Hugos in detail

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Headlines:

  • Closest results of the night were for Best Related Work, the final margin for the Writing Excuses podcast being only 3 votes over The Cambridge Companion to Fantasy, after a tie-break on the penultimate count between the Cambridge Companion and Chicks Unravel Time. Second place was also decided by a mere five votes (Chicks Unravel Time this time ahead of the Cambridge Companion.)
  • The Unwritten Vol 6 missed nomination for Best Graphic Story by five votes; 15 people nominated The Unwritten without specifying whether they were nominating Vol 5 or Vol 6.
  • "The Waves" by Ken Liu (Novelette), The Writer and the Critic (Fancast), Abigail Nussbaum (Fan Writer) and Taral Wayne (Fan Artist) all missed nomination by one vote.
  • If the threshold for nominations had been 4% instead of 5%, there would have been eight nominees for Best Short Story rather than three.
  • Tansy Rayner Roberts won Best Fan Writer despite narrowly scraping into the fifth place in nominations. (Well done Tansy!) Mark Oshiro had more nominations for Best Fan Writer than the next two nominees combined, but still came only fourth in the actual award voting.
  • SF Signal crushed all opposition in the Best Fanzine category.
  • “The Lady Astronaut of Mars” by Mary Robinette Kowal got enough votes to qualify for nomination for Best Novelette, but was ruled ineligible due to being an audiobook.

Full results here.

Best Novel:

  • A convincing win for Redshirts (which also had the most nominations) by 827 to 614 for Captain Vorpatril's Alliance on the final count. Captain Vorpatril's Alliance was behind 2312 on first preferences (though it got mine), but overtook the Robinson book on transfers from Blackout.
  • Captain Vorpatril's Alliance again came from behind to take second place, 2312 came third, Throne of the Crescent Moon (which had lagged in previous counts) fourth, and Blackout fifth, all by decent margins.
  • The nearest miss among nominations was Monster Hunter Legion by Larry Correia, which got 101 votes to Throne of the Crescent Moon's 118.

Best Novella:

  • The Emperor's Soul (which also had the most nominations) won by 699 to 541 for "The Stars Do Not Lie" on the final count. One of those votes was mine.
  • "The Stars Do Not Lie" lost second place also, by a smaller margin, to After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall, but took third place over San Diego 2014 convincingly. San Diego 2014 then lost to On A Red Station, Drifting, for fourth place.
  • “In the House of Aryaman, a Lonely Signal Burns” by Elizabeth Bear missed nomination by 7 votes.

Best Novelette:

  • "The Girl-Thing Who Went Out for Sushi" won by 659 to 550 for "In Sea-Salt Tears" on the final count.
  • The other places were also decided by substantial margins, "In Sea-Salt Tears" second, "Fade To White" (which had the most nominations and got my vote) third, "Rat-catcher" fourth and "The Boy Who Cast No Shadow" fifth.
  • "The Waves" by Ken Liu missed nomination by 1 vote. "Astrophilia" by Carrie Vaughn missed by 2 votes. "Portrait of Lisanne de Patagnia" by Rachel Swirsky missed by 3.
  • “The Lady Astronaut of Mars” by Mary Robinette Kowal got the third highest number of nominations but was ruled ineligible in this category due to being an audiobook.

Best Short Story:

  • From a limited selection, one of the clearest results I can recall: "Mono no Aware" missed a first-count victory by 30 votes and won on the second with 671 to 439 for "Immersion" (which had by far the most nominations) and 180 for "Mantis Wives", which took second and third place respectively by substantial margins.
  • The nearest miss among potential nominees was "No Place Like Home" by Seanan McGuire, with 30 votes to 34 for "Mantis Wives". Four other stories were tied on 28. If the threshold had been 4% rather than 5%, there would have been eight nominees in this category rather than three.

Best Related Work:

  • The closest results of the night, with Writing Excuses winning by only 3 votes, 418 to 415 for the Cambridge Companion to Fantasy Literature on the final count – and that after an even narrower margin on the penultimate count when both the Cambridge Companion and Chicks Unravel Time were on the same total, the tie being broken by the number of first preferences. Chicks Dig Comics was also not too far behind. .
  • For second place, Chicks Unravel Time beat the Cambridge Companion by a mere five votes, and the Cambridge Companion was again beaten by Chicks Dig Comics for third place, but secured fourth over I Have An Idea for a Book… by a big margin.
  • Chicks Unravel Time had the most nominations, but Writing Excuses was very close (90 and 88 respectively). Hank Reinhardt's Book of Knives: A Practical, Illustrated Guide to Knife Fighting missed nomination by 3 votes. (Whew!)

Best Graphic Story

  • Saga (which had the most nominations) won with 518 votes to 352 for Schlock Mercenary on the final count.
  • Schlock Mercenary also lost second place to Locke and Key, but beat Saucer Country for third place. Saucer Country took fourth place by a margin of five votes from Grandville Bête Noire.
  • The Unwritten, Vol 6: Tommy Taylor and the War of Words missed nomination by five votes, to my personal dismay. 15 people nominated The Unwritten without specifying whether they were supporting volume 5 or volume 6; if they had been more specific it probably would have been on the ballot.

