Time for the results! Without further ado, here they are for Science Fiction! Thank you, pixelmum, for your hard work on these awards (in not one, but two genres!). Contestants, please check out their shout-out chapters-they have their username in the chapter title-if you haven't done so already. They deserve some appreciation. :)

If you did not win, meaning you are not in this chapter, we will PM you ASAP with your results. If you do not receive your results, you were probably disqualified, but give us some time to send the results.

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Genre Results

🌻Third Place🌻

Username - DiverseLiterati
Book Title - Free Minds
Score - 91/100
Review -

This story is fab from the start! A quick note about the blurb - it's super-vague and reads like every blurb ever e.g. "A girl is having a tough time at school when an incident happens and she is forced to make a choice, and both choices are hard, and by the way, there is a boy who she hates, but actually he's pretty hot". You are way too good a writer to fall into that blurb trap. We really need to know what this story is about specifically, so that we can jump into the amazing world that you have created, and see instantly how different it is from every other high school story on Wattpad. Who is Beth? What's up with Zavlon School? What happens there that sets Beth on her adventure? What obstacles will she face? You don't need to give away the plot points that you don't want to, but come on - give us hungry readers a little hint!

Grammar, syntax and punctuation are polished, with just a few issues that a copy editor would pick out, like run-on sentences and redundant commas scattered around, but I'm scraping the barrel here! I really love your dialogue beats and the fast-paced and witty dialogue too.

I need to say that I absolutely love Beth's Mum. She is hilarious from the start, and that's saying a lot because I adore Beth. She is quietly confident despite all of the stress she has at school, and she is totally honest with herself about why she's a Zavlonian and what sacrifices she is making. I really love her scathing inner voice too. I can almost hear her chatting along with me while I'm reading! There are a lot of other students for the reader to take in, and a fair few teachers for that matter, but that is the nature of being new to a high school, and I am sure that there will be chances to get to know these characters over the coming chapters.

The world-building is seamless and I really like how it fits into the story unobtrusively, with no need to explain the operational details. There is a lot to take in, but not a single sense of info-dump exposition. It would be good to get clarification on when, or maybe where, this story is set, since there are mentions of contemporary people like Tony Stark, Elon Musk and Robert Downey Jr, which makes me wonder where I need to put my brain, temporally speaking.

The pacing is great, and I really like how the chapters are broken into little vignettes where you get a bite-size snippet of plot, along with a lot of nice dialogue and description. I also really like where the reader gets to by the end of Chapter Five, where Beth seems more settled at school, but elements don't seem to sit well with her, and a brooding atmosphere is developing as we go on. In summary, I really loved reading this - it was a treat!

🌻Second Place🌻

Username - SuVida777
Book Title - Komoreby
Score - 93/100
Review -

Wow! You have my attention until the end of this book! The first thing that hits me about this book is the rich description. Each paragraph evokes a full video in glorious colours! It's really easy to just dwell on each paragraph to absorb the depth of the descriptive elements, which you are clearly gifted at writing. I am a sucker for this, especially being a sci fi reader I am drawn to vivid description, so this is a huge bonus for me.

The title is the name of the city, so it would be really good to see the city itself as a pseudo-character in the book. We do get to see a lot of the inside of the high school, and there are a few architectural descriptions, but I would love to know how Nuara and Komoreby differ, and how Evanna feels about those differences. I also am not sure how Komoreby is an eco-city, since there didn't seem to be anything remarkable about it in the text, neither in an ecological, or other context. Maybe this will be expanded on as I read further into the story, though.

Evanna is a lovely character; she is really level-headed and surprisingly pragmatic about the fact that her world is turning upside-down, and I love all of the little niggles with self-confidence that she has, which are really relatable. There are a lot of characters to learn in quite a short time, but I am sure that I will get used to them as I read on. I must admit that I am not a big fan of high-school or young adult stories, unless they are teenagers in extraordinary circumstances (e.g. I love Buffy the Vampire Slayer) but luckily Evanna has a particle accelerator available to make this story extraordinary!

This story has varied pace, with some parts which are shocking and action-packed, and some parts which are relaxing slice-of-life scenes, so I am sure that a reader will find something to love in here. I'm committed to reading this to the end; consider me a fan!

