I’m so glad that I read this! I have to be honest: I didn’t even know that Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association (SFWA) published this annual showcase. It’s a lovely way to get an overview of what was happening in the SFF genre in a particular year, and to celebrate and appreciate the finalists and winners of the Nebula Awards, which are presented annually at the SFWA Nebula Conference.

This year’s showcase anthology starts with an introduction by series editor Stephen Kotowych, which includes historical info about the Nebulas and SFWA, thoughts on how the Nebulas have changed over the years, and announces a new format for the showcase, featuring more full stories and fewer excerpts of longer works. I can’t speak to how this will be received by long time readers, but it certainly makes sense to me. I find excerpts fairly unrewarding and I think this change will be good for the series overall.

Since the Nebulas are voted on by the membership of SFWA, the stories that appear in this anthology are necessarily going to be hit or miss for some readers. But overall I thought this was a good selection and an excellent reflection of the genre in 2024. The overall quality was high; the stories that I didn’t like as much were a matter of personal taste.

Another lovely addition to this showcase was a list of all the Nebula finalists, with descriptions of each work. As somebody who mostly follows the fiction categories (short story, novelette, novella, and novel), this was a really useful and excellent resource. It was great to learn more about the finalists and awards I was less familiar with. I added a bunch of stuff to my TBR and watch list, and also tried two of the finalists in the “Game Writing” category - something that absolutely would not have happened if I hadn’t read this showcase. I’m looking forward to trying some of the other described works as well, across all categories. All in all, this was an excellent showcase and I’m very glad I got the chance to read it.

Highlights:
- “Why Don’t We Just Kill the Kid in the Omelas Hole” by Isabel J. Kim
- “The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video” by Thomas Ha
- “Negative Scholarship on the Fifth State of Being” by A.W. Prihandita
- “Joanna’s Bodies” by Eugenia Triantafyllou
Thank you to SFWA and NetGalley for generously providing an ARC for review!

A solid collection of Nebula nominees/winners, though some materials (novellas) were posted only as excerpts and obviously novels are only listed as winners/nominees. As a fantasy/sci-fi enthusiast, I'm glad the short stories and novelettes were collected in one place!

This was my first time reading the NEBULA AWARDS SHOWCASE and I am so happy I did. Surprised to see that most of these authors are yet to write a full novel, and I have added many that I want to keep my eyes on for more.

NEBULA AWARDS SHOWCASE 60 IS RATED 3.5 STARS or 70% (ROUNDED UP TO 4)
14 STORIES : 3 AWESOME / 4 GOOD / 4 AVERAGE / 3 POOR / 0 DNF

[AWESOME]
Why Don't We Just Kill the Kid in the Omelas Hole • [Omelas] • (2024) • short story by Isabel J. Kim. (*WINNER OF THE NEBULA - SHORT STORY)

I've not read many of the other stories that rework Ursula K Le Guin's short, but I get the feeling a lot of them are probably preachy. Whenever I hear someone talk about Omelas, it always turns into some philosophical debate. I'm glad to say this rework remembers what the original short story was trying to say, but it doesn't wax philosophical, it smashes the glass and tells us straight. Why Don't We Just Kill The Kid In The Omelas Hole.

[GOOD]
The V*mpire • (2024) • short story by P. H. Lee

I was never on Tumblr, but I knew of how terrible a place it was. Unfortunately, it was also a place many young people discovering the internet would frequent and make 'friends'.
There are messages here about the dangers lurking on the internet, about grooming, and about manipulation. However, what stood out the most was our protagonist coming to terms with their identity. They only believed themself a girl on the internet and in person a boy. Almost making excuses any time the thought of accepting themselves as a girl came into their mind. It was only when that one friend came to them at the end and called them Alexandra that they felt happiest and free.

[AVERAGE]
Five Views of the Planet Tartarus • (2024) • short story by Rachael K. Jones

I think I got what this story was about and I found how they closed the loop at the end interesting, but otherwise it didn't really grab me or make me curious to learn more. I don't want to say this is due to the short length of the story because the writer does a very good job of conveying different views of Tartarus to give us a full picture of what happens there. I was just not interested.

