Hugo Time

It's that time of year, when Sci Fi fen feel the pull of a distant land, where they will gather and fight to the death until there is only one... No wait, that's Highlander.

Ok, it's the time of year when Sci Fi fen gather at WorldCon, which is in Toronto this year. The highlight of the convention is the Hugo awards. These awards are a popular award that are voted on by those members of the worldcon who actually bother to vote, and are intended to honor the "best" of the genre. Winning the Hugo means you get to stand among the august ranks of folks like Lary Niven, and Robert A. Heinlein, and say, hey I got a shiny rocket ship trophy.

Actually, there has been a bit of a brouhaha surrounding the fact that this year the field seems a bit week. I can't comment on that since I haven't actually read any of the novels myself. So here is Mark's predictions of who will win which category. Predictions based on fan psychology.

Nominees can be found HERE.

2009 Hugo Award Predictions:

Best Novel: I’m predicting Gaiman for the win not because it’s the “best” as I generally don’t like Gaiman’s style, but because he is a) popular, and b) the Guest of Honor (GoH). Obviously I’m in the minority as lots of folks like Gaiman. Regardles, the hugo voters don’t like to snub the GoH. Also, there is at least a segment of attendies that will go to a con specifically due to the GoH, so the GoH has a built in fanbase advantage.

The shot fiction categories are much harder to predict, since lots of Hugo voters just skip the category on their ballots, which is fair enough, as trying to keep up with the short fiction is a bit of a task.

Best Novella: “True Names” wins best Novella simply because it has Doctorow’s name on it. (yeah I’m cynical). Doctorow has a huge following, and he's Canadian.

Best Novelette: Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear. She's a popular writer, and her name is reasonably well known.

Best Short Story: Toss up between "26 Monkeys into the Abyss" and "From Babel's Fall'n Glory we Fled." Both were published in Assimov's, and hardly anyone has even heard of the other publications. I'm picking Babel for the win.

Related book: Considering how huge a following the Vorkosigan saga thing has, The Vorkosigan Companion is probably a shoe-in. (long odds on Scalzi's your Hate Mail will be graded) But I'm picking TVC for the win.

Graphic Story? (I’m not even sure this should be a Hugo category). Coin flip between Phil Foglio and Howard Taylor. Smart money is on Foglio, he's well known in fanish circles. I recall meeting him at a WorldCon once.

Dramatic Long: Wall-E. Personally hate it’s pro eco-facist message, but folks like cartoons.

Dramatic Short: Dr. Horible FTW. Brilliant, simply Briliant. Also Wheden has the sort of fan base that will actually bother to vote. Besides Steve Moffet already has 3 Hugos. (at least 2 he deserved, and they should have made a supersized 2-meter tall one for Blink) BSG is over, (it's inthe past for most people), so even though Revelations was a very strong episode it's going to end up at the bottom of the pile.

I'm going to ignore all of the awards for editing and stuff, also I'm ignoring hte best artist award. It used to be the best ART, not artist.

So, thats 8 predictuons. Random chance says I should get two right. If I get 3 or more someone owes me bacon.