154 thoughts on “Best Series Hugo: Eligible Series from 2018”

1. Earthsea by Ursula K. LeGuin, The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition

2. Swordheart by T Kingfisher, not sure if there’s an official title for the but the cover says “return to the world of Clockwork Boys” so I guess that will do for now.

   It’s set in the world but not directly connected. The afterword suggests further books linked to this one are coming.

   Word counts for the three books to date are roughly 70,000, 89,000 and 121,000 so comfortably over 240,000.
   —
   For the record, Lies Sleeping by Ben Aaranovitch was 99,331 words and Lies Sleeping was 29,862, which confirms what’s already listed above – that it isn’t yet re-eligible.

3. Regarding Earthsea – Dave McCarty (this year’s Hugo Admin) ruled Summer in Orcus as sufficiently changed to qualify this year due to the chapter illustrations added in the book version (the on-line version itself was ineligible due to the last installment being published in 2016). Assuming Nicholas Whyte (next year’s Hugo Admin) would be of a similar mind, Charles Vess’s illustrations for the new Earthsea book could possibly be enough to qualify it.

   But we don’t have to rely on that. The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition contains one short story not published elsewhere, and another one that, as far as I can tell, was published this year for the first time in a magazine, qualifying Earthsea for Best Series without regard to illustrations.

   Also, I’m wondering what Vernon is calling her new Series. Is it really “The World of Clockwork Boys”? Clocktaur Wars is a good overarching title for the Duology but I don’t think Swordheart, while set in the same universe, has anything to do with the actual clocktaur wars? (I have only read the first four words of the book, then fell asleep over my tablet due to jetlag and not enough sleep.)

   I also wonder what other books K. B. Spangler edited that came out this year.

   (This comment doesn’t have enough parenthesis.)

4. For the moment, until we get a definitive series name from the author, I’m calling the T. Kingfisher series Anuket City, because that’s the element all three works have in common (it only narrowly defeated Gnole World in the naming sweepstakes).

5. A gnole is disappointed.

6. @Mark (kitteh): “For the record, Lies Sleeping by Ben Aaranovitch was 99,331 words and Lies Sleeping was 29,862, which confirms what’s already listed above – that it isn’t yet re-eligible.”

   I presume you mean The Furthest Station for the 29K word count. Thanks for the info!

7. @Kendall

   Oops, yes, good catch!

8. Mark Kitteh on December 1, 2018 at 6:42 am said:

   A gnole is disappointed.

   LOLs and golf claps.

9. I don’t think it’s any kind of spoiler to say that Swordheart has a few brief references to the Clocktaur War but has no direct connection to the first two books.

10. Would the Alpennia books by Heather Rose Jones be eligible? There was a novelette published this year.

11. added:
    Age of Darkness by Stephen Aryan, Of Gods and Men (novella)
    Alpennia by Heather Rose Jones, “Gifts Tell Truth” (novelette)
    Bound Gods by Rachel Dunne, The Shattered Sun
    Earthsea by Ursula K. LeGuin, The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition
    Rowankind by Jacey Bedford, Rowankind

12. Does anyone know what the word count is for the 2018 book Firefly: Big Damn Hero? I was wondering if the series might be eligible, considering the TV scripts were published, there was the movie novelization and all the graphic novels too.

13. The print version of this year’s Hugo nomination form has been released and confirms that, as in 2018, the 2017 finalists will not be eligible this year unless they’ve added enough installments and words since the end of 2016.

14. Goobergunch: The print version of this year’s Hugo nomination form has been released and confirms that, as in 2018, the 2017 finalists will not be eligible this year unless they’ve added enough installments and words since the end of 2016.

    Thanks for calling attention to that. I’m surprised, but pleased, that they were willing to rule on this in advance. I guess they were not happy about how many series they had to disqualify off the ballot last year.

15. added:
    Firefly by James Lovegrove, Big Damn Hero
    Heirs of Alexandria by Eric Flint and Dave Free, All the Plagues of Hell
    Odyssey One by Evan Currie, Odysseus Ascendant
    Polity / Rise of the Jain by Neal Asher, The Soldier (must be nominated under the main series, as the subseries has insufficient word count and/ or volumes)
    Queens of Renthia by Sarah Beth Durst, Queen of Sorrow

16. According to Seanan McGuire’s tweet yesterday, you can add her October Daye series to the list: “And like, there’s a LOT of Toby at this point. The series is actually eligible for the Hugo Award for Best Series again this year, because I’ve added that much material (even when you discount the Patreon stories as being of limited availability).”

17. It’s already there, Cassy. 😀

18. JJ. whoops; sorry; missed it. In my defense, it’s a LONG list… <rueful>

19. Thanks for all your work on this!

20. Someone has posted on Twitter that the Deverry series by Katharine Kerr is eligible, but I don’t see an entry on ISFDB published in 2018. Can anyone confirm that a 2018 work was published for that series?

