From the Renovation website:

Best Novel
Blackout/All Clear by Connie Willis (Ballantine Spectra)
Cryoburn by Lois McMaster Bujold (Baen)
The Dervish House by Ian McDonald (Gollancz; Pyr)
Feed by Mira Grant (Orbit)
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin (Orbit)

Best Novella
“The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers beneath the Queen’s Window” by Rachel Swirsky (Subterranean Magazine, Summer 2010)
The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang (Subterranean)
“The Maiden Flight of McCauley’s Bellerophon” by Elizabeth Hand (Stories: All New Tales, William Morrow)
“The Sultan of the Clouds” by Geoffrey A. Landis (Asimov’s, September 2010)
“Troika” by Alastair Reynolds (Godlike Machines, Science Fiction Book Club)

Best Novelette
“Eight Miles” by Sean McMullen (Analog, September 2010)
“The Emperor of Mars” by Allen M. Steele (Asimov’s, June 2010)
“The Jaguar House, in Shadow” by Aliette de Bodard (Asimov’s, July 2010)
“Plus or Minus” by James Patrick Kelly (Asimov’s, December 2010)
“That Leviathan, Whom Thou Hast Made” by Eric James Stone (Analog, September 2010)

Best Short Story
“Amaryllis” by Carrie Vaughn (Lightspeed, June 2010)
“For Want of a Nail” by Mary Robinette Kowal (Asimov’s, September 2010)
“Ponies” by Kij Johnson (Tor.com, November 17, 2010)
“The Things” by Peter Watts (Clarkesworld, January 2010)

Best Related Work
Bearings: Reviews 1997-2001, by Gary K. Wolfe (Beccon)
The Business of Science Fiction: Two Insiders Discuss Writing and Publishing, by Mike Resnick and Barry N. Malzberg (McFarland)
Chicks Dig Time Lords: A Celebration of Doctor Who by the Women Who Love It, edited by Lynne M. Thomas and Tara O’Shea (Mad Norwegian)
Robert A. Heinlein: In Dialogue with His Century, Volume 1: (1907–1948): Learning Curve, by William H. Patterson, Jr. (Tor)
Writing Excuses, Season 4, by Brandon Sanderson, Jordan Sanderson, Howard Tayler, Dan Wells

Best Graphic Story
Fables: Witches, written by Bill Willingham; illustrated by Mark Buckingham (Vertigo)
Girl Genius, Volume 10: Agatha Heterodyne and the Guardian Muse, written by Phil and Kaja Foglio; art by Phil Foglio; colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
Grandville Mon Amour, by Bryan Talbot (Dark Horse)
Schlock Mercenary: Massively Parallel, written and illustrated by Howard Tayler; colors by Howard Tayler and Travis Walton (Hypernode)
The Unwritten, Volume 2: Inside Man, written by Mike Carey; illustrated by Peter Gross (Vertigo)

Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1, screenplay by Steve Kloves; directed by David Yates (Warner)
How to Train Your Dragon, screenplay by William Davies, Dean DeBlois & Chris Sanders; directed by Dean DeBlois & Chris Sanders (DreamWorks)
Inception, written and directed by Christopher Nolan (Warner)
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, screenplay by Michael Bacall & Edgar Wright; directed by Edgar Wright (Universal)
Toy Story 3, screenplay by Michael Arndt; story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton & Lee Unkrich; directed by Lee Unkrich (Pixar/Disney)

Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form
Doctor Who: “A Christmas Carol,” written by Steven Moffat; directed by Toby Haynes (BBC Wales)
Doctor Who: “The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang,” written by Steven Moffat; directed by Toby Haynes (BBC Wales)
Doctor Who: “Vincent and the Doctor,” written by Richard Curtis; directed by Jonny Campbell (BBC Wales)
Fuck Me, Ray Bradbury, written by Rachel Bloom; directed by Paul Briganti
The Lost Thing, written by Shaun Tan; directed by Andrew Ruhemann and Shaun Tan (Passion Pictures)

