Blazing Reader,

My birthday webinar, last Thursday, was called "unprecedented in the 47-year history of the Prometheus Award precisely because of its big and suspenseful reveal, and its emotional impact" by Michael Grossberg, co-founder and secretary of The Libertarian Futurist Society.

Here's how Grossberg described the video recording, which I released on Friday:

"If you were nominated for a Prometheus Award for Best Novel, would you invite the world to watch you in the moment you found out whether your novel was selected among the finalists?

"Novelist John C.A. Manley was willing to do that yesterday with his editor Peter Toccalino in an interesting and wide-ranging 40-minute video discussion of this year’s Best Novel nominees and finalists.

"Personally, though, I’m not sure I’d be willing to do that – because after an initial discussion of the nominees, Toccalino read the Libertarian Futurist Society press release that went out to the media and LFS members a day earlier. And that’s when Manley learned that his novel didn’t make it into the top-five slate of finalists in what many Prometheus judges agreed has been an unusually strong year.

"For one thing, I’d want to have some initial privacy to react to the news, especially if it was bad news. Whether I’d be delighted or disappointed, the news would be a surprise, and I’m sure I’d have a variety of emotions to process."

Yes, I guess it was a bit daring. Delaying and filming the moment only increased the anticipation. It wasn’t as nerve-wracking as when I did the same for The Kirkus Reckoning (where Jordan Henderson, the cover artist, read me the as-yet-unpublished review of Much Ado About Corona while I was blindfolded by a stuffed orangutan).

While I was, naturally, a little disappointed All the Humans Are Sleeping was not among the Prometheus Best Novel finalists, I'm hardly emotionally torn apart. Having read several of the nominated titles, I think it would have been a difficult choice for the judges. In a more recent Prometheus Blog, Grossberg reported that many of the judges felt this year's nominations had "been a superior one for freedom-themed SF/fantasy."

Personally, I'm surprised that Where the Axe is Buried by Ray Naylor's, and For Emma by Ewan Morrison, were not among the finalists. Nonetheless, it leaves me feeling my novel, All the Humans Are Sleeping is in good company.

John C.A. Manley

P.S. You can read the rest of Michael Grossberg's reaction to our video here: A new video, by a nominated author and his editor, discusses the Prometheus Best Novel nominees and 2026 finalists – with a big reveal

P.P.S. And you can still watch the video YouTube, BitChute, Rumble and X.

John C. A. Manley is the author of Much Ado About Corona, All The Humans Are Sleeping and other works of philosophical fiction that are "so completely engaging that you find yourself alternately laughing, gasping, hanging on for dear life." Get free samples of his stories by becoming a Blazing Pine Cone email subscriber.