Best Motion Picture
Alpha and Omega
How to Train Your Dragon
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole
Toy Story 3
The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Editor’s Choice: You gotta go with How to Train Your Dragon on this one, right? Granted, Toy Story 3 is a far superior film, but it’s not a furry film. The other three films in the category are nowhere near as good, despite what certain dragons keep trying to tell me.

Best Dramatic Short Work or Series
Adventure Time With Finn and Jake
“Foxy Bingo”
Mongrels
“Orangina Naturally”
The Regular Show
Wallace & Gromit’s World of Invention

Editor’s Choice: Honestly as long as anything but Foxy Bingo and the Orangina campaign win, I’d be fine. Yes, I know what fox was a dancing machine, and yes, god yes, that gay cougar is hot, but there is no way in hell the fandom should give an award to commercials for gambling and sugar water when some of the smartest written shows on television are in the same category.

Best Novel
Basecraft Cirrostratus by Justin Lamar
Descent by Phil Guesz
Otters in Space by Mary Lowd
Save the Day by DJ Fahl
The Seventh Chakra by Kevin Frane
Shadow of the Father by Kyell Gold

Editor’s Choice: Wow, this is an exciting year for novels, and I can see it being a close race. That said, I’ve got to go with The Seventh Chakra. It’s definitely the most ambitious novel on the list, and Frane pulled off an exciting original thriller, and one of the most unique novels I’ve read from the fandom.

Best Short Fiction
Bridges by Kyell Gold
“False Dawn” by Kyell Gold
“Felis ex Machina” by EO Costello
“Gerty and the Doesn’t-Smell-Like-a-Melon” by Mary E Lowd
The Peculiar Quandary of Simon Canopus Artyle by Kevin Frane

Editor’s Choice: I’m leaning towards Bridges in this category. It was one of those experiments that did something new, even if it was a bit… superfluous. It’s hard to argue the literary merits of writing the same spit-roasting scene three times, but hey, there it is. That said, Simon Canopus also has a cool experimental writing feel to is, as the Cupcake branded books tend to have.

Best Other Literary Work
Furpiled #4 by Leo Magna
Different Worlds, Different Skins edited by Will A Sanborn
Iron Claw Bestiary by Chris Goodwin
i.s.o. #1 by Vince Suzukawa
Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk: A Modest Bestiary by Dave Sedaris

Editor’s Choice: In any other situation I’d automatically say Dave Sedaris, but his latest book is actually one of his weakest, so go for one of the fandom made choices. Furpiled and i.s.o. both are cool for slice of life stuff, and the Iron Claw Bestiary is something that nerds tell me is pretty cool.

Best Graphic Story
Concession by Immelmann
Furthia High by QuetzaDrake
Cruelty by Rukis
Lackadaisy by Tracy J. Butler
Twokinds by Tim Fischbach

Editor’s Choice: Lackadaisy. No question. The others are good, but don;t really compare, except maybe Cruelty for it’s potential. Rukis has the art talent, and if she can tighten up her storytelling I can easily see her winning this award in the future, but not this year.

Best Comic Strip
“Broken Plot Device” by Lis Boriss
“Faux Pas” by Robert and Margaret Carspecken
“Little Tales” by Genesis Eve Whitmore
“Housepets!” by Rick Griffin
“Sandra and Woo” by Powree and Oliver Knörzer

Editor’s Choice: Everyone’s got a favorite, just pick one. They’re all good.

Best Magazine
Anthropomorphic Dreams Podcast by Will A. Sanborn
Heat #7 published by Sofawolf
New Fables Summer 2010 edited by Tim Susman
South Fur Lands edited by Bernard Doove
Tales of the Tai-Pan Universe edited by Gene Breshears

Editor’s Choice: I’m tempted to say go for Anthro Dreams because it might spur an entire Podcast category next year (God knows there are enough of them to warrant it). But there are so many great stories in New Fables that I can’t snub it. Go with that.

Best Published Illustration
Big Red: Lady Sings the Blues by Richard Bartrop
Cenotaph by Susan Rankin-Pollard
The Seventh Chakra by Kamui
Shadow of the Father by Sara Palmer
New Fables Summer 2010 by Mary Mouse

Editor’s Choice: All of these illustrations are fantastic and every one of them is deserving of the award. These are some of the best talent the fandom has to offer. Personally, Kamui’s The Seventh Chakra is one of the most eye catching covers I’ve seen. It also has an array of symbolism that tie it in with the book. Plus it’s bright fucking yellow.

Best Game
Disney Epic Mickey
Furry Basketball Association
Rocket Knight
Sam & Max: Season 3, Episode 1: The Penal Zone
Sonic Colors

Editor’s Choice: There’s only one game on here that is done by the fandom, for the fandom. I don’t care if you like basketball, or like roleplaying, the Furry Basketball Association is a beast that is fueled by talented and dedicated players. Add on to that, it’s fun to follow even if you’re not participating. That’s way cooler than an XBLA game about a franchise everyone forgot about.