Best Editor, Short Form
John Joseph Adams
Stanley Schmidt
Jonathan Strahan
Gordon Van Gelder
Sheila Williams

Best Editor, Long Form
Lou Anders
Ginjer Buchanan
Moshe Feder
Liz Gorinsky
Nick Mamatas
Beth Meacham
Juliet Ulman

Best Professional Artist
Daniel Dos Santos
Bob Eggleton
Stephan Martiniere
John Picacio
Shaun Tan

Best Semiprozine
Clarkesworld, edited by Neil Clarke, Cheryl Morgan, Sean Wallace; podcast directed by Kate Baker
Interzone, edited by Andy Cox
Lightspeed, edited by John Joseph Adams
Locus, edited by Liza Groen Trombi and Kirsten Gong-Wong
Weird Tales, edited by Ann VanderMeer and Stephen H. Segal

Best Fanzine
Banana Wings, edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
Challenger, edited by Guy H. Lillian III
The Drink Tank, edited by Christopher J Garcia and James Bacon
File 770, edited by Mike Glyer
StarShipSofa, edited by Tony C. Smith

Best Fan Writer
James Bacon
Claire Brialey
Christopher J Garcia
James Nicoll
Steven H Silver

Best Fan Artist
Brad W. Foster
Randall Munroe
Maurine Starkey
Steve Stiles
Taral Wayne

John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer
Award for the best new professional science fiction or fantasy writer of 2009 or 2010, sponsored by Dell Magazines (not a Hugo Award).
Saladin Ahmed
Lauren Beukes
Larry Correia
Lev Grossman
Dan Wells
Note: All finalists are in their 2nd year of eligibility.

My first thoughts? Meh.

I dunno, beyond the Campbell nominees, the list just doesn’t excite me. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms was good, but not Hugo-worthy. Cryoburn is the nth volume in a long-running series that I’ve not read. Blackout and All Clear were published as two volumes and should be counted as such. Feed keeps appearing on awards lists, but nothing I’ve heard about it seems even vaguely interesting (or above-average). I will admit to having keen interest in The Dervish House, and plan to read it later this year. The list of nominees kinda reminds me of the year Shakespeare in Love won the Oscar for Best Picture.

The Campbell list is great. I loved The Magicians by Grossman. Ahmed is one of my favourite short fiction writers (and I’m dreadfully excited for the 2012 release of the first volume of his Crescent Moon series) and Beukes is one of the most interesting young writers to hit the scene in years.

The editor lists look good. Daniel Dos Santos should win the Best Artist award. Semiprozine Award is strong and I’d be happy to see any of them win.

But don’t even get me started on the Best Fanzine and Best Fan Writer awards. Maybe I’m exposing my ignorance here, but beyond StarShipSofa, I haven’t heard of a damn one, nor am I familiar with any of the writers. My beef, obviously, is the lack of presence of blogs, bloggers and online writers. Where’re the Nialls (Harrison and Alexander)? Where’s Abigail Nussbaum or Adam Whitehead? No nod for SF Signal? Really?

I know the root of the awards and the SF/F fan-writing is firmly rooted in ‘zines, but it’s time for the writers and the voters to grow up and recognize that the online sphere is producing some of the best commentary on the genre and reaches a far greater audience. Hell, my blog boasts only a slightly lower number of monthly readers than Realms of Fantasy, Asimov’s and Interzone (Source: Warren Ellis, numbers are from 2008 and have likely dropped even further since), all of which are considered professional magazines, and I’m a small fry compared to many of the other blogs and fan writers on the web. I can only imagine that the reach of the ‘zines is even smaller than that. The entirety of eFanzines.com, which hosts several of these ‘zines, gets less than half the traffic that A Dribble of Ink does. The name and nature of the award both need a looking at. At least Ansible wasn’t nominated again.

Does anyone know when we’ll see a full list of votes cast? What are your thoughts on this list?