21. I don’t see anything on her (outdated) web site, Wikipedia, or Amazon.

22. I know that she is taking care of a husband with dementia, and that owning their house makes getting any financial assistance difficult (and you wouldn’t dare sell it, because the proceeds wouldn’t keep you in a rental very long!), and that has taken precedence over writing for her. It’s a sad situation, and one that so many people are facing right now. 🙁

    https://www.patreon.com/KatharineKerr

23. Well, here’s an interesting hiccup that WSFS will probably need to address at the next Business Meeting:

    The author confirms that the Rivers of London series word counts are:
    The Hanging Tree – 95,000 words
    The Furthest Station – 30,000 words
    Lies Sleeping – 99,000 words

    The Hanging Tree was published in the UK in November 2016 and in the U.S. in January 2017. My reading of the rules is that the “published in the U.S. for the first time” exemption applies to individual works, but not to a series as a whole, and that for the additional word count of 240,000 words to re-qualify for nomination in a series, The Hanging Tree would not count, since it was published prior to 2018.

    This is something that next year’s Hugo Admin should probably start thinking about now, because they are almost certainly going to have to rule on it next year, given that the novella The October Man is coming out this March.

24. The Hanging Tree is what actually made it eligible for best series in 2017, right? That would have been based on its UK publication. So the same book cannot count as additional material.

    So just like a single work that actually got nominated based on a non-US pub date, it’s not eligible again on US publication.

25. Laura: The Hanging Tree is what actually made it eligible for best series in 2017, right? That would have been based on its UK publication. So the same book cannot count as additional material.

    I was thinking that there had been a second entry that year, but you’re right, that book’s UK release is what made it eligible in 2017, so its US word count can’t be used toward the next 240,000-word re-qualification.

    And WSFS is still going to need to address a change in the rules for that next August, for cases where a series has two books in one year, one of which is non-US only.

26. Yes, when a series becomes a finalist, the last work considered part of the series as nominated should be specified on the ballot. That way there’s no question what counts as additional. And also just so voters know what they should and should not be considering if there is already additional material available.

27. You may already know this, but Jesi Lipp is the WSFS Business Meeting Chair this year and Linda Deneroff is Secretary again.
    [email protected]

    ConZealand hasn’t listed their WSFS or Business Meeting people on their web site as yet. I think the Div Head might be Colette Fozard? From vague memories of a conversation at Worldcon 76? If so, Colette is probably busy with Dublin in 2019 right now.

    (Also, I thought ConZealand was going to raise their rates for upgrade from Supporting to Attending at the end of 2018 but their web site says we can’t upgrade yet due to technical difficulties so I shan’t worry that I haven’t gotten an e-mail yet. Assuming we do upgrade. We haven’t decided yet.)

    I’ve started my Hugo noms. So far Earthsea and Alpennia are on Best Series. Contemplating the rest.

28. @ULTRAGOTHA: I was able to find the CoNZealand division leadership here and can confirm your recollection.

29. And here is Dublin’s. (It is Jesi Lipp, though, not Lopp.)

30. Goobergunch, AhHA! They have two pages and I was looking at the other one. Thanks.

    And yes, it is Lipp. Sorry Jesi! My brain knew that but my fongers have a mind of their own.

31. To muddy the waters further on Rivers of London (sorry both for the content and for that pun), there were four graphic novel volumes published in 2017 and 2018: Black Mould, Detective Stories, Cry Fox and Water Weed. I doubt that the four of them combined would contribute the same word count as The Hanging Tree, however.

32. I think that any Hugo Admin is going to rule that first publication, regardless of country, will be counted as publication year — the alternative would be saying “you can’t nominate your favorite series until next year, because last year’s book hasn’t been published in the U.S. yet”, and no Hugo Admin is going to take that approach.

    So Rivers of London is going to need another novel in addition to this year’s novella before it qualifies again.

33. Given a scenario where a series makes the finals but doesn’t win. Three years later Book 6 is published in the UK, which brings the installment and word count to the point where the series is eligible again. I agree that if it gets enough nominations that year to make the finals, it’s a finalist. If it loses again, then it’s not eligible again until installment and word counts are again met. Book 9 or whatever.

    However, what if it doesn’t make the finals that year and the following year Book 6 is published in the US? Is that series still eligible to be nominated based on the US publication of Book 6?

    3.4.2: Works originally published outside the United States of
    America and first published in the United States of America in the previous calendar year shall also be eligible for Hugo Awards.

    I’d say yes, as both Book 6 and the Series itself is a “work”.

    Note: I am not a Hugo Admin, nor do I play one on TV.

34. ULTRAGOTHA: However, what if it doesn’t make the finals that year and the following year Book 6 is published in the US? Is that series still eligible to be nominated based on the US publication of Book 6? I’d say yes, as both Book 6 and the Series itself is a “work”.

