Category: Awards News

See the video of the 44th Prometheus Awards ceremony, with speeches by Prometheus-winning authors Daniel Suarez and Victor Koman, Reason’s Bob Poole and LFS leaders

How can science fiction and fantasy help people envision a freer, better future?

Can a grippingly realistic novel about near-future space commercialization play a role in transforming dreams of such progress into scientific and economic fact?

How important is humor in exposing and surviving oppression and tyranny?

Such are among the fascinating and fertile questions explored by SF authors and freedom-loving SF/fantasy fans during the recent 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony.

Airing live Aug. 25, 2024, the half-hour-long ceremony honored Daniel Suarez, winner of the 2024 Prometheus Award for Best Novel for Critical Mass; and the late great Terry Pratchett, whose comic-fantasy Discworld novel The Truth was inducted into the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.

Continue reading See the video of the 44th Prometheus Awards ceremony, with speeches by Prometheus-winning authors Daniel Suarez and Victor Koman, Reason’s Bob Poole and LFS leaders

2024 Prometheus Hall of Fame acceptance speech: Stoddard quoting the late great Terry Pratchett on libertarianism and a key passage from The Truth

Editor’s note: As part of our coverage of the 44th Prometheus Awards ceremony, the Prometheus Blog is posting a variety of reports and the full texts of all the speeches.

Terry Pratchett (Creative Commons license)

Here are the remarks of LFS President William H. Stoddard, a long-time Terry Pratchett fan. Stoddard stepped in to accept the 2024 Prometheus Hall of Fame for the late great Pratchett (1948-2015), whose Discworld comic-fantasy novel The Truth was inducted into the 2024 Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction.
Before his death, Pratchett was able to attend and speak at the 2003 Prometheus ceremony at the Worldcon, when he won his first Prometheus Award for Best Novel for Night Watch. 


By William H. Stoddard

Regrettably, Terry Pratchett cannot be with us to accept his award. But rather than talk about him, I’d like to quote some relevant words of his own.

Continue reading 2024 Prometheus Hall of Fame acceptance speech: Stoddard quoting the late great Terry Pratchett on libertarianism and a key passage from The Truth

2024 Prometheus Awards: Reason’s Bob Poole presents Hall of Fame category, with tribute to Pratchett and The Truth

Editor’s note: Veteran LFS member Robert Poole, who co-founded the Reason Foundation and has voted for the Prometheus Awards annually as one of the earliest LFS members, presented the Prometheus Hall of Fame category at the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony. Here is the transcript of his remarks:

By Robert Poole

I’m honored to introduce the winner of the 2024 Prometheus Hall of Fame Award.

My Libertarian Futurist Society involvement dates back to the very first Prometheus Award ceremony.

Continue reading 2024 Prometheus Awards: Reason’s Bob Poole presents Hall of Fame category, with tribute to Pratchett and The Truth

How SF offers a critical forum to imagine new ideas and futures: Daniel Suarez’s 2024 Prometheus Award Best Novel acceptance speech for Critical Mass

By Daniel Suarez

Two-time Prometheus-winning author Daniel Suarez Photo: Steve Payne

It is wonderful to receive this award, especially for a novel that means so much to me. 

First: my thanks to the Libertarian Futurist Society — both for the principles this Prometheus Award represents and also for awarding it to me in a pivotal year for freedom of expression in science fiction. 

Authoritarianism is on the march in this world once more, and the first step in resisting it, is to be free in one’s own thoughts and imagination. That is, after all, where sci-fi lives, and the LFS is helping to keep free-thinking science fiction alive.

Continue reading How SF offers a critical forum to imagine new ideas and futures: Daniel Suarez’s 2024 Prometheus Award Best Novel acceptance speech for Critical Mass

2024 Prometheus Awards: Best Novel presenter Victor Koman’s speech on mortality, the awards’ longevity, the diversification of publishing and the future of liberty


Victor Koman, a veteran libertarian SF writer, had the honor of presenting the Best Novel category Sunday at the 44th Prometheus Awards ceremony.

Prometheus-winning novelist Victor Koman in 2019 Photo courtesy of Koman

Who better to fulfill that role than Koman, one of very few writers to win as many as three Prometheus awards for Best Novel?