Discussion
  • Lindsay Smith April 25, 2011 at 11:06 am

    Agreed on Lev Grossman–though I was under the impression he’d published some historical thrillers before THE MAGICIANS. N. K. Jemisin is the only of the nominated novels I’ve read, but THTK blew me away. I’ll be very surprised if it doesn’t win.

  • neth April 25, 2011 at 11:46 am

    Bah – the Hugo awards are a legacy of pre-internet science fiction fandom. They traditionally neglect all things fantasy and female (just to name a couple) and the voting is pretty much limited to a few hundred aging baby-boomer men (I’m sure it’s an over-generalization – but really, is it?). It’s hardly a representative award for the SFF world. Frankly, it shouldn’t be given half the attention it receives – even if they do occaissionly get a nomination or award right.

  • John Stevens April 25, 2011 at 12:20 pm

    Oh, I shall have thee an answer for that, sirrah! :-) Check my Apex post tomorrow.

    Briefly, I think you have a point, Aidan, but the Hugos are an ambivalent conundrum: they are voted on by fans, but a very select group of fans. I do not know the voting mix but I do know it is not just middled-aged WASPs, given exchanges I have seen and had with folks about it. It is certainly a small subset of readers, but they are readers who really care about the genre. At the same time, they often favor older authors and less adventurous books, although the choices are usually solid. Like I said, there is ambivalence there.

    I think your point about ignoring websites and blogs is pretty spot-on. I would love to see more hard numbers about visits, comments, linking, etc., to get a better picture of how the ideoscape for fantastika is changing. My first thought is that you’re right, that traffic and interest gravitates more towards blogs, but do we then need more specificity about blog vs. fan writer, site v. online ‘zine? Hmmmm. . . .

  • John Joseph Adams April 25, 2011 at 1:05 pm

    Aidan,

    The full breakdown of nominations (how many nominations each work or person received, including those below the finalist cutoff) is typically revealed after the Hugo winners are presented, along with the detailed breakdown of the (complicated Australian ballot) finalist voting.

  • S. Eric Rhoads (WordTipping) April 25, 2011 at 1:14 pm

    I have been puzzled by the antipathy for The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. Even today Peter Ahlstrom, Brandon Sanderson’s editor, was slamming tHTK.

    While tHTK was not the best novel written last year in my opinion it was a very good novel. More importantly it was a good novel that did something quite unique and important…it presented a strong female lead in a balanced and realistic way; destroying the traditional gender tropes endemic in fantasy. The fact that the lead was strong and embodied both creative and destructive powers I think was amazing.

    There are a number of other social issues that are subtly addressed in tHTK but the aforementioned is the most important. I think this is the basis for the Hugo Nomination.

  • aidan April 25, 2011 at 1:23 pm

    Thanks, John. That’s what I thought.

    Congrats on your nominations, by the way!

  • Doug M. April 25, 2011 at 2:00 pm

    Yeah, Feed was an OK book. Best Novel nomination material? Hardly. I could have sworn that Adam Troy-Castro’s short story “Arvies” was nominated… or was that for a Nebula? I can’t keep ’em straight. Great, great short, anyway.

  • Alex April 25, 2011 at 3:11 pm

    Hello Aiden
    First time poster…
    I was hoping to see their The Bone Palace by Amanda Downum, wasn’t really surprised she wasn’t there. Then I googled her and was shocked how much she is under the radar almost no reviews online (at least not on the blogs\sites I’m familiar with).

    I post it her because of two reasons – first time I heard her name was her in an interview with Jesse Bullington from 2009 (it says something about me that I followed a randomly thrown name in an interview, but good reading material is hard to come by).

    The second reason is you patting yourself on the back, on how the digital media is so much better than the written one, and you are – I just wish you weren’t such a herd, reviewing the same books and riding the same hype.

    Apologizes for any grammatical and other errors, English is not my first language.

  • SMD April 26, 2011 at 4:19 am

    I’ll be totally honest: StarShipSofa isn’t even a fanzine anymore. They’re a publisher. They stopped being a fanzine when they started selling merchandise.

