Reviews – Prometheus Blog

Novelist Laura Montgomery hails Pierce’s A Kiss for Damocles as an “awesome” Prometheus winner 

By Michael Grossberg

J. Kenton Pierce’s A Kiss for Damocles, the 2026 Prometheus Best Novel winner, is receiving rave reviews. Even from novelists whose works Pierce beat to win his first Prometheus award.

The latest raves come from Laura Montgomery, herself nominated in 2026 for Planting Life: Shut the Kingdom.

“I read Damocles to vote on and absolutely loved it. I’m now closing on the end of the third book in the (Tales of the Long Night) series and will clearly have to figure out where these rumored short stories can be found,” Montgomery wrote on her website.

“Everyone is recommending A Kiss for Damocles, and you should definitely read it. It’s awesome and just won the Prometheus.”

Continue reading Novelist Laura Montgomery hails Pierce’s A Kiss for Damocles as an “awesome” Prometheus winner 

A “Midsummer” tribute to Poul Anderson’s imagination (and a reminder of his range beyond his many Prometheus winners) 

By Michael Grossberg

Looking for an imaginative and allusive novel to add to your summer reading list?

Consider reading Poul Anderson, the first writer to receive a Special Prometheus Award for Lifetime Achievement. Anderson (1926-2001) has won seven Prometheus Awards, several posthumously. Yet the freedom-themed novels and stories that have received such recognition are only a small fraction of Anderson’s rich and wide-ranging ouevre.

A seven-time Hugo winner, three-time Nebula award winner and Grand Master (a title bestowed in 1998 by his peers in the Science Fiction Writers of America in 1998), Anderson wrote first-rate fantasy as well as science fiction.

A Midsummer Tempest, one of his best fantasy novels, recently has received a tribute in File 770, a leading online publication covering the SF/fantasy field.

“This is one of the lighter, funnier and confectionary of Anderson’s oeuvre. Some of his work can be fraught with doom, dark destiny and a vision of fighting against fate bravely but in vain. A Midsummer Tempest is the exception that proves the rule,” Paul Weimer writes in a highly appreciative review of Anderson’s 1974 novel for File 770’s occasional Memory Lane column.

Continue reading A “Midsummer” tribute to Poul Anderson’s imagination (and a reminder of his range beyond his many Prometheus winners) 

Review: The bulletproof philosophy of the double-Prometheus-winning V for Vendetta, and why the graphic novel is more insightful and pro-liberty than the vivid film

By John C.A. Manley

The V for Vendetta graphic novel – inducted in 2006 into the Prometheus Hall of Fame – has been on my “Why haven’t I read this yet?” reading list for many years.

Written by Alan Moore and illustrated by David Lloyd in 1989, its fame doubled with James McTeigue’s 2005 film adaptation, written and produced by the Wachowkis and starring Hugo Weaving.

For the last two decades, V’s smiling mask has been haunting me, asking why I have not yet read this classic of pro-liberty fiction. Well, last month, I finally read it while narrating the artwork to my blind son, Jonah (forcing me to translate every sneer, smile and shadow into words). Despite the story’s numerous flaws — which oddly enough almost enhance its philosophical flair — I feel it’s a five-star work of art.

Continue reading Review: The bulletproof philosophy of the double-Prometheus-winning V for Vendetta, and why the graphic novel is more insightful and pro-liberty than the vivid film

“Fly Me to the Moon” – The Smithsonian museum highlights the power of science fiction in sparking advances in air and space  

By Michael Grossberg

On a recent visit to the Smithsonian museums in Washington, D.C., I was delighted to discover some recognition of the work of a Prometheus-winning author. And not just any author, but the Golden Age Grand Master who has received more Prometheus Awards than anyone else: Robert A. Heinlein.

Destination Moon, a 1950 Technicolor feature film co-written by Heinlein, is highlighted in the Destination Moon gallery (Gallery 206) at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.

Continue reading “Fly Me to the Moon” – The Smithsonian museum highlights the power of science fiction in sparking advances in air and space  

Imagining Travis Corcoran’s two Prometheus-winning Aristillus novels as movies on an IMAX screen 

By Michael Grossberg

Which Prometheus Award winners would you like to see on screen someday?

Travis Corcoran wins his first Prometheus Award (photo courtesy of author)

So far, 17 Prometheus Award-winners have been adapted with varying degrees of success to the large or small screen or have been recognized as original movies – including George Orwell’s Animal Farm, most recently adapted for the third time into a 2026 animated film.

When I asked my fellow Prometheus Best Novel judges which other winning works they most yearn to see made into a movie or TV series, Lowell Jacobsen chose two related novels by the same author: Travis Corcoran.