Here, for the record, is the transcript of Koman’s speech.

Continue reading 2024 Prometheus Awards: Best Novel presenter Victor Koman’s speech on mortality, the awards’ longevity, the diversification of publishing and the future of liberty


Final update: Watch the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony, with Zoom web link to watch it Sunday Aug. 25


Not one but two celebrity presenters will grace the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony, set for Sunday Aug. 25 in a Zoom event set to begin at 2 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (11 a.m. Pacific time) and open to the public.

We invite Libertarian Futurist Society members, their families and friends, science fiction/fantasy fans and all freedom lovers  to watch the roughly hourlong awards show, which is expected to include interesting, entertaining and substantive speeches by celebrity presenters, LFS leaders and this year’s Prometheus Award winner for Best Novel.

Continue reading Final update: Watch the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony, with Zoom web link to watch it Sunday Aug. 25


Reason Foundation’s Robert Poole confirmed as presenter for 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony Aug. 25

Robert Poole (Photo courtesy of Reason Foundation)

The Libertarian Futurist Society is pleased to announce that prominent libertarian policy expert and lifelong SF fan Robert (Bob) Poole will be a presenter at the 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony.

Poole, a veteran LFS member and consistent Prometheus Awards voter for decades, co-founded the Reason Foundation, a leading libertarian think tank that publishes Reason magazine.

Continue reading Reason Foundation’s Robert Poole confirmed as presenter for 44th annual Prometheus Awards ceremony Aug. 25

Suarez and Pratchett: Both 2024 Prometheus Award winners earn well-deserved recognition – again

By Michael Grossberg

The third time’s the charm, as the saying goes. Yet, in the Prometheus Awards, it seems the second time around’s the charm, too.


In the 2024 Prometheus Awards, both winners are being recognized for the second time.

Daniel Suarez, winner of the 2024 Best Novel category for Critical Mass, previously won Best Novel in 2015 for Influx.

Meanwhile, the late Terry Pratchett, winner of the 2024 Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction for The Truth, was first recognized by the Prometheus Awards in 2003, when he won Best Novel for Night Watch.

When recently notified of the news that he’s won the Prometheus Award a second time, Suarez responded positively but soberly:

“Authoritarianism is on the march in this world once more, and I’m convinced the first step in resisting despots is to be free in one’s own thoughts and imagination. LFS is doing great work to keep free-thinking science fiction alive, and for that I thank you,” Suarez said in an email.

Continue reading Suarez and Pratchett: Both 2024 Prometheus Award winners earn well-deserved recognition – again

Three-time Prometheus winner Victor Koman to present Best Novel category at our public 2024 awards ceremony

Victor Koman, a veteran libertarian sf writer who’s won three Prometheus Awards for Best Novel, has agreed to speak and be a presenter at the 44th Prometheus Awards ceremony.

Prometheus-winning novelist Victor Koman (Courtesy of author)

Koman will present the Best Novel category at the online Zoom ceremony, tentatively planned for a Saturday afternoon in mid- to late August.

Continue reading Three-time Prometheus winner Victor Koman to present Best Novel category at our public 2024 awards ceremony

How do the 2024 Best Novel finalists fit the distinctive focus of the Prometheus Awards?

The Prometheus Awards are distinctive among literature-oriented awards, including within the sf/fantasy field, for having a dual focus – on both overall literary quality and on libertarian/anti-authoritarian ideas.

As LFS awards press releases summarize and define our award:

“The Prometheus Awards recognize outstanding works of science fiction and fantasy that dramatize the perennial conflict between liberty and power and champion cooperation over coercion as the root of civility and social harmony.

Such works may critique or satirize authoritarian trends, expose abuses of power by the institutionalized coercion of the State, imagine what forms a fully free society might take, and/or uphold individual rights and freedom for all as the only moral and practical foundation for peace, prosperity, progress, justice, tolerance, civility and civilization itself.

Here are capsule descriptions of the Best Novel finalists, explaining how each fits our awards’ distinctive focus:

Continue reading How do the 2024 Best Novel finalists fit the distinctive focus of the Prometheus Awards?