    And I agree with you about the absence of bloggers, etc. on the list. But what are you going to do? It’s a popularity contest, not an accurate measure of anyone’s actual worth to the community. The awards are, thus, heavily controlled by format politics.

  • aidan April 26, 2011 at 9:02 am

    @Alex — Welcome to the blog!

    On your word, I picked up a copy of The Bone Palace last night and added it to the ever growing pile of books beside my desk.

  • DongWon April 26, 2011 at 10:08 am

    Hey, glad to hear the enthusiasm for Amanda Downum. She’s a brilliant writer and The Bone Palace is a terrific book. It is, however, the second book in the series and while they can be read separately, it’ll definitely be easier on a new reader to start with The Drowning City.

  • Peter Ahlstrom April 26, 2011 at 10:56 am

    S. Eric Rhoads (WordTipping)
    I have been puzzled by the antipathy for The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. Even today Peter Ahlstrom, Brandon Sanderson’s editor, was slamming tHTK.

    Hold on, here’s all I said: “I’ve read so many laughably bad quotes from The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms on the Westeros forums…is it really worth reading?”

    I’m asking because I haven’t read the book and want to know. Folks on the Literature forum at ASOIAF Westeros lambasted it in the threads I read, and their quotes from the novel didn’t impress me, so I had no desire to read it. But now it’s been nominated for best novel. So I’m wondering if I should reconsider.

    Anyway, I’m not Brandon’s editor. I’m his Personal Editorial Assistant and Extra Brain. Moshe Feder is Brandon’s editor.

    I’ve read Cryoburn and liked it, but felt it was a much weaker novel than Bujold’s previous best novel nominees and winners. Paladin of Souls was a fantastic book, for instance, and I voted for it for best novel and was thrilled when it won. But something about Cryoburn just wasn’t up to snuff. The most interesting part was the very beginning when Miles was hallucinating, and there was a minor character POV later that I just couldn’t care about. And while the theme of the book obviously has to do with what suddenly happened at the end, it seemed like Lois wasn’t quite able to bring herself to deal with what she really wanted to deal with, and instead it’s left for another novel. So anyway, I’d like to vote for a different novel. My preferred nominee didn’t make the final ballot, so I’ll have to sample the others. (Not sure I want to tackle Willis; I loved every other chapter of Doomsday Book but hated the future outbreak stuff, and couldn’t get very far into To Say Nothing of the Dog though I may try again sometime.)

  • aidan April 26, 2011 at 11:46 am

    @DongWon — Thanks for dropping by to clear that up. Looking again, I see that it was The Drowning City that I picked up, so I’m in good shape!

    @Peter — For what it’s worth, I really enjoyed The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. I’ve followed that thread on Westeros also, but many of those quotes (which can be somewhat loaded and full of cheese) are taken out of context and aren’t so bad in the narrative of the novel. It’s worth a look.

    You mention that your preferred nominee didn’t make the ballot. What novel was that?

  • Kathleen April 26, 2011 at 12:00 pm

    They traditionally neglect all things fantasy and female

    except for this year, obviously.

  • Kathleen April 26, 2011 at 12:04 pm

    are the commenters criticizing THTK at Westeros the same ones who were saying women shouldn’t write fantasy?

  • Andrea K Host April 26, 2011 at 3:48 pm

    Is there a reason you haven’t read Bujold? The Vorkosigan series is pretty amazing, starting out as clever space adventure, and reaching its heights around “Memory”. It does some nice stuff with cultural shifts following changes in technology. [I’d start with “Warrior’s Apprentice” if I was picking it up.]

    Fan-nominated awards are always a bit of a mixed basket, since size of audience/noteriety greatly impacts a book’s chances of being shortlisted. I was eligible to nominate, since I attended WorldCon, but since I hadn’t read anything which really transported me, I didn’t take up the option. [Of those shortlisted, I really enjoyed “Cryoburn”, but didn’t quite consider it outstanding, and felt “Blackout” would have been a far better novel at half the length.]

