First, a brief history of the Prometheus Awards (via the Libertarian Futurist Society’s web site):

In 1979, science fiction writer L. Neil Smith created the Prometheus Awards, to honor libertarian fiction. A panel selected F. Paul Wilson’s Wheels Within Wheels as the best novel, and a gold coin then worth $2,500 was presented to Wilson. Due to the cost of the award, and lack of a formal organization, the Prometheus Awards fell into limbo the following year.

Founded in 1982 to provide encouragement to science fiction writers whose books examine the meaning of freedom, the Libertarian Futurist Society revived the Prometheus Award for best libertarian novel of the year. LFS began in 1982 sponsoring the annual Prometheus Award for Best Novel

This year’s race for Best Novel resluted in a tie and was awarded to:

The Freedom Maze – Delia Sherman

About the book:
“Thirteen-year-old Sophie isn’t happy about spending summer at her grandmother’s old house in the Bayou. But the house has a maze Sophie can’t resist exploring once she finds it has a secretive and playful inhabitant. When she makes an impulsive wish, she slips one hundred years into the past, to the year 1860. Once she makes her way, bedraggled and tanned, to what will one day be her grandmother’s house, she is taken for a slave.”

Ready Player One – Ernest Cline

About the book:
“At once wildly original and stuffed with irresistible nostalgia, Ready Player One is a spectacularly genre-busting, ambitious, and charming debut-part quest novel, part love story, and part virtual space opera set in a universe where spell-slinging mages battle giant Japanese robots, entire planets are inspired by Blade Runner, and flying DeLoreans achieve light speed.”