Ledger Awards 2006 - Writer of the Year

I haven’t been exactly bowled over this year -nothing really stood out but there was some strong writers that deserve nomination.

I think the pace and plot in Azerath kind of slowed down (maybe even slumped a tad), a lot of ‘lets move from this wacky situation to the next’ which can get a bit tiring. But Daniel Lawson’s characters and dialogue are still a lot of fun to read and my complaints are really very minor criticisms. Though I’m not that into cyberstuff Matt Godden's Surfing the Deadline had some really nice moments specifically some of the internal monologue stuff.
In terms of breadth, Graeme Macdonald produced a bunch of differing titles through the new Local Act Comics publishing group. Kids comics, to scifi to crime; each title had its strengths; Millie the Pup was generally fine for a kids comic with a couple of funny moments but generally I’m not the audience and there wasn’t enough sex and/or violence or subversiveness to really enjoy it. The Ma B previews was incredibly clumsy and tedious to read (the same 3 plot points repeated on all 6 or so pages) but it looked pretty. These too comics aside Afterlife was a good read, a very slight read but still good. Vigil was the best of the lot with some strong plotting/story structure and characters, that’s got me wanting more.
Even though I did publish it, I think Doug Holgate’s writing for both his stories in Sureshot Presents All Adventure Annual as being much better than the regular competency most writer/artist creators display; in both stories the ending are a bit naff but not so much to ruin the whole thing. Checkmate Wordsworth was an imaginative and fun rollick.
It would be remiss to not nominate Christian Read for Witch King, it was a solid read – and I actually liked the various beats and plot points until the magic demons popped up to which I just rolled my eyes and remembered there’s a reason I don’t like fantasy. What I did like though was the proactive nature of the main character – not some farmboy you finds a magic wingnut that will defeat the blah blah blah but some rich kid that gets bullied and wants revenge. Now I don’t know how original that is but it doesn’t matter -i liked it.
Lastly, Daniel Reed for Crumpleton Experiments, continuing a longer story line it hits my freaky nerve.