  • aidan April 26, 2011 at 3:52 pm

    @Kathleen — I must’ve missed those comments. Link?

    @Andrea — No reason, she’s just one of those gaps in my reading history. I bought The Curse of Chalion a few years ago and had hoped to read it sometime soon. Like you mention, I might not be interested in Cryoburn for obvious reasons, but it’s nomination did remind me that I’ve got to track down a copy of Warrior’s Apprentice sometime.

  • Andrea K Host April 26, 2011 at 4:17 pm

    There’s a good chance it’ll be in Baen’s Free Library as an ebook. [Can’t check from here, but since I received a CD with all the preceding Vorkosigan books on it free with my copy of Cryoburn, it seems a fair chance.]

  • aidan April 26, 2011 at 4:28 pm

    Ahh, good thinking, Andrea. Just downloaded it! I always forget about that Baen library.

    Cheers.

  • Doug M. April 26, 2011 at 4:50 pm

    “but since I received a CD with all the preceding Vorkosigan books on it free with my copy of Cryoburn, it seems a fair chance.”

    That CD (with Cryoburn and the entire Vorkosigan saga) you received is available for free download (legally, with Baen’s and Bujold’s permission) from the Fifth Imperium website. That’s 14 novels in multiple formats plus various interviews and other tidbits.

    http://baencd.thefifthimperium.com/24-CryoburnCD/CryoburnCD/

  • neth April 26, 2011 at 9:05 pm

    Kathleen
    They traditionally neglect all things fantasy and female
    except for this year, obviously.

    This year is an exception – I stand by the statement that traditionally these things are ignored. We’ll see if this year is the beginning of trend. It may be, but it all depends on who’s bothering to nominate and vote.

    Kathleen
    are the commenters criticizing THTK at Westeros the same ones who were saying women shouldn’t write fantasy?

    No, not at all. While Westeros can go really heavy into vitriol when discussing books/authors they don’t like, I think that the discussions around THTK offer a lot of very valid criticisms. And it’s actually rather split – about half really liked the book, about half not so much.

    I fall into the same area as Aidan on it – I liked THTK quite a bit, but I don’t think it belongs on a short list for the best books of the year. And I’ve only read around 35 2010 releases.

    Of the shortlisted novels, I’ve only read THTK and The Dervish House. I wouldn’t have picked either, though I realize I’m in the minority for my opinions on The Dervish House.

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  • James Davis Nicoll April 27, 2011 at 7:31 am

    But don’t even get me started on the Best Fanzine and Best Fan Writer awards. Maybe I’m exposing my ignorance here, but beyond StarShipSofa, I haven’t heard of a damn one, nor am I familiar with any of the writers. My beef, obviously, is the lack of presence of blogs, bloggers and online writers.

    Apparently the net is large enough for us not to have run into each other in the 25 years I’ve been online + however long you’ve been online but aside from one thing back in the 1980s most of what I’ve done fannish writingwise have been online; first USENET and then later livejournal.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Nicoll

    I’m not saying “vote for me”, although I am also not saying “don’t vote for me” (campaigning for Hugos is an abomination) but I am a blogger, even if you’ve not heard of me.

    File770 won the Hugo in 1984,1985,1989, 2000,2001, and 2008 and was nominated in 1980, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1987, 1988, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2009, 2010 and 2011. How many wins and nominations would you say it needs to really count? And I note it’s online here:

    http://file770.com/

    So it’s a blog.

    Steven H. Silver’s been up nine times, so clearly someone has heard of him, whether it’s for founding the Sidewise award or for Argentus or the other things he does. He also blogs.

  • James Davis Nicoll April 27, 2011 at 8:05 am

    campaigning for Hugos is an abomination

    Campaigning for oneself, I mean.VOTE FOR NICK MAMATAS FOR BEST EDITOR!

  • aidan April 27, 2011 at 8:17 am

    My point being, James, that the Hugo voters keep dipping their pens back into the same pot year-after-year without (in my most humble opinion, of course) giving proper consideration to some of the newer writers and blogs that have arisen in the past few years.

