Sad news this morning as we mourn the passing of one of the greats of science fiction, Harry Harrison. Harrison, 87, was best known as the author of Make Room! Make Room! (the basis for the film Soylent Green), for the Deathworld novels, and for his twelve novels about Slippery Jim DeGriz, the Stainless Steel Rat.
Harrison actually started out as an illustrator working on SF comics including Weird Science and Weird Fantasy before switching to writing—he was also the main writer for the Flash Gordon comic strip during the 1950s and 60s. In his short stories and novels, Harrison often tackled serious issues (such as overpopulation), but he is equally beloved for his humorous and satirical work, including Bill, the Galactic Hero (which spoofs Robert A. Heinlein’s Starship Troopers). In his long and celebrated career, Harrison helped raise the bar for science fiction, both through his own work and as an editor and anthologist. He will be greatly missed.
Congratulations to the winners! But I did notice onr thing: Lois Bujold is 2/2 on the Best Series. But I think she’s out of series. So I wonder who will win next year.
I have crunched the numbers here.
Closest result of the night was Best Editor Short Form – Lynne M. Thomas and Michael D. Thomas finished just 6 votes ahead of Sheila Williams.
Most crushing victory was File 770 for Best Fanzine, 20 votes short of a first-count win, easily getting there on the second count.
Missed being on the final ballot by a single nominating vote:
Archive of Our Own (Best Related), would have replaced Sleeping with Monsters;
C.C. Finlay (Best Editor, Short Form), would have replaced Sheila Williams;
Yuko Shimizu (Best Professional Artist), would have replaced Kathleen Jennings;
Black Gate (Best Fanzine), would have replaced Rocket Stack Rank.
Declined nomination:
Best Series – The Broken Earth (N.K. Jemisin);
Best Editor Long Form – Liz Gorinsky;
Best Professional Artist – Julie Dillon;
Best Fancast – Tea and Jeopardy
For Best Series, N.K. Jemisin declined for The Broken Earth;
the following were ruled ineligible, due to not having added enough to the series since last year:
The Expanse,
The Craft Sequence,
the October Daye books
@1 – Don’t forget Sharing Knife, which is pretty nifty too.
Congrats to all of the authors and to Tor, who had another strong year.
Aha. Jemisin declined. That explains a lot, as I couldn’t figure out how the heck Broken Earth didn’t even get nominated. And it makes sense, the idea of the series award was, at least in part, to call attention to series that didn’t have individual books strong enough to win the Hugo. Obviously, that was not the case with Broken Earth.
Oh the hold list already for best novella and just started [book one of the series for] the best novel at my local library…and it turns out I have best Graphic Story sitting in my pile of library books at home.
Seems I’ve got some reading to do.
Well done Hugo winners!
The Broken Earth books were the only ones that ever made 2nd person Point of View work for me as a reader.
@3, RobM, but the rules of the Series award is a new work must have been added to the series in the year of eligibly. Since the Sharing Knife is finished, it can’t get a nod. While I love Bujold, the Sharing Knife is not for me. It has a cool magic system, but the rest of the story bugs me.
So, it’s open season on who will win the next Series Award. :-D
All around, a pretty good year. (1943 wasn’t bad, either) Only a couple of my actual first choices won, but there was nothing to argue with.
@6 I wonder if next year might be October Daye’s year for Best Series. InCryptid came in second according to the stats published by @2 (thanks for your hard work!), and I think October Daye is by far the stronger of the two. With two volumes published since its last nomination it would be very strange if it didn’t make the cut on rules grounds again. With Bujold out of the picture for the foreseeable future, it may open up the category.
I do hope that Jemisin’s declining the nomination doesn’t set a precedent for turning Best Series into a lesser category than Best Novel. I do think that the genre needs an award for a work in which the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, as opposed to a backup award for “good, but not good enough for Best Novel”. I’d hate to end up with a situation like the Oscars, where the existence of Best Animated Film seems to be making it artificially difficult to nominate an animated film for Best Picture.
@8 I found it interesting that InCryptid placed second this year while October Daye placed sixth last year. (I agree with you that the latter is the stronger series.) I suspect this may reflect the difference in electorates between a California WorldCon and a Finnish one, and to the extent that it does (the strength of the rest of the field being the most obvious other factor) I also suspect next year’s Irish WorldCon’s membership will be closer to the latter than the former. But who knows really.
@6 – Well, Ms. B could fix that defect by writing another work in the SK world. Dr. Dag, Medicine Man anyone?