Earlier today, the Horror Writers Association announced the final ballot for the 2015 Bram Stoker Awards, and I’m thrilled to see that my story “Becoming Invisible, Becoming Seen” is one of the final five in the category of Superior Achievement in Long Fiction.

Here are the five stories which survived the voting process and are now Stoker nominees.

Gary A. Braunbeck – Paper Cuts (Seize the Night) (Gallery Books)

Lisa Mannetti – The Box Jumper (Smart Rhino Publications)

Norman Partridge – Special Collections (The Library of the Dead) (Written Backwards)

Mercedes M. Yardley – Little Dead Red (Grimm Mistresses) (Ragnarok Publications)

Scott Edelman – Becoming Invisible, Becoming Seen (Dark Discoveries #30)

This marks the sixth time a story of mine has been voted onto a final Stoker Awards ballot. I previously appeared there with—

“A Plague on Both Your Houses” (on the 1997 ballot)

“The Last Supper” (2003)

“Almost the Last Story by Almost the Last Man” (2007)

“Petrified” (2008)

“The Hunger of Empty Vessels” (2009)

Funny … it’s only now, as I review those earlier five titles, that I realize four of my six nominations have been for zombie stories!

Voting on the final ballot will begin shortly, with the winner announced at a banquet in Las Vegas, Nevada on Saturday, May 14. If you’re an Active or Lifetime member of the HWA who hasn’t yet read “Becoming Invisible, Becoming Seen” and would like a PDF, please let me know.

Oh, and one last thing—

As much as I’d love to win a Stoker—and I would love to win a Stoker—due to what happened with my previous nominations, even if I lose this time around, I’d sorta win. Because based on this information Locus put together of nominees who’ve never won, if do lose, I’d then be tied for the title of the writer with the greatest number of Stoker nominations without a win.

And what’s wrong with being Susan Lucci?

Still … a trophy would be better!