    The inclusion of a writer like yourself on the 2010 ballot is absolutely a step in the right direction. Thanks to Niall Harrison (and several others on twitter), I’ve been directed to your blog and look forward to exploring your opinions. Maybe next year we can end up on the ballot together. Or I’ll get knocked off thanks to Ansible making a comeback.

  • neth April 27, 2011 at 8:41 am

    Honesly, I think that James pointing out that long-time fan-writers who receive repeat nominations (and have happened to migrate to the web over the years) only reinforces the idea of how out of touch the Hugos are.

  • Jonathan M April 27, 2011 at 8:52 am

    I Agree with Neth.

    I think that Aidan’s irritation flows from the fact that the Hugo fan-writing pool is composed largely of older fans whose interaction with the SFF blogosphere is limited. People like Aidan and others regularly review and comment and interact with a whole bunch of people but none of these people show up on the shortlist because the shortlist is filled with a bunch of people who have been on there for ages for reasons that are largely impenetrable to the sphere of people that Aidan and people like him interact with.

    In short, Aidan and his ilk are largely invisible to Hugo voters and the people that ARE visible to Hugo voters are largely invisible to people such as Aidan and his ilk.

    Angrily responding that people on the shortlist have been getting nominated for Hugos since the 80s neither refutes Aidan nor addresses the problem: It underlies it.

  • James Davis Nicoll April 27, 2011 at 9:20 am

    I am not angry. If you think I am, you are interrogating my comment from the wrong perspective.

    “I haven’t heard of a damn one, nor am I familiar with any of the writers” seems like a really weak way to argue that the same grognards are getting nominated over and over and that’s not how I interpreted that line; I took it to mean that the writer had not heard of the works and authors in question. If indeed the meaning was “these people again” I myself would not have then said “I haven’t heard of a damn one, nor am I familiar with any of the writers.” I freely grant people’s kilometerage may vary.

    I am not hostile to the idea that new people should be nominated (it’s my second nomination and my first one was only last year [1]), I am not hostile to the idea of bloggers being nominated (being a blogger myself, it’s in my best interests not to be). In fact, I am not even arguing with that point, just that there are not bloggers being nominated.

    1: The same year I had the bright idea of pointing out Fred Pohl was eligible for the Best Fan Writer Hugo. Go me! But I came in 4th so it’s not like it cost me a Hugo.

  • Steven H Silver April 27, 2011 at 9:55 am

    Neth commented “long-time fan-writers who receive repeat nominations (and have happened to migrate to the web over the years)”

    I’d like to point out, looking at this year’s crop of nominees (and yes, I’m the “old man” on the list), note these are generalities, but then, Neth’s comment was a generality and incorrect in its assertion that the long-time fan-writers migrated to the web)…

    James Bacon…Writes for both on-line and paper fanzines.
    Claire Brialey…Publishes and writes for a paper fanzine.
    Christopher J Garcia…Writes for fanzines, most of which are produced on-line and his primary fanzine, Drink Tank, is entirely on-line.
    James Nicoll…Primarily known for Usenet postings and his blog
    Steven H Silver…First Best Fan Writer nomination based on on-line writing (I had done very little print fannish writings prior to my first nomination)

  • Christopher J Garcia April 27, 2011 at 10:45 am

    Jonathan M
    I Agree with Neth.
    I think that Aidan’s irritation flows from the fact that the Hugo fan-writing pool is composed largely of older fans whose interaction with the SFF blogosphere is limited. People like Aidan and others regularly review and comment and interact with a whole bunch of people but none of these people show up on the shortlist because the shortlist is filled with a bunch of people who have been on there for ages for reasons that are largely impenetrable to the sphere of people that Aidan and people like him interact with.
    In short, Aidan and his ilk are largely invisible to Hugo voters and the people that ARE visible to Hugo voters are largely invisible to people such as Aidan and his ilk.
    Angrily responding that people on the shortlist have been getting nominated for Hugos since the 80s neither refutes Aidan nor addresses the problem: It underlies it.

