Named in honor of the author of Dracula, the Bram Stoker Awards have been given every year since 1987 by the Horror Writers Association in celebration of horror writing in eleven categories, including novels, novellas, poetry, and screenplays.

Superior Achievement in a Novel
The Devil Takes You Home by Gabino Iglesias

Buried in debt due to his young daughter’s illness, his marriage at the brink, Mario reluctantly takes a job as a hitman, surprising himself with his proclivity for violence. After tragedy destroys the life he knew, Mario agrees to one final job: hijack a cartel’s cash shipment before it reaches Mexico. Along with an old friend and a cartel-insider named Juanca, Mario sets off on the near-suicidal mission, which will leave him with either a cool $200,000 or a bullet in the skull. But the path to reward or ruin is never as straight as it seems. As the three complicated men travel through the endless landscape of Texas, across the border and back, their hidden motivations are laid bare alongside nightmarish encounters that defy explanation. One thing is certain: even if Mario makes it out alive, he won’t return the same.

Superior Achievement in a Young Adult Novel
The Triangle by Robert P. Ottone

Born with a gift for engineering and technology, Azlynn and her father Merrill spend their days running a small shop in the flotilla community of Coral Cove. They scavenge shipwrecks, sunken vessels, and what precious little remains of the world before the planet drowned. With her best friend Ellis, they do their best to support their community, while struggling to survive.

When a group of scouts sent by The Order, a mysterious and powerful northeastern cabal, goes missing in the nearby Bermuda Triangle, Merrill is tasked with finding them. Unbeknownst to him, Azlynn and Ellis have snuck aboard to join in on the mission to find out what lurks within The Triangle. The ancient, cosmic truths they discover may be more terrifying than they ever imagined.

Superior Achievement in a Fiction Collection
Breakable Things by Cassandra Khaw

Cassandra Khaw’s dynamic and vibrant debut collection, Breakable Things, explores the fragile and nebulous bonds that weave love and grief into our existence. This exquisite and cutting collection of stories showcases a bloody fusion of horrors from cosmic to psychological to body traumas.

Superior Achievement in an Anthology
Screams from the Dark: 29 Tales of Monsters and the Monstrous, edited by Ellen Datlow

From werewolves and vampires, to demons and aliens, the monster is one of the most recognizable figures in horror. But what makes something, or someone, monstrous?

Award-winning and up-and-coming authors like Richard Kadrey, Cassandra Khaw, Indrapramit Das, Priya Sharma, and more attempt to answer this question. These all-new stories range from traditional to modern, from mainstream to literary, from familiar monsters to the unknown … and unimaginable.

This chilling collection has something to please—and terrify—everyone, so lock your doors, hide under your covers, and try not to scream.

Superior Achievement in a Screenplay
The Black Phone

After being abducted by a child killer and locked in a soundproof basement, a 13-year-old boy starts receiving calls on a disconnected phone from the killer’s previous victims.

Superior Achievement in a Screenplay
Stranger Things: “S04E01: Chapter One: The Hellfire Club”

El is having trouble with bullying at school, Joyce opens a mysterious package which she is determined to decipher and a scrappy new player shakes up D&D night at the Hellfire Club.

Superior Achievement in a First Novel
Beulah by Christi Nogle

Superior Achievement in Long Fiction
The Wehrwolf by Alma Katsu

Superior Achievement in Short Fiction
“Fracture” by Mercedes M. Yardley from Mother: Tales of Love and Terror

Superior Achievement in Non-Fiction
Writing in the Dark: The Workbook by Tim Waggoner

Superior Achievement in Short Non-Fiction
“I Don’t Read Horror (& Other Weird Tales)” by Lee Murray from Interstellar Flight 10/22

Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection
Crime Scene by Cynthia Pelayo

Superior Achievement in a Graphic Novel
Kolchak: The Night Stalker: 50th Anniversary, edited by James Aquilone