Username - AnneLWilkin
Book Title - The Allotment of Syrius 6
Score - 93/100
Review -

The blurb has punctuation, grammar and syntax errors. It's an excellent blurb, otherwise. Also there is missing capitalisation on the tagline on the cover. It's worth correcting it since readers who judge books by the writing quality will be turned off by that, and you are way too good a writer to miss out on readers!

I love how this story unfolds in medias res and we don't have to go through the complexities of the allotment, with only a few hints about what kind of regime Nova Prime enforces being more than enough for the reader. It's great that you have taken care to make sure that the mining planet world-build is carefully woven into Kyana's thoughts and actions, but there are a few chapters where we'd probably enjoy the exposition more as dialogue, especially since Kyana has such a strong voice as a character that it would be amusing and interesting to hear her views on some of the world-build e.g. does she like the rehydrated food, and does she complain about the Syrius 6 landscape or weather? (I personally am very glad that they are drinking port - the drink of champions!)

The miners are all great characters; I really love how Kyana slowly learns about how cool and rebellious they all are, when initially she put them down as old folk who did nothing but mine and drink. It's really great that they are all sticking together and opposing the actions and the values of the hellish regime - it makes me feel really positive about their adventures on a new planet. I love how this is all helping Kyana find out about her father's, and her own, true nature, since this is the first time she has had a chance to use her skills, wits and cunning for something that matters - life and death. I really loved how she kept her mother's trinkets, and how valuable such personal artefacts are to a pioneering people. It was beautiful to hear Kyana's inner thoughts on her family life, and I really hope that she gets the same family feeling with her mining chums (if they manage to escape!).

In short, I really love this story and I hope that it gets the reads that it deserves. It combines wonderful world-building, a twisting plot, strong and deeply complex characters, and a compelling writing style. Amazing work!

🌻First Place🌻

Username - annkreeves
Book Title - We the Orphans
Score - 97/100
Review -

Full disclosure - I judged this book before, and loved it so much that I carried on reading it.

This story is sci-fi in name, but actually is a mix of a lot of genres, and any reader will find things to like. The story does however stay true to sci fi since there is a strong and comprehensive worldbuild complete with environmental obstacles to the characters, strange and terrifying flora and fauna, resource depletion resulting in bizarre and new ways of living, and a lot of new-world jargon, including futuristic swear words. It's immersive and carries you along easily with no need to refer to glossaries and lengthy expositions to get worldbuild onto the page.

The plot is masterfully-written with the pacing just right to make a reader want to binge! The story is multi-layered with a plethora of sub-plots becoming apparent in the first chapter, and all of them are deliciously hooky. The characters are probably my favourite part - Andi is a compelling, realistic and complex character who is flawed but still very loveable, and her antagonist/lover Shepherd is a magnificently well-painted character, especially when we get to see the depth of his thoughts in his POV.

I personally was really drawn into this story, and I really hope that it gets a bigger following - it mixes action, intrigue, romance and a lot of humour to make it a brilliant all-rounder.

Username - AziaElga
Book Title - The First Gift
Score - 97/100
Review -

This was such a charming read. It's a tragic story, and indeed a lot of very sad things happen, but you have this amazing ability to make your work exude sweetness and hope despite the difficult subject matter!

The grammar is almost perfect (but I am British so maybe I'm just being super-traditional and nit-picky). You are really gifted at dialogue, and I especially love the actions beats you add in to make it seem more like watching a film than reading a book.

Your characters rock! Lara is so naive that I can't help but worry about her e.g. she compared receiving her gift to drinking too many sodas - such a cutie! It's a poignant and funny way to show that she's very childlike with zero experience. I absolutely hate Elena (so good job!), who is a fantastic villain: totally manipulative and ruthless, and totally unrivalled in power, along with Kim Jong-un style gaudy tastes. Ryan was infuriating in the first two chapters but as I learn about him I realise that he is so broken that he's probably self-sabotaging the thing he cherishes most - his relationship with Lara. The pacing is great, and I am trying really hard not to binge this!

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Congratulations to all of the winners! You will receive your prizes once the awards are over. :)