Voting for 2018 BookNest Fantasy Award

I'm pleased to announce that Age of War has made the long list for the 2018 BookNest Fantasy Award. Voting to create the shortlist will continue from now until Sunday 14th October. Nine popular Fantasy Blogs (Bookworm Blues, Fantasy Book Critic, Fantasy Book Review, Fantasy-Faction, Grimdark Magazine, The Fantasy Hive, The Fantasy Inn, The Grim Tidings Podcast & The Weatherwax Report), three big Fantasy Imprints (Gollancz, Harper Voyager & Orbit), and two well-respected Agents (John Jarrold & Joshua Bilmes of JABberwocky Literary Agency) helped to create the nominees.

All told, there are 4 categories for you to vote on including:

• Best Traditionally Published Novel
• Best Self-Published Novel
• Best Debut Novel
• Best Imprint (Publisher) 

You don't need to vote for my book, but please do go and vote for your favorites.  The full list of nominees in the Best Tradtiionally Publihsed Novel Category is presented here along with some data from Groodreads regarding how many books have been shelved, what people have rated the books, and how many ratings have come in. Any book on Goodreads with a rating higher than 4.3 is truly exceptional, so I highlighted some of those.

Title	Author	Rating	# Ratings	# shelved
A War in Crimson Embers	Alex Marshall	4.14	341	1,007
Age of War	Michael J. Sullivan	4.48	3,507	18,163
A Time of Dread	John Gwynne	4.47	992	5,666
Aru Shah and the End of Time	Roshani Chokshi	4.15	4,384	22,944
Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance	Ruth Emmie Lang	4.23	6,428	29,821
Blood and Tempest	Jon Skovron	4.11	329	900
Blood of Assassins	RJ Barker	4.20	451	1,183
Bloody Rose	Nicholas Eames	4.41	1,386	8,181
Charmcaster	Sebastien de Castell	4.34	705	2,448
Children of Blood and Bone	Tomi Adeyemi	4.28	43,536	178,630
Circe	Madeline Miller	4.36	42,200	162,103
City of Lies	Sam Hawke	3.94	528	6,848
Darksoul	Anna Stephens	3.81	895	2,285
Fire Dance	Ilana C. Myer	3.47	1,115	1,392
Foundryside	Robert Jackson Bennett	4.39	1,843	19,432
Furyborn	Claire Legrand	3.89	6,490	59,536
Grey Sister	Mark Lawrence	4.47	7,183	19,112
Iron Gold	Pierce Brown	4.26	20,597	71,528
Jade City	Fonda Lee	4.01	2,355	14,248
King of Assassins	RJ Barker	4.56	194	815
Magic Triumphs	Ilona Andrews	4.63	7,920	27,301
Master Assassins	Robert V.S. Redick	4.19	634	4,411
Oathbringer	Brandon Sanderson	4.64	58,330	140,180
Port of Shadows	Glen Cook	4.21	354	3,751
Quillifer	Walter Jon Williams	3.90	288	1,064
Ravencry	Ed McDonald	4.33	516	1,521
Seventh Decimate	Stephen Donaldson	3.21	614	2,657
Shadowblack	Sebastien de Castell	4.16	1,593	4,237
Spinning Silver	Naomi Novik	4.33	13,882	67,472
Starless	Jacqueline Carey	4.12	1,383	8,901
Tempests and Slaughter	Tamora Pierce	4.12	7,452	39,075
The Bitter Twins	Jen Williams	4.36	228	693
The Deathless	Peter Newman	3.91	131	2,018
The Ember Blade	Chris Wooding	4.18	61	1,812
The Empire of Ashes	Anthony Ryan	4.19	1,122	4,198
The Fall of Dragons	Miles Cameron	4.33	1,652	4,525
The Fall of Gondolin	J.R.R. Tolkien	4.11	413	7,247
The Forbidden City	Deborah Wolf	4.39	18	165
The Girl In The Tower	Katherine Arden	4.44	16,749	51,409
The Infernal Battalion	Django Wexler	4.33	1,869	5,658
The Land You Never Leave	Angus Watson	4.44	25	262
The Last Namsara	Kristen Ciccarelli	4.17	6874	26,818
The Mere Wife	Maria Dahvana Headley	4.15	620	5,365
The Outcast	Taran Matharu	4.24	924	7,515
The Poppy War	R. F. Kuang	4.12	6,483	41,804
The Skaar Invasion	Terry Brooks	4.16	779	2,536
The Tower of Living and Dying	Anna Smith Spark	4.35	82	553
Trail of Lightning	Rebecca Roanhorse	4.17	2,878	18,157
Witchsign	Den Patrick	3.78	94	2,448
Wrath of Empire	Brian McClellan	4.56	2,723	8,459