Eagle Award 2007 Nominations Launched

Nominations are now being invited for this year's Eagle Awards, the British comics awards. You can designate your 2007 favourites in 30 different categories at www.eagleawards.co.uk.

We're delighted to report that downthetubes is one of the comic web sites already nominated and the more nominations we get, the greater the chance we may make it to the final ballot. Thanks to everyone who nominated us and fingers crossed!

Established in 1976 by Mike Conroy, now editor of Comics International, the Eagles are the comics industry’s longest established awards. Acknowledged as the pre-eminent international prizes, they have been featured on the covers of leading US and UK titles across the last three decades with such diverse titles as X-Men, Swamp Thing, Preacher, 2000AD and MAD among those proud to display the Eagle Award emblem.

Aiming to offer a broader spectrum of the industry, voters will again be asked to select from the top five nominees in each of the 30 categories, as they were last year. Nominations, which are once again open to the comics reading public worldwide, close at midnight on Saturday, 22 March.

Voting is to begin on Tuesday 1 April with the winners announced at the Bristol International Comic Expo on Saturday, 10 May 2008. The award ceremony is one of the highlights of Britain's longest-running comics’ festival and will be held at Bristol's Ramada Plaza Hotel where the ceremony is to be hosted by British TV and sitcom personality Fraser Ayres (pictured), best known as a regular in TV shows such as The Smoking Room and Thieves like Us, but whose credits also include Urban Gothic and Casualty. Assisting him will be Eagle Awards regular Cassandra Conroy, daughter of awards founder, Mike Conroy.

The presentation is to be preceded by the traditional gala dinner. With demand for tickets always high, early booking is highly recommended. Reservations can be made through Martin 'Biff' Averre, who can also provide further details. He can be contacted via email at martin AT acecomics.co.uk or by telephone on 01206 364140 (011-44-1206 364140 from North America).

The Eagles have their very own message forum, where discussion is taking place on all aspects of the awards including suggestions for who and what might garner nominations next year.

Web Link: www.eagleawards.co.uk