The Horror Writers Association has announced the long list of contenders for the 2010 Bram Stoker Awards, and there are some Aussies in the running.

Closest to home is Kirstyn’s Madigan Mine — huzzah! — in the category for Superior Achievement in a First Novel.

It’s also very cool that Scenes from the Second Storey has made the long list for Superior Achievement in an Anthology: all Aussies in that one (including Kirstyn!), edited by Aussies, and a premise in that the stories are all based around an album by The God Machine.

A Chaosium collection of Cthulhu-inspired stories, appropriately named Cthulhu’s Dark Cults, lands two mentions on the Aussie front: editor David Conyers in the Anthology category and Shane Jiraiya Cummings for his yarn in that antho, Requiem for the Burning God.

The long list will be pared down to a list of finalists, with winners to be announced at the Stoker Weekend in June.