Best Dramatic Presentation – Long Form

  • The Avengers (which had the most nominations) won convincingly, with 755 votes to 392 for The Hobbit and 345 for Looper on the final count.
  • The Hobbit took second place, The Hunger Games third and Looper fourth, all over The Cabin In The Woods which seems to have been particularly transfer-repellent.
  • The closest almost-nominated were John Carter, which missed by 24, then Brave and Wreck-It Ralph.

Best Dramatic Presentation – Short Form

  • Blackwater (which had the most nominations) won convincingly, by 754 to 466 for The Angels Take Manhattan on the final count.
  • Letters of Transit was second on first preferences, but lost out for second place to The Angels Take Manhattan and for third place to Asylum of the Daleks before tying for fourth place with The Snowmen, the only tie of the evening.
  • Nominations here were particularly consensual, the five on the shortlist getting between 89 and 95 votes, and the next down the list (Mark Oshiro's reading of John Scalzi's spoof nominee from last year) getting only 58.

Best Editor – Long Form

  • Patrick Nielsen Hayden won by 385 to 330 for Sheila Gilbert on the final count.
  • Toni Weisskopf, who had been second on first preferences, then took second place by nine votes over Gilbert, who then took third place also by nine votes ahead of Lou Anders (who had the most nominations). Anders took fourth place over Liz Gorinsky by a larger margin.
  • Anne Lesley Groell missed nomination by five votes.

Best Editor – Short Form

  • Stanley Schmidt won by 396 to 368 for Sheila Williams on the final count.
  • Williams took second place by a good margin over John Joseph Adams (which had the most nominations). Adams then took third place over Jonathan Strahan. Strahan then lost fourth place to Neil Clarke by three votes.
  • Ellen Datlow missed nomination by 20 votes.

Best Professional Artist

  • John Picacio (who had the most nominations) won by 586 votes to 387 for Julie Dillon on the final count.
  • Dillon then lost second place to Dan dos Santos by five votes; but won third, Chris McGrath coming fourth and Vincent Chong fifth.
  • Stephan Martiniere missed nomination by eight votes.

Best Semiprozine

  • Clarkesworld (which had the most nominations) won convincingly, with 403 three votes on the final count to 221 for Lightspeed and 178 for Strange Horizons. Beneath Ceaseless Skies had fewer first preferences than No Award.
  • Lightspeed came second, Strange Horizons third, Apex fourth and Beneath Ceaseless Skies fifth, all by clear margins.
  • Locus, which once had a lock on this category, along with the NYRSF and Interzone, missed nomination with votes in the 40s to 75 for Beneath Ceaseless Skies.

Best Fanzine

  • The clearest victory of the night, with SF Signal's 385 votes on the final count dwarfing 153 for Journey Planet, 129 for The Drink Tank and 98 for No Award. (SF Signal also had the most nominations.) Banana Wings and Elitist Book Reviews had fewer first preferences than No Award.
  • The Drink Tank took second place by five votes from Journey Planet, which came third, Banana Wings coming fourth and Elitist Book Reviews fifth.
  • The World SF Blog missed nomination by five votes, Argentus by eight and Challenger by nine.

Best Fancast

  • SF Squeecast (which had the most nominations) won with 370 votes to 245 for SF Signal on the final count. StarShipSofa and Galactic Suburbia both got fewer first preferences than No Award.
  • SF Signal took second place by a big margin over StarShipSofa, which got third place by 12 votes over Coode Street. Coode Street took fourth place over Galactic Suburbia, which came fifth.
  • The Writer and the Critic missed nomination by one vote.

Best Fan Writer

  • Tansy Rayner Roberts won by 285 to 267 for Steven H Silver on the final count, having led narrowly on the first two counts, slipped behind on transfer from No Award and Chris Garcia, and then climbed back with transfers from Mark Oshiro (who had by far the most nominations) . James Bacon got fewer first preferences than No Award.
  • Second place went by a substantial margin to Steve Silver, and third to Chris Garcia. Mark Oshiro, who had by far the most nominations, took fourth place by three votes ahead of James Bacon.
  • Abigail Nussbaum missed nomination by one vote; A Cracked Moon and Charles A Tan by seven, and Liz Bourke by nine.

Best Fan Artist

  • Galen Dara won by 377 to 326 for Brad Foster (who had the most nominations) on the final count. Maurine Starkey got fewer first preferences than No Award.
  • Second and third places went clearly to Brad Foster and Spring Schoenhuth, and Maurine Starkey caught up to take fourth place by seven votes from Steve Stiles.
  • Taral Wayne missed nomination by one vote, Katy Shuttleworth by four and Kathleen Jennings by eight.

John W. Campbell Award For Best New Writer

  • Mur Lafftery beat Stina Leicht by 409 votes to 364. (Leicht had the most nominations, but Lafferty was not far behind.)
  • The other places were also fairly clear: Leicht second, Chuck Wendig third, Max Gladstone fourth and Zen Cho fifth.
  • Madeline Ashby, who had the third highest number of nominations, withdrew "due to prior professional works".
  • Brooke Bolander and Rachel Hartman both missed nomination by three votes, and Brit Mandelo and Jeff Salyards both missed by four.