    Well, as one of the nominees, I gotta admit, I’m not young (36), but I only started my Fan Writing in 2002, doing a lot of it in 2004 and started my zine The Drink Tank in 2005. I’m almost exclusively a on-line writer, my primary appearances, though, tend to be in eZines and not blogs. I don’t blog much anymore, and I’m not quite a fan of blogs. They just don’t do it for me most of the time, but I read zines rabidly, especially on-line at eFanzines.com.

    I would agree there are a lot of folks in the zining community who completely refuse to read blogs, and it’s also true that there are folks who are deep into the eScene who have never read a fanzine, neither print nor eZine, and they don’t want to. It’s one of the most frustrating things. It’s hard to get people to read The Other Stuff, whether it’s Zine fans to read Blogs or vice-versa.

    But then again, Niall Harrison writes for zines pretty regularly, including Banana Wings and The Drink Tank, and there are a bunch of bloggers that I work with to bring content into my zines.

    From my end, I just wish folks would give us Zines a chance. I’d love it if blog-regulars would take a look at what’s going on at eFanzines.com for example and see what’s out there in the would of zines.
    Chris

  • Kathleen April 27, 2011 at 12:29 pm

    aidan – I looked around and couldn’t find the comments I was thinking of. maybe I am thinking of a different forum.

  • James Enge April 27, 2011 at 1:34 pm

    This is like any political process, it seems to me. If you want a better result (in the sense of: one that reflects your own views), you should get involved: buy a membership; encourage other like-minded people to do the same; create a voting constituency for your point of view. I’m sure the guys running WorldCon (any WorldCon) wouldn’t be upset by this.

    Members of Renovation get to nominate for the following year, I think. So the time to make an impact on this year’s nominations is past. But the time to make an impact on next year’s nominations is now.

    JE

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  • Kevin Standlee May 13, 2011 at 2:47 pm

    Although this thread is obviously Internet Ancient History, being more than two weeks old, I only now noticed it and feel moved to comment. I hope it doesn’t come across as “mansplaining.” I don’t mean it to be. But as a passionate advocate for the Hugo Awards and as someone who has spend more than twenty years as a volunteer with the World Science Fiction Society, it pains me to hear old canards repeated as if they were obvious and irrefutable Truth.

    Neth:

    They traditionally neglect all things fantasy…

    The Hugo Awards are explicitly open to works of science fiction and fantasy. I find your comment particularly ironic given that in recent years I have seen quite a few complaints that too much fantasy is being nominated, particularly after Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire won in 2001. And really, do you consider American Gods (2002), Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (2005), and The Graveyard Book (2009) to be “neglecting fantasy”?

    …and female (just to name a couple)…

    Connie Willis. Lois McMaster Bujold. Cherie Priest. Catherynne M. Valente. Naomi Novik. I could keep going. (This does include both Novel winners and nominees.) What percentage of women would be enough to satisfy you? There are, however, some good (and most unfortunate IMO) reasons why women authors may be underrepresented in the Hugo Awards, and I hope that this year’s nominations are the sign of a changing of attitudes.

    …and the voting is pretty much limited to a few hundred aging baby-boomer men…

    The eligible electorate is all of the members of last year’s World Science Fiction Convention in Melbourne, Australia, combined with the members of this year’s World Science Fiction Convention in Reno, Nevada. That’s hardly “a few hundred aging baby-boomer men,” although the “aging baby-boomer” part may have more validity than I might find comfortable. (I was born in 1965.) Thus there were something around 5,000 people eligible to nominate, of whom just over 1,000 chose to do so. I’d be happier if more of the eligible members exercised their right to nominate, but just as in the mundane world, it’s often hard to get people to use their voting rights. (Just look at the low turnout in most elections, and at “donkey voting” in those places that make voting compulsory.)

