By Michael Grossberg
The Libertarian Futurist Society will present its first Special Prometheus Award for Young Adult Fiction to Dave Freer’s Storm-Dragon.
Several years ago, the LFS Board of Directors unanimously approved this new awards category in recognition of the crucial connection between literacy and liberty and the vital importance of writing fiction, including fantastical fiction, that attracts and engages young people.
Storm-Dragon, by Dave Freer, will receive the Special Award Aug. 16, 2026, at the 46th annual Prometheus Awards, along with the previously announced 2026 winners in the two annual categories for Best Novel (J. Kenton Pierce’s A Kiss for Damocles) and the Prometheus Hall of Fame for Best Classic Fiction (Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.)
Storm-Dragon, published by Raconteur Press, centers on a boy who saves and adopts an intelligent alien pet on an ocean-dominated colony planet with dangers both alien and human.
In the spirit of Robert Heinlein’s Red Planet and Farmer in the Sky and Alan Dean Foster’s Flinx novels, the story centers on two resourceful middle-school boys: Skut, a native of the planet, and Podge, part of a family of refugees who’ve arrived on a starship. As they make friends, the boys confront class bullies and repressive teachers, cope with mob behavior and navigate the ocean’s tricky shores.
In the process, they interact and communicate more with their orphaned young “dragon,” an electrosensitive six-limbed alien creature who may be more intelligent and formidable than it appears.
Aimed primarily at ages 8 to 18 and avoiding explicit ideology, the novel gradually expands to include parents, administrators and other adults enmeshed in the colony town’s increasingly corrupt politics, which threatens livelihoods through onerous regulations, taxes and property confiscations. Ultimately, a violent invasion from human raiders threatens the colonists’ broader rights.
With a strong career background in fishing and oceanography, Freer focuses more on the plausible ecology and boy-centered adventures than the politics of this plausible frontier planet, while allowing his live-and-let-live, peace and freedom themes to emerge naturally.
Visit the Prometheus blog for a full review of Storm-Dragon that illuminates how it fits the distinctive dual focus of the Prometheus Award on quality and liberty.
This year’s recognition for Storm-Dragon marks the first Special Award presented by the LFS since 2017. But it’s not the first recognition for Dave Freer, who won the Prometheus for Best Novel in 2023 for Cloud-Castles.
WATCH THE AUG. 16 PROMETHEUS AWARDS CEREMONY
The 46th annual Prometheus Awards will be presented online Sunday afternoon Aug. 16, 2026, in a zoom awards ceremony open to the public.
This year’s roughly hourlong ceremony, tentatively scheduled to start at 1 p.m. Eastern time and emceed by LFS President William H. Stoddard, will feature several guest speakers.
Two-time Prometheus winner Travis Corcoran (The Powers of the Earth, Causes of Separation) will present the Special Award and speak about the importance of Young Adult Fiction.
Lifelong science-fiction fan Ilya Somin (George Mason University law professor, Cato Institute scholar and author) will present the Hall of Fame award and discuss the many libertarian and anti-authoritarian themes and currents in science fiction and fantasy.
Updates will be posted on the Prometheus Blog over the next several weeks about additional speakers and the full ceremony line-up.
* Read the full press release announcing the 2026 Best Novel and Hall of Fame winners.
ABOUT THE LFS AND THE PROMETHEUS AWARDS
* Join us! To help sustain the Prometheus Awards and support a cultural and literary strategy to appreciate and honor freedom-loving fiction, join the Libertarian Futurist Society, a non-profit all-volunteer international association of freedom-loving sf/fantasy fans.
Libertarian futurists understand that culture matters. We believe that literature and the arts can be vital in envisioning a freer and better future. In some ways, culture can be even more influential and powerful than politics in the long run, by imagining better visions of the future incorporating peace, prosperity, progress, tolerance, justice, positive social change, and mutual respect for each other’s rights, human dignity, individuality and peaceful choices.
* Prometheus winners: For a full list of Prometheus winners, finalists and nominees – including in the annual Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction (Hall of Fame) categories and occasional Special Awards – visit the enhanced Prometheus Awards page on the LFS website. This page includes convenient links to all published essay-reviews in our Appreciation series explaining why each of the 106 works that have won a Prometheus since 1979 fits the awards’ distinctive dual focus on both quality and liberty.
* Watch videos of past Prometheus Awards ceremonies, Libertarian Futurist Society panel discussions with noted sf authors and leading libertarian writers, and other LFS programs on the Prometheus Blog’s Video page.
* Read “The Libertarian History of Science Fiction,” an essay in the international magazine Quillette that favorably highlights the Prometheus Awards, the Libertarian Futurist Society and the significant element of libertarian sf/fantasy in the evolution of the modern genre.
* Check out the Libertarian Futurist Society’s Facebook page for comments, updates and links to the latest Prometheus Blog posts.