[POOR]
The Witch Trap • (2024) • short story by Jennifer Hudak

I don't entirely get what is happening in this story.

[POOR]
Evan: A Remainder • (2024) • short story by Jordan Kurella

I think this was another trans story about acceptance and identity, but I'm not entirely sure. The pacing was a little slow for a short story.

[GOOD]
We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read • (2024) • short story by Caroline M. Yoachim

A little experimental with how it's told, the prose flowing almost like a poem with a repetition running through as aliens try to teach us how they communicate. It builds up to a point where they show what looks like a barcode to emphasis how they communicate all lines at once. It was a really interesting concept for how someone of not our world might communicate and the difficulty of it.

[AWESOME]
Negative Scholarship on the Fifth State of Being • (2024) • novelette by A. W. Prihandita. (*WINNER OF THE NEBULA - NOVELETTE)

I loved love loved this. I want to read more from Prihandita. There were themes here about the medical system and how restricted it can be unless you have a large sum of money (and even then it might not help). What I loved was more to do with the communication between two people who barely understand each other. Through empathy and compassion, a solution can be found and the system can be overcome. It's an optimistic story and it reminded me of the difficulties a friend has to overcome with their job when seeing patients who do not speak English. Their compassion motivates them to help as best they can and find alternative ways to communicate.

[AVERAGE]
Katya Vasilievna and the Second Drowning of Baba Rechka • (2024) • novelette by Christine Hanolsy

It was a good fairy tale story. A sapphic romance between lady and water-spirit and how the spirit overcomes obstacles and trials to be reunited with her love. I've rated it average because I felt it didn't really give me anything new. It was alright. Nothing bad, nothing great.

[AVERAGE]
Joanna's Bodies • (2024) • novelette by Eugenia Triantafyllou

An interesting story about two best friends who grew apart, only to become close again after death... sort of. Both main characters led different lives as they grew up, with different friends, and then Joanna dies in an accident. With the help of a spell from a book they used to bond over, Joanna is brought back to possess a body, but it isn't permanent. Bodies eventually deteriorate if occupied for too long and a new host needs to be found. I get the feeling this plays on themes of guilt and toxic friendships. When Joanna doesn't get what she wants, she guilts her friend into helping. I didn't dislike the story, it played on the themes well, but I also didn't love it. It was okay.

[POOR]
Another Girl Under the Iron Bell • (2024) • novelette by Angela Liu

I wanted to love this. Stories that show us humans being more monstrous than monsters is a favourite trope of mine, however, the time jumps ruined the pacing for me and had me lost until I realised where in the story I was again. If this was a longer story with more room for the characters and world building to breathe, I would be very interested in reading it.

[AWESOME]
The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video • (2024) • novelette by Thomas Ha

One of my top 3 picks of this collection and possibly my favourite. It's set in a future where nothing seems to be genuine. People wear glasses that filter what they see so everyone looks beautiful, books and movies are updated and changed on the fly with happy endings. Everything is digital and 'perfect' and (to me) a nightmare. Our main character has an original book with it's imperfect ending where the hero doesn't save the day. It is valuable enough to be dangerous. My only gripe is that I wanted to know more and be in this hellscape world longer, just to see how people like our main character live. Instantly followed the author on Goodreads to keep an eye on what else they write.

[GOOD]
What Any Dead Thing Wants • (2024) • novelette by Aimee Ogden

It's a skill when the author can world build, not just the location of the main story, but also the system politics inside a novelette. We learn about the crew of exorcists who are sent onto a planet after terraforming it. Why would you need exorcists for this? Because they aren't terraforming dead planets. This is almost the equivalent of taking a death ray to the amazon rainforest, then sending in a crew to clear the bodies, except on a planetary scale. With that much death, it's no wonder exorcists are needed to cleanse the trauma from the land of all the haunted fauna. However, unlike most jobs, they encounter a human, and the story takes an interesting turn. I would love to read more books in this universe and more from this author.