    Before anyone even starts: You don’t have to attend Worldcon to vote. A supporting membership (currently around $50) gives you voting rights. Yes, that’s considered too much for your membership dues to the World Science Fiction Society by some; indeed, I’m sure some people are convinced that any membership dues would be Wrong, but I’m equally sure that if voting cost nothing, many of the same people complaining now about the “elitist” nature of the Awards would be complaining about “too many people voting.” BTW, there are pending changes to WSFS rules that may lead to the cost of voting coming down in the future, possibly to approximately the cost of a new hardcover book. I think that’s about the right target amount. (Any attending member of this year’s Worldcon can come to the WSFS Business Meeting and vote on those changes, and I encourage anyone with an interest to do so.)

    Yes, the Hugo Awards are presented by a club, and the members of that club give their awards to the works that their most active members like. But the entry barriers to participation are really quite low, and the solution to perceived bad nominees is to get more people to participate who agree with your opinions. Like lots of things in life, 90% of success is showing up.

    James Enge is right: all of the members of this year’s Worldcon are eligible to nominate in next year’s Hugo Awards, as are all of the people who join next year’s Worldcon before January 31, 2012. So if you want to have an influence on the 2012 Hugo Awards to be presented in Chicago next year, the time to get active and involved is now.

  • Kevin Standlee May 13, 2011 at 2:51 pm

    My beef, obviously, is the lack of presence of blogs, bloggers and online writers.

    An especially ironic comment in light of the number of people I’ve seen complaining bitterly about the inclusion of StarShipSofa in Best Fanzine and saying, “Who He?” about some of the recent nominees in Best Fan Writer like James Nicholl.

    Did you nominate? Did you encourage other people to nominate? Are you a member of this year or next year’s Worldcon? The way you make things change is to participate, not just to gripe online. It really doesn’t take a huge number of nominations to make the final ballot in those categories, after all.

  • […] I promised I’d return to Aidan Moher’s questions about the fan Hugo nominees: […]

  • […] Sound familiar? Martin further expands on these ideas in the comments section of the post in discussion with Kevin Standlee and Steven H. Silver, both of who are respected members of the fan community and have strong ties to the Hugo Awards. The requirement that a fanzine must have “discrete issues” printed on a “periodical basis” just strikes me as a roundabout way to exclude blogs without actually saying “blogs need not apply.” You might as well stick in a clause requiring that fanzines be printed on twilltone. […]

  • Harper Jayne January 30, 2012 at 11:22 am

    The solution is, in my eyes, to expand the awards with a new category for electronic media. This would include podcasts, blogs, etc. This new category would allow traditional zines to continue to have their place (which I believe they have earned over the years) while offering the new media folks a chance to earn a shot at an award.

    I would like to point out something slightly amusing as an aside. A great deal of attention from new media outlets is paid to the old world of traditionally published books. The books that Orbit or Pyr or Golancz or Tor or whoever thinks you should read.

    This means that the struggle for establishing legitimacy for bloggers, podcasters and other new media participants mirrors in many ways those tribulations of the authors (like myself) who write in order to self publish.

    Now I don’t necessarily suggest we split off a Hugo for self-published long/short forms. But looking at the parallels, is that such a crazy idea? Self-published works are largely ignored by the people who are voting for Hugos. Nebulas cannot even be voted for by other self-published authors since the membership in the SFWA is still restricted to people who have jumped through the hoop of getting a novel or three short stories published.

    So, like those who pour their hard work into putting out fantastic content for readers (I only recently discovered this blog but it’s my new favorite) only to have it be prohibited from consideration for one of the industry’s highest accolades, self-published authors also have to work against the traditional stigmas which are present in the industry.

    Just something to ponder.

  • […] is a subject that I’ve written about on a few occasions (like this, or this, or this). I think it’s integral to keeping the Hugo Awards relevant in the industry […]

  • Danny in Canada July 11, 2014 at 7:59 am

    “They traditionally neglect all things fantasy and female.”

    It’s amazing how strange that looks a mere three years later, with certain bloggers being upset that the Hugos are now *too* female-friendly and fantasy-centric, to the point that they feel organized opposition is required.