Continue reading Imagining Travis Corcoran’s two Prometheus-winning Aristillus novels as movies on an IMAX screen 

L. Neil Smith’s The Probability Broach: The Prometheus winner that one Best Novel judge dreams of seeing on screen someday 

By Michael Grossberg

It’s relatively rare for a Prometheus-winning work of pro-freedom science fiction or fantasy to be adapted into a movie or for television. But that happened this year, with the recent 2026 release of an animated film of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, inducted in 2011 into the Prometheus Hall of Fame.

While the misconceived third film version of Orwell’s anti-authoritarian and anti-communist classic fable proved disappointing, our hopes remain high for more Prometheus-winning novels or stories to be filmed – and some are already in the works.

Meanwhile, sparked by this year’s film release, I asked Libertarian Futurist Society members I work with as fellow Best Novel judges which Prometheus-winning works they’d like to see on screen.

Adam Tuchman’s top choice is The Probability Broach, L. Neil Smith’s alternate-history SF novel that won the 1982 Best Novel award.

Continue reading L. Neil Smith’s The Probability Broach: The Prometheus winner that one Best Novel judge dreams of seeing on screen someday 

Richard Salman’s unusually insightful review of the flawed new Animal Farm film illuminates George Orwell’s thinking and goals in writing his 1945 satirical fable 

By Michael Grossberg

Of the many reviews of the flawed new film version of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, perhaps the most insightful is one that broadens its critique to examine Orwell himself.

Richard M. Salsman, an economist and visiting assistant professor of political economy at Duke University, goes deeper than most other writers in contextualizing Andy Serkis’ widely panned animated film version.

With disturbing clarity, Salsman explains how Orwell’s evolving views led him to reverse his initial conception of Animal Farm as a critique of capitalism – but also how the British democratic socialist remained faithful to some of his deepest underlying assumptions.

This is a powerfully illuminating review and essay that deserves to be read in full at The Daily Economy, a publication of the American Institute for Economic Research.

But I also want to highlight some of Salman’s key insights, because they are so relevant to the themes and world view that shape the Prometheus Awards.

Continue reading Richard Salman’s unusually insightful review of the flawed new Animal Farm film illuminates George Orwell’s thinking and goals in writing his 1945 satirical fable 

Read our reviews of this year’s Best Novel finalists by Freer, Gallagher, Hoyt, Pierce and Turtledove 

By Michael Grossberg

As a guide to Prometheus Awards voting, the Prometheus Blog has once again published full-length and in-depth reviews of each of this year’s five Best Novel finalists.

Here, for your convenience, are the embedded links to the reviews of the five Best Novel finalists: Dave Freer’s Storm-Dragon, Sarah Hoyt’s No Man’s Land, J. Kenton Pierce’s A Kiss for Damocles), Karl K. Gallagher’s War By Other Means and Harry Turtledove’s Powerless.

Whether Libertarian Futurist Society members read the reviews (which do contain a few spoilers) before, during or after reading the finalists themselves, the reviews are designed to illuminate and raise the visibility of each novel.

Other SF/fantasy fans and other libertarians, outside the LFS, also are invited to check out the reviews to better understand how they fit the distinctive dual focus of the Prometheus Awards on both quality and liberty.

Continue reading Read our reviews of this year’s Best Novel finalists by Freer, Gallagher, Hoyt, Pierce and Turtledove 

The Man in the White Suit: One of the great libertarian film comedies – with a sci-fi premise 

By Michael Grossberg

Before he became best known to younger generations as Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars, British actor Alec Guinness was known in part for his comedies.

Guinness made his name in six Ealing Studios film comedies between 1949 and 1957, most notably playing eight characters in Kind Hearts and Coronets and lead roles in The Ladykillers, The Lavender Hill Mob and The Man in the White Suit. The latter film, released in 1951, has a deserved reputation as one of the great movie comedies of its era. It also happens to be both libertarian and individualist in its wry themes.

Not only that: The Man in the White Suit has an ingenious plot whose premise is clearly science fiction, making the film of even greater interest to the Libertarian Futurist Society.

Continue reading The Man in the White Suit: One of the great libertarian film comedies – with a sci-fi premise 

“Tired of Giving Lies a Helping Hand” – A review of Harry Turtledove’s Best Novel finalist Powerless 

By John C.A. Manley

Charlie Simpkins is no philosopher. He’s just another “comrade” in the West Coast People’s Democratic Republic, operating a vegetable shop in Los Angeles. He smokes the government-issued Progress cigarettes, he drinks the rationed rotgut at the local class-four tavern and, generally, lives a life of silent compliance.

Until, one day, the government asks him to put up a communist propaganda poster, with the words “WORKERS OF THE WORLD UNITE!” Instead of taping it to the window of his shop, he tosses it in the garbage.

That’s how Harry Turtledove’s Powerless opens: With one man finally saying no, even though the consequences could easily involve time breaking rocks in a concentration camp.

Continue reading “Tired of Giving Lies a Helping Hand” – A review of Harry Turtledove’s Best Novel finalist Powerless 