Kritzer, Lady Business Added to Hugo Ballot

MidAmeriCon II has backfilled the vacancies on the 2016 Hugo Awards ballot created by the withdrawal of Thomas A. Mays and Black Gate.

The official announcement on Facebook reads:

Thomas A. Mays has withdrawn his short story “The Commuter”. It will be replaced on the ballot by the story “Cat Pictures Please” by Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld, January 2015).

John O’Neill has withdrawn the fanzine Black Gate. It will be replaced on the ballot by Lady Business, edited by Clare, Ira, Jodie, KJ, Renay, and Susan.

Naomi Kritzer’s “Cat Pictures Please” also a 2016 Nebula nominee, can be read at Clarkesworld. Her blog is Will Tell Stories for Food.

Click here to read Lady Business.

60 thoughts on “Kritzer, Lady Business Added to Hugo Ballot

  1. So Much Cooking and Cat Pictures were both on my ballot, and I’m ecstatic that the latter made it on.

    The Hugo Spreadsheet of Doom was a major reference for me last year, so yay for Lady Business!

  2. Evelyn C. Leeper:

    In general (and I realize the current situation is possibly atypical), what this means is that people go into the voting knowing the relative positions of at least some of the finalists.

    In this atypical year – is that a bad thing?

  3. I loved Cat Pictures, and it was on my ballot, and given the rest of the ballot it will (unless someone else drops out) be the only thing going above No Award for me this year. VERY glad it’s got the recognition it deserves.
    Not previously familiar with Lady Business, but just skimming it now it’s clearly a deserving finalist (as, actually, was Black Gate, who I hope get several legitimate nominations in future years)

  4. @Evelyn C. Leeper: People and works who squeak in sometimes win. 😉 Anyway, I hope no one votes based on something silly like two finalists getting 1 (or more) fewer nominations compared to slated works, of all things. In fact, I find it impossible to believe that incredibly minor fact will have any effect,especially (but not only) given it’s a very atypical year.*

    That said, the fact that they weren’t slated may give them a bit of an edge! But the same goes for the other non-slated finalists, and also IMHO for at least some of the so-called “human shields” (popular works/people who were slated). Yet another reason slates are evil, sigh. ;-(

    * BTW I’m surprised you call it “possibly atypical,” since you’re aware of the Puppy slates. It’s definitely atypical.

    Anyway, just my take on it – knowing two entries’ had fewer nominations won’t matter.

  5. Whoops, I forgot my obligatory ::bow:: to Mays and (sadly) Black Gate, and welcome/congrats to Naomi Kritzer and the fine folks at Lady Business. 🙂 In all seriousness: I respect the withdrawals even though I feel Black Gate should’ve stayed on the ballot (I know nothing about Mays or his work yet, so I can’t comment either way about him), while I’m also happy to see a couple more non-slated works show up.

    And thanks to MAC II for updating the ballot and announcing the changes.

  6. Kritzer was not on my ballot (she was in my top ten and a worthy finalist) but she was my single biggest bet for who would make the ballot after Mays dropped out. So I feel like I won out in her nomination even if my personal top 5 didn’t quite. (No disrespect to Mays. I haven’t read his story and I make no judgement upon him as a writer; and he has behaved honourably as a person.)

    Like others, i hadn’t connected Lady Business with the Hugo Spreadsheet of Doom. That alone wouldn’t make it a worthy candidate, but it does speak well for them.

    Oops, better leave it there; the baby is trying to torture the SJW Qualification.

  7. @JJ Heck yeah. 😀

    Also, meant to note in response to a question someone asked yesterday — “So Much Cooking” is a novelette.

  8. I’m wanting an Alfie-equivalent just for those puppy-nominted heroes who have bowed out of a flawed process.
    We’re getting a fair number at this point.
    The Bartleby?

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