Carbon-Based Bipeds: June 2025
Join us at the Clarke Award ceremony, plus book now for Sci-Fi-London 25
Greetings, Carbon-Based Bipeds!
We’ll be announcing the 39th winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award on Wednesday 25th June, and we’d love for you to join us for the big reveal.
Every year we aim to make public tickets available to our award event and these are live and bookable online now.
We hope you can join us, and look forward to welcoming you on the night!
Read the 2025 Shortlist
With two weeks to go until the big reveal, there’s still just time to read all of this year’s shortlist (or at least buy it to add to your TBR pile) and to that end, to save you looking it up, here it is again in all its glory.
And congratulations once again to all our shortlisted authors!
Private Rites by Julia Armfield (4th Estate)
The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley (Sceptre)
Extremophile by Ian Green (AdAstra)
Annie Bot by Sierra Greer (The Borough Press)
Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Tor UK)
Thirteen Ways to Kill Lulabelle Rock by Maud Woolf (Angry Robot)
Links will take you uk.bookshop.org, supporting independent book shops, and we’re very grateful to the team there for promoting our shortlist on their homepage these past few weeks and helping us sell lots of books!
SCI-FI-LONDON celebrates 25 years of bold, independent science fiction
Running from 19th to 22nd June, SCI-FI-LONDON, the UK’s leading festival for science fiction film (and Clarke Award partner) celebrates its 25th edition at Picturehouse Cinema, Finsbury Park, London.
Visit sci-fi-london.com for the full festival programme.
Highlights include:
MATTER OF TIME, a slick time-travelling caper starring country singer — and The Next Step alum — Myles Erlick as a struggling video game designer looking for his big break.
Beautifully realised South African feature THE FIX exploring a world where the air is contaminated, and a powerful corporation controls access to the drug that makes life bearable.
The London premiere of STRANGE JOURNEY: THE STORY OF ROCKY HORROR, a new documentary by Linus O’Brien. Featuring his father, Richard O’Brien, alongside Tim Curry and other original stars, this is the definitive story of a global cult phenomenon.
The unmissable sci-fi themed dog show, SCI-FIDO, complete with a dog-friendly screening.
AI Dreams and Sci-Fi Nightmares panel at King’s College London
We were delighted to be invited to take part in the King’s Festival of Artificial Intelligence with a special science fiction panel exploring the challenges and opportunities for SF writers in telling one of the 21st century's most urgent stories.
You can now watch the full panel online via the King’s Institute for Artificial Intelligence’s YouTube channel.
As a King’s alum himself, we think Sir Arthur would have enjoyed this one!
And finally, given all the you-know-what on social media, if you’re looking for more friendly Clarke Award flavoured news and content, the best place to support and follow us right now is definitely here on Bluesky, clarkeaward.bsky.social.
Thanks for reading!
Tom Hunter, Award Director