[GOOD]
Loneliness Universe • (2024) • novelette by Eugenia Triantafyllou

I can't imagine anything more lonely than not being able to meet your friends and family. Ever. Having lived through that year we don't talk about with bubbles, sourdough starters, and zoom quizzes... the story hits close to home and it's pretty obvious where the inspiration and connections must lie.
Imagine you leave a room and come back, and your brother who was just there a moment ago has disappeared. They text you asking where you went, and you look confused as you message them back that you're in the living room they were just in. As more people from your life disappear, you learn that you have transported into a different universe. A universe where anyone who knows you enough to become a friend is suddenly gone. What's weird, and the saving grace to give a (kinda?) happy ending, is that contact through text is still possible, and contact through an MMO is also still possible.

[AVERAGE]
The Dragonfly Gambit (excerpt) • short fiction by A. D. Sui

Maybe because it's an excerpt and not the whole story, I just couldn't get into this. Or, maybe it's the leaning towards a military scifi that disinterested me. The characters were mildly interesting, and I was very curious about they relationships with each other. I loved the idea of an empire that has recruited into the army, people from the planets they have absorbed into the empire. It felt very Roman Empire. Add to that a rebellion on the horizon and an attempt to bring down the empire and it's my kind of story. That's why I've given it an average. I'm curious and might pick up the novella to find out more, but I'm not running to the shop for it.

Many thanks to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Association for the ARC through Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

I had only heard briefly of this award before I received this ARC, but with further research I found that I had enjoyed and been recommended many of the books (etc.) that had won or been nominated for this prize over the years.

I mostly enjoyed the short stories but found the novelettes better overall. I didn't dislike any of the works, however. For each of the categories I had a favourite and least favourite.

Short stories
Favourite: The Witch Trap by Jennifer Hudak - I am keen on folkloric tales and this one specifically reminded me of the Museum of Magic, Fortune-telling & Witchcraft in Edinburgh (which has some really cool stuff) and the ways people used to try to keep witches out- like mummified cats in the walls (ew!)
Least favourite: We Will Teach You How To Read | We Will Teach You How To Read by Caroline M. Yoachim - this just wasn't my favourite, while I enjoy the abstract structure and the message it is trying to tell, I found it difficult to read the words at the barcode part (likely a download error) and felt bored by the end.

Novelettes:
Favourite: Katya Vasilieva and The Second Drowning of Baba Rechka by Christine Hanolsy - again, it's a folkloric story and mixed with historical countryside settings and sapphic yearning. The scenery was reminiscent of places I've been and while not all of the folk tale figures were known to me, a few were familiar.
Least favourite: Loneliness Universe by Eugenia Triantafyllou - while I have felt isolated before, I couldn't seem to connect with this story as much as I would have liked. I also preferred the writer's other story that was nominated more than this one. It was still good and I liked it more than some of the short stories.

Overall, I look forward to the next selection and will be going back and checking out previous nominees and winners.

Great way to sample lots of exciting writing. Awesome selection of authors. Thank you to the authors. Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for an ARC.

NEBULA AWARDS SHOWCASE 60

RATED 79% POSITIVE. STORY SCORE: 3.8 OUT OF 5

14 STORIES : 3 GREAT / 6 GOOD / 4 AVERAGE / 1 POOR / 0 DNF

For a long time we feared that the Nebual Awards Showcase was dead. Fewer and fewer Year’s Best anthologies were being published. Although the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association (SFWA) was still giving out Nebula Awards, they weren’t publishing the stories in a book form that is easy both to read and the archive for the future.