Voting for the Ursa Majors ends April 17. Visit the official site to cast your vote.

I love it when authors mix things up with their writing styles. Switching genres, or changing from the perspective they normally do can be a risk, but when it works it’s really cool to know an author has more up their sleeve. Kyell Gold’s newest book, Bridges works really well, despite some hangups. And it certainly does some new things, I mean besides having a male/female sex scene.

Bridges is the first book in the Cupcakes line of novellas, and it feels very experimental. Each chapter switches characters (Like those annual Animorphs specials, remember those, guys?), and tells the story through the various characters. It’s a story of a red fox named Hayward, who is quite adept at playing matchmaker, but won’t let people into his own life, for reasons largely unknown by his friends. It’s interesting to see the story told from five different perspectives and really showcases Gold’s ability to develop multiple characters.

The novella starts with a single night told by three different people, on a group date. They’re all very different, and the introspection of each fox gives each chapter a very different feel, despite the same scenarios. Gold leaves out enough details from each one to allow the other characters fill in the blanks, and even scenes of eating at a restaurant or chilling on a couch are interesting, even though paled somewhat by the more engrossing scenes that happen in between.

The same thing that makes the book interesting also makes it drag. It’s not until over halfway through the book that the real plot becomes apparent. It makes me wonder if three chapters about one night was really necessary, especially when two of the three foxes involved are just side characters. The fact that the first third of the book is taken up by character that don’t significantly influence the plot is a little odd. And since the book jumps ahead eight months, and then another month after that, it seems like one of those chapters could have been about the interstitial time, while still allowing the side character to reveal more about Hayward and his situation.

Bridges is a short novella, so the plot dragging is kind of like saying a half hour episode of a TV show dragged. And I should stress that it doesn’t feel gratuitous or unnecessary while it’s happening. It’s exciting, it’s entertaining, and Gold is in top form with his descriptive powers. It speaks highly of an author that he made the same exact sex scene that interesting three times in a row.

Despite the imbalances, the story is heartfelt, and at times heartbreaking. In a single chapter Gold can develop a character, tell their whole arc, and really make the reader care about them, which is more than some authors can do with an entire novel. Bridges is definitely worth picking up, and I like seeing these different writing styles coming from an established author. It shows he’s not in a rut (the noun, not the verb, pervs).

[[Editor's note: One last minor quibble, though it’s just a bugaboo of mine that doesn’t detract at all from the story. Gold can’t seem to figure out how he wants to approach pop culture. He starts with real world things, talking about Shakespeare plays, CSI and Law and Order. Then moves on to made up stuff like a fictional show called Bearly Brothers. Then switches again to the furry parody method, inserting animals into titles, like the hit song, “I Know What Wolves Like.” Pick one and stick with it, fox!]]

Authors Kyell Gold, Rikoshi and foozzzball have teamed up with furry publisher FurPlanet to produce a line of novellas, works of fiction that fall in that space between short story and novel. Full length novels are, as Gold describes them, cakes, and so the stories produced by the Cupcakes brand are the same flavor and quality, but in a smaller size.

The brand, which sees its first book in February, was created as a way to fulfill a noticed niche in the fiction market, one that both consumers and authors weren’t getting.

“My thinking has always been that novella length pieces have always been the most comfortable thing for me to write, and they are the single most difficult thing to do publishing wise,” Rikoshi explained. “They’re too long to get into an anthology, and until now they’ve been too short to do anything with on their own.”

What may make Cupcakes unique and appealing as a line of books is not so much what happens in the story, but who it happens to.

“One of the things that really ties our work together that we all really agree on and feel passionate about is that our stories are all, at the core, about the characters.” Gold said. “And for all three of us, character comes first. And that’s something that we really respect in each other’s work.”

“I think that most readers tend to value that sort of thing, but especially in the furry fandom, character is something that people just latch on to,” Rikoshi added. “Maybe more so than plot, more so than nuance, more so than theme, I think it’s the characters that pull people in.”

With the first book premiering at Furry Fiesta 2010, the authors plan to write four novellas a year, with varying themes and content ratings. Gold’s first story, Bridges is a modern day romantica story about finding love in a new city, whereas Rikoshi’s first novella is an all ages fantasy themed story about the social lives of wizards.

“We have a gay porn writer, a straight porn writer and a gay non-porn writer,” Gold joked. “Although our styles are distinctive, within the context of furry fiction they’re more similar than dissimilar.”

Bridges can be purchased at Furry Fiesta 2010, February 19-21 in Dallas, TX. It will be available shortly thereafter on the FurPlanet website.