The latest installment of the Octothorpe podcast has a couple of points on counting Hugo nominations raised by Alison Scott, which I'd like to address here ( Read more... )

We didn't publish the full stats for the 1945 Retro Hugo categories that weren't put to the final ballot this year, mainly because voting ended only seven days before the Retro ceremony and we had to prioritise fairly ruthlessly ( Read more... )

I'm glad to say that after some effort we have managed to find homes for all of the 1945 Retro Hugos. The trophies themselves are currently in New Zealand and will be shipped en bloc to the USA, where our dedicated (and unpaid) team will ship them to the recipients (all of whom are in the lower 48).

As with last year ( which I wrote up here), some ( Read more... )

1584 votes cast at nominations phase, 2221 on the final ballot. Lower than any year since 2013, higher than any year up to 2013. As expected for a smaller worldcon in difficult times. Full stats here.

The closest result was for Best Fanzine, where the winner had a margin of 4 votes on the final count. Best Graphic Story or Comic was decided by 11 ( Read more... )

Headlines:

• Full statistics here.
• 521 votes cast.
• Tie in Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form! The first ever tie in the Retro Hugos.
• Close results also in Best Novelette (6 votes) and Best Fanzine (9 votes)
• Crushing first round victories for John W. Campbell and Margaret Brundage

One interesting point that jumped out at me from reading this year's Hugo finalists in this category, and comparing with the 1945 Retro Hugo finalists: the protagonists of the stories on the 2020 ballot are all women, and the protagonists of the stories on the 1945 ballot are all men ( Read more... )

One of the problems with this Hugo category (which has, thank heavens, been renamed to include the crucial word "Comic" - after extraordinary struggle) is that we are not always comparing like with like. For this year, we have two standalone stories, two finalists that are the concluding installments of long series, and a middle volume and a first ( Read more... )

I don't know much about art, but I know what I like. Here are my favourite pieces from the artists on this year's Hugo and Retro Hugo ballots - for 1945 artists, I'm giving two full pieces each, and for 2020 artists, it'll be a part of one favourite work,

1945 Retro Hugo finalists, Best Professional Artist

Earle K. Bergey - specialises in ( Read more... )

I'm a late convert to the Lodestar Award. I opposed instituting it, because I felt (and feel) that there are already too many Hugo categories (even if this is formally not a Hugo). It also seems to me that the diligent voter is carrying an ever heavier burden of reading obligations, though I guess this applies more to Best Series than here. However ( Read more... )

For the record, I am not a huge fan of the Retro Hugos in general. It's striking that three of the 1945 Best Novel finalists are really from outside the sfnal subculture that existed at the time, indicating how few actual novels were being written by the sf pulp writers. Anyway, it's an interesting selection.

The Golden Fleece aka Hercules, My ( Read more... )