This is too bad because the Nebula Awards Showcase has been a staple of my SciFi reading:

“Nebula Awards 22” edited by George Zebrowski. [1986] - 81%

“Nebula Awards 32” edited by Jack Dann. [1998] - 89%

“Nebula Awards Showcase 2001.” edited by Robert Silverberg. - 75%

“Nebula Awards Showcase 2010.” edited by Bill Fawcett. - 75%

“Nebula Awards Showcase 2015.” edited by Greg Bear. - 80%

“Nebula Awards Showcase 2016.” edited by Mercedes Lackey. - 75%

Then in 2025 the Showcase came roaring back with six volumes being published in the first half of of the year. I’m definitely going to read them.

Stephen Kotowych edits the 60th volume and his description of the new structure of the book is music to my ears. It solved by biggest criticism of the anthologies. Not enough of the stories. I also found the summaries of the novellas and novel to be quite helpful. There are books on this list that I wasn’t planning to read until these summaries.

“Long-time readers of Nebula Awards Showcase volumes may notice a change to the content of this volume from earlier entries in the series. This new format had a soft launch in the last few volumes, as we played catch-up after a five-year interruption in the annual publication of the Nebula Awards Showcase, but it is the format we plan to use in this and future volumes, even as next year's entries grow to contain new Nebula Awards categories.

In short, we’ve elected to focus on publishing full stories and fewer excerpts or original essays. Reaction to so many excerpts of longer works in previous volumes was mixed. I can understand why: longer works like novels were meant to be experienced in full and not in part.

In this volume, therefore, you’ll be able to read the full short story and novelette winners and finalists alongside descriptions of the Best Novel, Andre Norton Nebula Award for Middle Grade and Young Adult Fiction, Ray Bradbury Nebula Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation, and Game Writing winners and finalists. We hope those descriptions intrigue you enough to seek out those works in full, many of which are best enjoyed in entirely different formats.

One exception to this “no more excerpts” switch is in the Novella category. Some have argued that the novella is the ideal length for SFF work, and it's hard to argue the fact that we’re living in a golden age of science fiction and fantasy novellas. However, for the purposes of the Nebula Awards Showcase, this golden age of novellas has its drawbacks.

Don’t misunderstand: We’re thrilled for the success that our novella-writing colleagues have found with work at these lengths, but their success means that you can acquire many of today's novellas as standalone books, and reprint rights to the full work are simply not available for an annual series the same way that they were when novellas mainly showed up inside SFF magazines. So, we're adapting (again) to the times.”

—-Stephen Kotowych, Introduction

But How are the stories?

While I love the existence of the Nebula Awards Showcase - and we always find it worth reading - the anthologies tend to rate pretty average on my scale. I can’t entirely blame it on the industry’s obsession with fantasy, but I’m well aware how my dislike of fantasy plays out in these scores. If you like fantasy, this volume may speak more to you.

But let’s not dwell on the weaker stories. Three stories quality for my All-Time Great List:

Five Views of the Planet Tartarus • (2024) • short story by Rachael K. Jones

Great. Very brief and very powerful. The horrifying and ultimately bittersweet story of convicted criminals who are sentenced to “eternal life” as punishment. Manages to flip your empathy in very a few pages.

We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read • (2024) • short story by Caroline M. Yoachim

Great. Structurally experimental “story” of an alien transmission from a dying civilization that reads all things at once. They try to make us understand through a multi-column structure that has echoes of House of Leaves.

Loneliness Universe • (2024) • novelette by Eugenia Triantafyllou

Great. An uncanny analog of the ways that modern life breaks your most important connections and tries to reassemble them in the digital world. A woman returns to Greece to reconnect with an old friend. She slowly discovers that she is unable to communicate or interact with anyone she cares about. She comes to believe that she has slipped into an alternative universe - a Loneliness Universe - where she can only have superficial interactions with people around her.

NEBULA AWARDS SHOWCASE 60 IS RATED 79% POSITIVE

14 STORIES : 3 GREAT / 6 GOOD / 4 AVERAGE / 1 POOR / 0 DNF

How do I arrive at a rating?

Why Don't We Just Kill the Kid in the Omelas Hole • [Omelas] • (2024) • short story by Isabel J. Kim. (*WINNER OF THE NEBULA - SHORT STORY)

Good. I hate stories that rework Omelas. (The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas • (1973) • short story by Ursula K. Le Guin.) They are often self righteous and too proud of their own morality - something Le Guin managed to avoid in the original. This has that, but also an evil sense of humor that makes it rise above.

