Closing the Curtains on 2021

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Closing the Curtains on 2021

Cast of Wonders’ Annual Review and 2022 Awards Eligibility Post

Ten Years of Wonder

It’s been another busy year at Cast of Wonders. We didn’t quite dodge COVID, and we couldn’t gather together with our friends as much as we’d have liked, but we still had a chance to celebrate. 2021 was Cast of Wonders’ 10th birthday! Our little stage celebrated ten years of wonder last summer with a series of posts reviewing what makes a Cast of Wonders story special, and showcasing our favourite stories of the past decade.   

This year, we published 25 pieces of original fiction and 20 reprints – a full list can be found further down the page. As always, you can find our individual favourite stories on our Staff Picks page, and a highlights package for 2021 will follow soon.

A big welcome!

2021 brought a number of new faces to the Cast of Wonders team – we recently welcomed Cami Adams, Tanya Aydelott, Rhian Bowley, Somto Ihezue, Cup Jacob, Amanda Khong, Samuel Poots and Ryn Yee to the team. We’re still on the lookout for a few more new associate editors, so watch this space for more news.

Award Eligibility:

Cast of Wonders is eligible for the Best Semiprozine Hugo Award, and Katherine Inskip is eligible for the Best Editor (Short Form) Hugo Award.

The stage is very much a team effort – joining Katherine backstage are Andrew K Hoe (Assistant Editor, Banned Books Week Guest Editor), Karissa Sluss (Assistant Editor), Jeremy Carter (Audio Producer), our stellar support team of Alexis Goble (art director), Amy Brennan (editorial assistant), Denise Sudell (community manager), and a full cast of associate editors (Cami Adams, Tanya Aydelott, Rhian Bowley, Amy Brennan, Alicia Caporaso, Umairah H., Somto Ihezue, Cup Jacob, Amanda Khong, Rey O, Samuel Poots, Emma Smailes, Denise Sudell, Ryn Yee)

If you are in a position to nominate or vote for short fiction awards, please consider the amazing stories we’ve been privileged to share with you in 2021!  You can find links to each of these below. A number of our published authors are also in their first or second year of eligibility for the Astounding Award, and we’d strongly encourage everyone to check out their works, here and elsewhere.

Original Fiction:

Cast of Wonders published 25 0riginal stories in 2021, across 21 episodes:

Reprint Fiction:

In addition to our 2020 Staff Pick episodes and our birthday celebration event during the summer, the following seven reprint stories had their first appearance in Cast of Wonders in 2021

Encore!

Finally, we’d like to say a massive thank you to our amazing audience – we’re thrilled that you’ve joined us in bringing these stories to the world!  Do get in touch with us on Facebook, Twitter, Discord or the EA forum. Just don’t tell our sibling shows that we’re up past our bedtime…