own ghosts before he and the expedition are utterly destroyed.

Find All the White Spaces at Amazon

The rest of the 2022 Bram Stoker Awards nominations

The HWA organization presents the Bram Stoker Awards for Superior Achievement, named in honor of Bram Stoker, author of the seminal horror work, Dracula. Winners will be announced June 17 during the Annual Bram Stoker Awards at StokerCon™ 2023 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Bookings and information at: http://stokercon.com.

Superior Achievement in a Novel

The Devil Takes You Home
Gabino Iglesias
(Mullholland Press)

The Fervor
Alma Katsu
(G.P. Putnam’s Sons)

Reluctant Immortals
Gwendolyn Kiste
(Saga Press)

Daphne
Josh Malerman
(Del Rey)

Sundial
Catriona Ward
(Tor Nightfire)

Superior Achievement in a Middle Grade Novel

Camp Scare
Delilah S. Dawson
(Delacorte Press)

They Stole Our Hearts
Daniel Kraus
(Henry Holt and Co.)

This Appearing House
Ally Malinenko
(Katherine Tegen Books)

The Clackity
Lora Senf
(Atheneum Books for Young Readers)

A Comb of Wishes
Lisa Stringfellow
(Quill Tree Books)

Superior Achievement in a Graphic Novel

Kolchak: The Night Stalker: 50th Anniversary
James Aquilone, editor
(Moonstone Books)

Eat the Rich
Sarah Gailey (author) and Pius Bak (artist)
(Boom! Studios)

Kraken Inferno: The Last Hunt
Alessandro Manzetti (author) and Stefano Cardoselli (artist/author)
(Independent Legions Publishing)

Something is Killing the Children, Vol. 4
James Tynion IV (author) and Werther Dell’Edera (artist)
(Boom! Studios)

The Me You Love in the Dark
Skottie Young (author) and Jorge Corona (artist)
(Image Comics)

Superior Achievement in a Young Adult Novel

What We Harvest
Ann Fraistat
(Delacorte Press)

The Weight of Blood
Tiffany D. Jackson
(Katherine Tegen Books)

These Fleeting Shadows
Kate Alice Marshall
(Viking)

The Triangle
Robert P. Ottone
(Raven Tale Publishing)

Gallant
V.E. Schwab
(Greenwillow Books)

Burn Down, Rise Up
Vincent Tirado
(Sourcebooks Fire)

Superior Achievement in Long Fiction

And in Her Smile, the World
Rebecca J. Allred and Gordon B. White
(Trepidatio Publishing)

“Through the Looking Glass and Straight into Hell”
Orphans of Bliss: Tales of Addiction Horror
Christa Carmen
(Wicked Run Press)

Below
Laurel Hightower
(Ghoulish Books)

The Wehrwolf: A Short Story
Alma Katsu
(Amazon Original Stories)

Three Days in the Pink Tower
EV Knight
(Creature Publishing)

Superior Achievement in Short Fiction

“Nona Doesn’t Dance”
Cut to Care: A Collection of Little Hurts
Aaron Dries
(IFWG Australia, IFWG International)

“Poppy’s Poppy”
Douglas Gwilym
(Penumbric Speculative Fiction Magazine, Vol. V, No. 6)

“The Only Thing Different Will Be the Body”
A Woman Built by Man
J.A.W. McCarthy
(Cemetery Gates Media)

“A Song for Barnaby Jones”
Anna Taborska
(Zagava)

“The Star”
Great British Horror 7: Major Arcane
Anna Taborska
(Black Shuck Books)

“Fracture”
Mother: Tales of Love and Terror
Mercedes M. Yardley
(Weird Little Worlds)

Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection

We Are Here to Hurt Each Other
Paula D. Ashe
(Nictitating Books)

Hell Hath No Sorrow Like a Woman Haunted
RJ Joseph
(The Seventh Terrace)

Breakable Things
Cassandra Khaw
(Undertow Publications)

Spontaneous Human Combustion
Richard Thomas
(Keylight Books)

The Black Maybe
Attila Veres
(Valancourt Books)

Superior Achievement in a Screenplay

The Pale Blue Eye
Scott Cooper
(Cross Creek Pictures, Grisbi Productions, Streamline Global Group)

The Black Phone
Scott Derrickson and C. Robert Cargill
(Blumhouse Productions, Crooked Highway, Universal Pictures)

Stranger Things: Episode 04.01 “Chapter One: The Hellfire Club”
The Duffer Brothers
(21 Laps Entertainment, Monkey Massacre, Netflix, Upside Down Pictures)

Men
Alex Garland
(DNA Films)

Pearl
Mia Goth and Ti West
(A24, Bron Creative, Little Lamb, New Zealand Film Commission)

Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection

Sifting the Ashes
Michael Bailey and Marge Simon
(Crystal Lake Publishing)

Girls from the County
Donna Lynch
(Raw Dog Screaming Press)

Crime Scene
Cynthia Pelayo
(Raw Dog Screaming Press)

The Rat King: A Book of Dark Poetry
Sumiko Saulson
(Dooky Zines)

The Gravity of Existence
Christina Sng
(Interstellar Flight Press)

Superior Achievement in an Anthology

Screams from the Dark: 29 Tales of Monsters and the Monstrous
Ellen Datlow
(Tor Nightfire)

Human Monsters: A Horror Anthology
Sadie Hartmann and Ashley Saywers
(Dark Matter Ink)

Mother: Tales of Love and Terror
Christi Nogle and Willow Becker
(Weird Little Worlds)

Into the Forest: Tales of the Baba Yaga
Lindy Ryan
(Black Spot Books)

Chromophobia: A Strangehouse Anthology by Women in Horror
Sara Tantlinger
(Strangehouse Books)

Superior Achievement in Non-Fiction

Weird Fiction: A Genre Study
Michael Cisco
(Palgrave Macmillan)

A Haunted History of Invisible Women: True Stories of America's Ghosts
Leanna Renee Hieber and Andrea Janes
(Citadel Press)

Toil and Trouble: A Women’s History of the Occult
Lisa Kröger and Melanie R. Anderson
(Quirk Books)

Writing in the Dark: The Workbook
Tim Waggoner
(Guide Dog Books)

Writing Poetry in the Dark
Stephanie M. Wytovich
(Raw Dog Screaming Press)

Superior Achievement in Short Non-Fiction

“I Don’t Read Horror (& Other Weird Tales)” by Lee Murray
(Interstellar Flight Magazine) (Interstellar Flight Press)

“This is Not a Poem” by Cynthia Pelayo
(Writing Poetry in the Dark) (Raw Dog Screaming Press)

“A Clown in the Living Room: The Sinister Clown on Television” by Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr.
(The Many Lives of Scary Clowns: Essays on Pennywise, Twisty, the Joker, Krusty and More) (McFarland and Company)

“African American Horror Authors and Their Craft: The Evolution of Horror Fiction from African Folklore” by L. Marie Wood
(Conjuring Worlds: An Afrofuturist Textbook for Middle and High School Students) (Conjure World)

“The H Word: The Horror of Hair” by L. Marie Wood
(Nightmare Magazine, No. 118) (Adamant Press)