’tis the season to nominate and vote for your favourite speculative fiction published in 2017. I’ve read so much stunning, wonderful, crazy-good fiction this year, and (sadly) there are even more stories I never got around to reading at all.
The list below is a suggested reading list based on my own limited reading this year. For a much more complete list of stories I loved this year, check out all my monthly roundups, and check back on this post later in the year – I will be updating it as I keep reading. (Note: this list is randomized and not organized in any fashion!)
As an FYI, here are the word-counts / categories according to Nebula rules:
- Short Story: less than 7,500 words;
- Novelette: at least 7,500 words, less than 17,500 words;
- Novella: at least 17,500 words, less than 40,000 words
- Novel: 40,000 words or more.
Short stories
The Last Exorcist by Danny Lore in Fiyah.
Welcome to Your Authentic Indian Experience™ by Rebecca Roanhorse in Apex Magazine.
Fallow by Ashley Blooms in Shimmer.
Meat, by Sandra M. Odell in Pseudopod.
Witch’s Hour, by Shannon Connor Winward in Fantasy & Science Fiction.
Daddy’s Girl by Jennifer R. Donohue in Syntax & Salt.
Prayers to Broken Stone, by Cat Sparks in Kaleidotrope.
Stories We Carry On The Back Of The Night by Jasper Sanchez in Mithila Review.
The Wardrobe by Matthew Sanborn Smith in See The Elephant.
A Marvelous Deal, by Kate Dollarhyde in Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
Bear Language by Martin Cahill in Fireside Fiction.
Porcupine, by J.B. Park in Gamut.
Feathers and Void, by Charles Payseur in Shimmer.
Red Hood, by Eric Schaller in Nightmare Magazine.
Shadow Man, Sack Man, Half Dark, Half Light, by Malon Edwards in Shimmer.
The Worldless by Indrapramit Das in Lightspeed.
Her Hands Like Ice, by KT Bryski in Bracken.
The Bone Beaters by A.M. Muffaz in The Dark.
How Bees Fly, by Simone Heller in Clarkesworld.
The Famine King, by Darcie Little Badger in Mythic Delirium.
Wooden Boxes Lined with the Tongues of Doves by Claire Humphrey in Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
A Nightingale’s Map of the City, by Suzanne J. Willis in Metaphorosis.
The Bubblegum Man, by Eric Reitan in Gamut.
These Bones Aside by Lora Gray in The Dark.
Lares Familiares, 1981 by Rebecca Campbell in Liminal Stories.
Your Mama’s Adventures in Parenting by Mary Robinette Kowal in Shimmer.
Though She Be But Little by C.S.E. Cooney in Uncanny Magazine.
Cassandra Writes Out of Order, by Andrea Tang in Podcastle.
A Complex Filament of Light, by S. Qiouyi Lu in Anathema.
Hidden In Skin, by Ian Muneshwar in Gamut.
Brujitas, by Shara Concepción in Flash Fiction Online.
These Constellations Will Be Yours by Elaine Cuyegkeng in Strange Horizons.
Dispo and the Crow, by Rich Larson in Mythic Delirium.
Listen and You’ll Hear Us Speak, by A.T. Greenblatt in Flash Fiction Online.
The Waduf, by Naru Dames Sundar in Kaleidotrope.
Bibliopothecary, by Danielle Atkinson in Cast of Wonders.
Owl vs. the Neighborhood Watch by Darcie Little Badger in Strange Horizons.
Clearly Lettered in a Mostly Steady Hand by Fran Wilde in Uncanny Magazine.
Forty Acres and a Mule, by Stephanie Malia Morris in Fiyah.
The Stone Weta, by Octavia Cade in Clarkesworld.
Some Remarks on the Reproductive Strategy of the Common Octopus, by Bogi Takács in Clarkesworld.
Wendy, Darling, by A.C. Wise in Daily Science Fiction.
Secret Keeper, by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam in Nightmare.
Taiya, by Vanessa Fogg in The Future Fire.
The Heart Seed, by Joanne Rixon in Liminal Stories.
Small Town Immortals, by Valerie Alexander in LampLight Magazine.
Novelettes
The Dark Birds by Ursula Vernon in Apex Magazine.
The Lamentation of Their Women, by Kai Ashante Wilson at TOR.
A Human Stain by Kelly Robson at TOR.
Small Changes Over Long Periods of Time, by K.M. Szpara in Uncanny Magazine.
Waiting on a Bright Moon by JY Yang at TOR.
Luminaria by John Hornor Jacobs in Apex Magazine.
Novellas
A Portrait of the Desert in Personages of Power part 1 & part 2 by Rose Lemberg in Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
Killing Gravity by C.J. White.
Mapping The Interior by Stephen Graham Jones.
The Frozen Sea Takes Everything I Love by Meryl Stenberg in The Fantasist.
The Thing In the Ice by E. Catherine Tobler.
Binti 2 – Home by Nnedi Okorafor.
Pretty Marys All In A Row by Gwendolyn Kiste.
Culdesac by Robert Repino.
Novels
The Stone Sky by N.K. Jemisin.
Corpselight by Angela Slatter.
Horizon by Fran Wilde.
Null States by Malka Older.
The Changeling by Victor LaValle.
Amatka by Karin Tidbeck.
Beneath by Kristi DeMeester.
An Oath of Dogs by W.N. Wagner.
D’Arc by Robert Repino.
The Beautiful Ones by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.
Maria Haskins 
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