Silmarillion Awards 2016
Welcome to the first ever Silmarillion Awards!
The Silmarillion Awards have been created by DJ Edwardson and Jenelle Schmidt as a way to honor J.R.R. Tolkien as the Father of Modern Fantasy, open up a discussion about some of our other favorite fantasy works, and to have a ton of fun this summer.
When we started thinking about creating a sort of “Fantasy Oscars,” we found it difficult to fathom any award that wouldn’t be won by a character or item from The Lord of the Rings... so, to make things a bit more interesting, we decided to call them “The Silmarillion Awards” and have characters from LOTR and The Hobbit present the awards as examples of the ultimate standard for each award. Hopefully that will even the playing field a bit.
Joining our team are eight other bloggers and authors who will each be hosting one of these awards, called Silmarils, on their blogs towards the end of July.
But before we get there, we need YOUR help! Starting today, June 20th and proceeding through July 1st, the nomination period for each award will be open. Please visit the participating bloggers (found in the list below), read the descriptions of the awards and make your nominations!
Nominate characters in the comments of each blog post. If someone has already nominated the character you would have nominated, you may either second that nomination, open a new nomination, or do both. We will be picking the 5 characters with the most “seconds” for the final voting period that will take place between July 4th - 13th, so you may also “third,” “fourth,” “fifth,” etc any nominations you particularly like.
Fine print:
Please do not nominate anything from one of your OWN books!
You may nominate a character AND second, third, fourth a character... but please only vote once per character. (i.e. You cannot nominate a character and then also second that same character)
Please share about the Silmarillion Awards on social media to spread the excitement far and wide across Middle Earth. Use the hashtag: #silmawards2016 wherever possible!
Don’t nominate a Tolkien character/weapon/mount/riddle for the awards, as the characters presenting the awards are already the standard for each award - otherwise LOTR would win every award, so that is why they are considered the Ultimate Standard for each of these awards and characters from LOTR will be Presenting the awards come July!
Don’t stress if a character you nominate doesn’t win this year. We are hoping to make this an annual tradition, and these awards are LIFETIME AWARDS, meaning that they cannot be won by the same character more than once!
OFFICIAL SCHEDULE
Phase 1 - June 20-July 1: Award nominations open
Phase 2 - July 4: the final nominees will be announced and voting will open and last through July 14th
Phase 3 - July 16-28: Presentation of the awards, 1 per day, each award will be hosted on a different blog each day
Phase 4 - Celebration! July 29th was the official publication date of the Lord of the Rings back in 1954. We invite you all to celebrate with us the 62nd birthday of this masterpiece of Fantasy Fiction. Congratulate the winners, take and post a photo of yourselves with LOTR paraphernalia, write a blog post about your favorite LOTR moment, scene, character, quote, or memory... get creative and have fun!
Participating Bloggers:
DJ Edwardson Hosting the Best Friend Silmaril
Jenelle Schmidt Hosting the Most Heart Wrenching Death Scene Silmaril
Deborah O’Carroll Hosting the Strangest Character Silmaril
Abbey Hosting the Most Nefarious Villain Silmaril
JL Mbewe Hosting the Best Redemption Story Silmaril
Tracey Hosting the Riddling and Poetry Silmaril
Jack Lewis Baillot Hosting the Best Fantasy Mount Silmaril
Madeline J. Rose Hosting the Most Epic Hero Silmaril
Zachary Totah Hosting the Wisest Counsellor Silmaril
Rawls E. Fantasy Hosting the Best Fantasy Weapon Silmaril
As you can see, I will be hosting the Most Heart Wrenching Death Scene Silmaril here on my own blog. Below are the criteria for the sort of character who ought to be nominated for such an award. Keeping in mind that LOTR characters will be presenting these awards as the ultimate standard of Fantasy Fiction
The winner of the Most Heart Wrenching Death Scene Silmaril should go to a character whose death absolutely rips the heart of its reader to shreds. This cannot just be a character whose death is disappointing or unexpected, but should turn its readers into a soggy mess, unable to read the pages because they've gone all blurry every time they read the story.... or sometimes even when they're just thinking about the story.
This award will be presented to the character YOU vote for by a noble individual who is known most for his courage and determination and sky blue hood with a silver tassel... as well as for his final words of apology to one Burglar, which definitely brings tears to MY eyes every time I read it.
