Diana Pavlac Glyer Makes Statement About Bandersnatch Eligibility Year

By Diana Pavlac Glyer: I found out today that my book Bandersnatch: C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and the Creative Collaboration of the Inklings is listed on http://hugonoms2015.wikia.com/ as a possible nominee for a 2015 Hugo Award. I am deeply touched that people have noticed the book and commended it. There’s been a lot of controversy swirling around the Hugos in recent years, but my roots in fandom go way back, and this award means the world to me.

Bandersnatch coverThe problem is that I don’t think that Bandersnatch is eligible until next year. The book has a 2016 copyright date. The beautiful illustrations by James Artimus Owen are also copyright 2016. Kent State University Press considers Bandersnatch to be part of its Winter Catalog, which means the book was not released to their distributors until mid-January 2016. Copies did not become generally available until that time.

The complicating factor is that Amazon lists December 2015 as the official release date. But Amazon didn’t actually ship books until January 2016.

I know that these things aren’t as straightforward as they appear. Like a lot of things, it’s complicated. But here’s my take on it: the book has a 2016 copyright and WorldCat identifies it as a 2016 title. I hope it will be a contender in the next voting cycle.

24 thoughts on “Diana Pavlac Glyer Makes Statement About Bandersnatch Eligibility Year

  1. Good news for me as I’ve not found the time to read. Thanks for the information. I’m looking forward to reading it and am putting it now on my list of possibles for next year’s. 😀

  2. Dr. Glyer is the best. I was a freshman at Azusa Pacific University who had never written a paper in high school when I signed up for her Freshman Writing Class. Now I’m on staff at the university as a writing coach. She’s an excellent professor and scholar. I’ll definitely be getting a worldcon membership and voting for her next year if she’s eligible.

  3. This reinforces my existing thought to not completely trust Amazon publication information.

  4. Wasn’t the kindle ebook available in Nov/Dec? Although my amazon history shows I didn’t get around to buying and reading it til this year, I’m sure I’d read the amazon sample and mentally added it to my tbr last year?

    Obviously my swiss cheese brain may be faulty, but I can also see several amazon verified purchase reviews dating to Dec 15.

    Also: it’s a fine book and deserves strong consideration in whichever year it’s eligible for.

  5. Dear Dr. Glyer,

    Congratulations on the release of this important book; we publish our Ray Bradbury Collected Stories series through Kent State as well, and I’ve been following the publicity leading up to the release of Bandersnatch with great anticipation. I trust that your message will establish a reference point for nominators to follow for whichever year that Bandersnatch is declared eligible.
    Best wishes,
    Jonathan R. Eller, director, Center for Ray Bradbury Studies
    Indiana University School of Liberal Arts

  6. Much depends upon whether the book has an official publication date inside it. Publication date, if present, takes precedence over copyright or physical release date. This may be relevant to the Bujold eARC question, too; even if the copyright date of a work is 2015 and it was released in 2015, if it has an official publication date within the work of 2016, the latter date is what matters. This is analogous to the cover dates of dated periodicals, which are typically somewhat ahead of physical release dates; the cover dates take priority over copyright/release dates.

  7. My kindle version has the copyright dates as 2016 as stated above, and there is no publication date that I can see. A text search for “2015” shows that date only appears as references to other works in the notes, so the only internal references to the date of the book are 2016, but as they are copyright-related I assume that doesn’t trigger the “publication date” rule?

  8. Oh, I am actually pleased to hear this, as I own the book but hadn’t gotten around to reading it yet. This gives me another few months to do so, so yay!

  9. I was going to add it to my ballot today. Darn it! Well, it goes on the list, along with CITY OF BLADES, for next year.

  10. Hmm, I thought a “publication date” – normally not found on a book anyway – only mattered for periodicals. Yay, something else to muddy the waters. (eyeroll) If the book wasn’t for sale till January …but that’s not totally clear…ugh, sigh.

    I think my head will explode. 😉 Thanks, @Kevin Standlee. (Not your fault!)

  11. The hard copies of Bandersnatch say “copyright 2016” in them. There is no other publication information in the book. That makes it a 2016 book for Hugo purposes. Never rely on Amazon for this kind of information! Never!

  12. @Kevin

    This may be relevant to the Bujold eARC question, too; even if the copyright date of a work is 2015 and it was released in 2015,

    My ‘Bought from Baen after the offical release’ copy says copyright 2015.

  13. Thank you so much for this clarification!

    I thought I remembered the book having a 2016 publication date but thought I must be mis-remembering when I saw it on the Hugo Nominations Wiki and then saw the Amazon publication date was 2015.

  14. NickPheas on March 30, 2016 at 2:43 am said:

    My ‘Bought from Baen after the official release’ copy says copyright 2015.

    Does it have a publication date listed in it other than the copyright date? If it does, that publication date takes precedence over the copyright date.

  15. Kendall on March 29, 2016 at 8:41 pm said:

    Hmm, I thought a “publication date” – normally not found on a book anyway – only mattered for periodicals.

    Publication date (first printing date) does often appear on the copyright/publishing information page of a book. It does not only apply to periodicals. See WSFS Constitution section 3.2.3:

    3.2.3: Publication date, or cover date in the case of a dated periodical, takes precedence over copyright date.

    So have a look at the page of fine print that nobody every pays any attention to. It’s important.

  16. I think I’ve got the hang of this; I wish to nominate Bandersnatch, but I have to leave that till next year when it’s properly published and thus is eligible then.

    Please correct me if I’ve got that wrong.

  17. Furthermore, I think Gentleman Jolie and the Red Queen is a 2016 book because of the very limited distribution, ie a few e arcs, in 2015; once again, please correct me if I’m mistaken.

  18. Thank you, Mike! I can now get some sleep without worrying that I may mess that bit up. 🙂

  19. @Kevin Standlee: Thanks! I checked half a dozen U.S. print books and none had a publication date. I looked at a U.K. book and it did have one. I checked an ARC, which has the pub date and on-sale date (the same of course, but they use both phrases, in different spots). I see one regular hardback has a “First Printing August 2015” – not sure if that counts as publication date or not (but in August, it’s not like there’s any mystery – it’s obviously a 2015 book…). I haven’t checked the ebooks I have to see what they’re like. Whee, it’s all a big ol’ mystery.

    I think I prefer books published mid-year. 😉

  20. Kendall on March 30, 2016 at 11:04 pm said:

    @Kevin Standlee: Thanks! I checked half a dozen U.S. print books and none had a publication date…. I see one regular hardback has a “First Printing August 2015” – not sure if that counts as publication date or not….

    I consider the first printing date to be the publication date. The first printing date is the equivalent to the cover date of a periodical.

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