The Hugo Awards

I'll start with a brief run down of the winners and then get to commentary.

John W. Campbell Award
John Scalzi

Best Fan Artist
Frank Wu

Best Fan Writer
Dave Langford

Best Fanzine
Plokta

Best Semiprozine
Locus

Best Professional Artist
Donato Giancola

Best Professional Editor
David G. Hartwell

Best Dramatic presentation, Short Form
Dr. Who the Empty Child

Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
Serenity

Best Related Book
Storyteller : Kate Wilhelm

Best Short Story
Tk' tk' tk' : David D. Levine

Best Novellete
Two Hearts : Peter Beagle

Best Novella
Inside Job : Connie Willis

Best Novel
Spin : Robert Charles Wilson

Special Awards were also given to Betty Balantine and Harlan Ellison and Forrey Ackerman was given the Big Heart Award, which was renamed in his honor.

Now my commentary on the results

I wasn't happy with them.
I did not purchase a membership in time to vote, but had I vote, the only choice of mine to win would have been Serenity.

Now I'm a total GRRM fanboy, I've gotten to meet him and chat with him several times, and I really wanted him to win "the big one". But I'm also a realist, and while I think A Storm of Swords is one of the best novels ever written and was robbed, A Feast for Crows was not the book that was going to do it for him. Spin and Accelerando were both extremely tough competition, and Spin likely was deserving.

I also though Magic for Beginners was brilliant, and figured it was a shoe-in for Novella. I'm wondering if Willis didn't get some votes because she was GoH.

Dr. Who beating BSG was also hard to understand... Actually the who voting process is hard to understand. When leaving the awards we were given a printout of the official results. I wish there was an explanation as to how it worked because looking at the results BSG had more first place votes than Dr. Who, the empty child.... in fact is appears to have more votes for Everglade except for last.

This seems to have occurred several times, AFFC had the 3rd most first place votes and finished 5th. John Picacio had the 3rd most votes and finished 5th. Its all very confusing.


Now this was my first Worldcon and my first Hugo Awards. I really enjoyed the ceremony. It did drag on a few times, but for the most part it was very entertaining. The by play between Connie Willis and Robert Silverberg was a highlight. And then of course there was Harlan.
The man is a total dick. However, I find him to be an amusing dick, so I enjoyed his rant. Swallowing the mic was a hoot. Then of course there was "boobgate". IMO it was wrong. But I think some are making a mountain out of a foothill.

The most amusing thing to come out of the hugos to me personally was the rant by William Lexner at I hope I didn't just give away the ending. Looks like he got all the old guard of fandom riled up. Now William is a friend of mine, in fact he was my roommate at Worldcon, and I sat next to him at the Hugos. The man certainly can come off as bombastic, but in reality, he's one of the nicest guys you could meet. That said I know he is getting a kick out of the angry SMOFs. I mean they call themselves Secret Masters of Fandom... They deserve a bit of chain yanking now and again. Kevin Standlee has been one of the biggest critics. Check it out here.
He was also accused of causing Cheryl Morgan to close Emerald City.

Ahhh Good times....Good times.