The V*mpire • (2024) • short story by P. H. Lee

Average. Young teenage boy who is drawn to a trans identity spends a lot of time in the cesspool of Tumblr. Vampires are real and they are manipulating threats of cancel culture to exploit young impressionable people. The prose is almost impossible to tolerate if you are an adult as it swims deep in teenage internet subculture. What’s the analogy here? Woke People are vampires who prey on children? I can’t believe that the modern science fiction establishment who permit such a story to be a Nebula finalist.

Five Views of the Planet Tartarus • (2024) • short story by Rachael K. Jones

Great. Very brief and very powerful. The horrifying and ultimately bittersweet story of convicted criminals who are sentenced to “eternal life” as punishment. Manages to flip your empathy in very a few pages.

The Witch Trap • (2024) • short story by Jennifer Hudak

Poor. A muddled fantasy about witches that seems designed to wine

Evan: A Remainder • (2024) • short story by Jordan Kurella

Average. A trans-man, newly separated from the husband, starts vomiting human bones that eventually climbs out of the grave to be his skeleton boyfriend.

We Will Teach You How to Read | We Will Teach You How to Read • (2024) • short story by Caroline M. Yoachim

Great. Structurally experimental “story” of an alien transmission from a dying civilization that reads all things at once. They try to make us understand through a multi-column structure that has echoes of House of Leaves.

Negative Scholarship on the Fifth State of Being • (2024) • novelette by A. W. Prihandita. (*WINNER OF THE NEBULA - NOVELETTE)

Good. An alien comes to a medical practitioner who holds the license to a database of alien medical care. Unfortunately, this alien doesn’t appear in the database.

Katya Vasilievna and the Second Drowning of Baba Rechka • (2024) • novelette by Christine Hanolsy

Good. A charmingly cozy, sapphic fairy tale with magical Russian style. A water-spirit falls in love with a young woman and has to go on a quest to recover her when the woman is married off to a wealthy man in a nearby town.

Joanna's Bodies • (2024) • novelette by Eugenia Triantafyllou

Average. Horror story about two friends, one of whom is dead. The living friend uses magic to take over the body of other women as hosts for her dead friend. Too reliant on the reader knowing the movie “Jennifer’s Body.”

Another Girl Under the Iron Bell • (2024) • novelette by Angela Liu

Good. Wuxia fantasy from a. monsters point of view. The monster used to have feelings for a person, but now it is under the control of a warrior monk. The monk sends the monster and a young man on a mission. After completing the mission, the monster is to kill the young man. Of course, things aren’t quite that simple.

The Brotherhood of Montague St. Video • (2024) • novelette by Thomas Ha

Average. The discover of a “dead Book” leads to obsession and danger in a world where society is obsessed with altering and revising texts to make them “Perfect.”

What Any Dead Thing Wants • (2024) • novelette by Aimee Ogden

Good. During the terraforming of a new world, ghosts of living things are created and much be exorcised. The process is secular but deeply moving to the man who performs them. One day, he meets a ghost claiming to be a man who crashed on the planet years ago. And he doesn’t want to be exorcised.

Loneliness Universe • (2024) • novelette by Eugenia Triantafyllou

Great. An uncanny analog of the ways that modern life breaks your most important connections and tries to reassemble them in the digital world. A woman returns to Greece to reconnect with an old friend. She slowly discovers that she is unable to communicate or interact with anyone she cares about. She comes to believe that she has slipped into an alternative universe - a Loneliness Universe - where she can only have superficial interactions with people around her.

The Dragonfly Gambit (excerpt) • short fiction by A. D. Sui

Good. A fast, dialogue-driven sapphic space opera about revenge and betrayal, set against the backdrop of a crumbling empire, with clear echoes of Battlestar Galactica. Entertaining and sharply voiced that reads better as a submission for a future movie. Read my full review here.

Nebula Awards Showcase 60 is a well curated anthology of shortlisters and winners of the 60th Nebula awards as voted on by the members of the SFWA. Released 10th June 2025, it's 260 pages and is available in paperback and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links.

This is a nice collection of award worthy stories by new and established authors at the top of their form. The stories are varied, there were (as always) some which didn't grab me personally, but all were well written and competently plotted. They were mostly in the 4 star range(ish) with a smattering of really standout stories. This is a well curated solid anthology of stories in the 3-5 star range.

One reason readers love collections and anthologies is that short fiction is really challenging. It's spare and the author doesn't have a wealth of wordage to develop characters or the plotting. Well written short fiction is a delight.

The editor has also included lists and a blurb for all the nominated works. The format is a bit different this year.

Four stars on average. It's a diverting read.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.

This was such an interesting read! As someone who doesn't tend to dive into Sci-fi, I thought this would be a great way for me to get easily readable chunks of work that weren't going to be a huge commitment. Sometimes sci-fi can kind of lose me with the worldbuilding or understanding the science/magic systems. I would highly recommend this book to someone in the same boat. Each story was so interesting and very accessible to someone who doesn't read the sci-fi genre all the time.

Nebula Awards Showcase 60, editor Stephen Kotowych
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Association

3.45 stars marked down to 3 ⭐⭐⭐

The year is 2025, and my electric-powered rocket is on full display. Beautifully, it sits on a pristine launchpad located on the outskirts of my 25-acre property. As I climb into my cockpit, I comfortably check the appropriate switches to engage liftoff. The rumble from the engaging ion thrusters shakes the craft. Plotting my course, I mark a Nebula Award Showcase 60 book as my destination.

Floating amongst the stars, the autopilot firmly in control, I am finally able to unwind. My first mission is to complete my read-through. In the periphery, Earth stands still, yet moves, glowing in all its various complexities. As I slowly hover among the stars, I move to phase two of my mission, a proper assessment.

Numerous stories await your discovery, dear reader. I will highlight a few that tickled my taste buds.

Story number one, Five Views of the Planet Tartarus by Rachel K. Jones, is about a shuttle carrying prisoners to the Orpheus Factory. Along the way, the ship is under siege by some debris floating along the planet's orbit. As the morbid truth of the hovering garbage becomes clearer, the reader will certainly chuckle.

Our second story, Negative Scholarship on the Fifth State of Being by A.W. Prihandita, presents present-day issues in a more futuristic spin. Semau, a doctor, is visited by a rare species of alien that insists they have a hole in their body. What ensues is a compassionate tale about learning to circumvent a broken healthcare system while navigating through the trouble of miscommunication.

Flashing red lights have assaulted my eyes, and the incessant beeping infiltrates my ears. I am on the descent now; the autopilot has signaled I have five minutes to return to my seat. I will leave with this little nugget. Katya Vasilievna and the Second Drowning of Baba Rechka by Christine Hanolsy. A water spirit of a woman lives by the riverbank next to Katya’s home. Katya, whose parents plan to marry her off to some nobleman, has become smitten with the Naiad. An enduring love story with wondrous depth flows along the rocky banks. What happens when Katya befriends all of the ghostlike entities surrounding her home, and what about the notorious witch, Baba Yaga?

As I make my exit, I look off into the sky. I smile as I think about all the amazing stories I encountered upon my journey. Thanks to Stephen Kotowych, the editor, for allowing me to play in the Nebula Awards playground. If you are a fan of short stories with an SF twist, I can recommend it wholeheartedly.

Many thanks to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Association for the ARC through Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this ARC.

This is the 60th anniversary version of the Nebula Awards showcase. They changed some things about the format wo be warned that it'll be different than previous editions.

The stories were definitely very experimental which I appreciated. Some of the experiments worked better for me than others, but I think everyone will find something to love in here.

My favorite story was The V*mpire. If you were on Tumblr as a teenager you'll understand.