    I’d tend to agree with you, but obviously the Hugo Category Committee is going to have to put some serious thought into how the word count qualifying rules are worded.

    I can tell you right now there are going to be some Rivers of London fans next year insisting that the 2017 U.S. publication of The Hanging Tree should be counted since the series had other qualifying works in 2016. Sorry, but no.

    Frankly, I think that nominators should spread the love around to other series instead of nominating all of the previous finalists again, but I’m sure that’s too much to ask. 🙄

35. On the subject of spreading the love, I’m a little concerned to see the note against Best Series doesn’t mention the Vorkosigan Saga being ineligible due to its win in the “pilot” year, though it treats the rest of the pilot year finalists as subject to the same rules as the regular category. Do we know if that’s an oversight or a known loophole? If it’s the latter, and The Flowers of Vashnoi puts it back on the ballot, that would be pretty frustrating for those who want to see the category succeed beyond recognition of the same few works.

36. Arifel: Do we know if that’s an oversight or a known loophole?

    I saw that when I accessed my ballot, and based on Whyte’s various rulings during the 2017 Hugo nomination process (which he documented extensively), and the fact that he’s declared the non-winning 2017 finalists as subject to the category rules, I’m quite sure that it’s an oversight, and that he would rule The Vorkosigan Saga as permanently ineligible now.

    The advance ruling that he posted on the ballot — stating that he’s considering the 2017 one-time category finalists to be the same as finalists from the ongoing Series category finalists, and therefore subject to the same re-qualification rules — is really unprecedented. Historically, Hugo Admins have never done something like that. And I for one applaud him for it.

37. I’m less worried about seeing the Vorkosigan Saga appear again on the longlist (people do tend to be satisfied once they’ve won after all) but I do expect to see McGuire’s October Daye series back. Other repeat possibilities from the 2017 and/or 2018 longlists are Cherryh’s Foreigner series, Stross’ Laundry Files, and Martin’s Wild Cards series.

    I do wish we’d get a new mix of finalists, though.

38. Regardless of how Nicholas would rule on the Vorkosigan Series, and also regardless of how much I adore it, I won’t be nominating it again. A) it won and B) one novella is not enough for me to re-consider it even if it is somehow eligible.

    I very much like the transparency Nicholas Whyte has brought to the Hugo Admin process and hope other Admins emulate him.

39. ULTRAGOTHA: I very much like the transparency Nicholas Whyte has brought to the Hugo Admin process and hope other Admins emulate him.

    I feel the same way. Whyte’s administration of the awards have certainly highlighted for me the differences in the way the most recent Admins have run the awards. You can look at what went on each year and pretty much tell who the admin was.

40. JJ: I can tell you right now there are going to be some Rivers of London fans next year insisting that the 2017 U.S. publication of The Hanging Tree should be counted since the series had other qualifying works in 2016. Sorry, but no.

    I see there were some graphic novels released in 2016. However, I’m positive that the 2017 Hugo Packet material listed The Hanging Tree in its info on the series finalists. So it’s pretty clear that Hugo admin considered it part of the series at that time based on the 2016 UK publication. Not that people won’t try anyway.

41. The 2017 Hugo packet included an excerpt of Midnight Riot.

    It also included a reading guide, which listed The Hanging Tree. So I’d say the installment and word count for this series’s re-eligibility starts with things published anywhere *after* The Hanging Tree.

    Not an admin, etc….

42. ULTRAGOTHA:

    Do you know if the reading guide mentioned the graphic novels? I definitely remember The Hanging Tree on there, but I don’t remember if the graphic novels were listed.

    Not that they couldn’t be considered part of the series since I see they are additional stories and not adaptations of the books. But just that Hugo admin might have been thinking of The Hanging Tree as the only qualifying work from 2016.

43. I’m pretty sure that the Series Reading Guides in the Hugo Packet were not intended to be used as definitive “These are the works, and the only works, which contributed to this series’ eligibility” documents; they also listed forthcoming works which had been announced but not yet been published, and the Packet Coordinator said that they created them and asked the authors to okay them.

    Things I wanted to change or improve, and how I did that:
    … The new Series Category, and lack of a way to evaluate it: I created a “Reading Order” document for each Series containing both the long and short fiction titles, and sent these to the authors for approval/ corrections. (One finalist provided their own, along with their packet submission, so I just used that.)

44. This is what’s in the .pdf:

    Chronological Order:
    1: Midnight Riot
    (UK title: Rivers of London)
    “The Home Crowd Advantage*
    2: Moon over Soho
    “The Domestic”*
    3: Whispers Underground
    “The Cockpit”*
    4: Broken Homes
    5: Foxglove Summer
    “The Loneliness of the Long Distance Granny”*
    “The Furthest Station” (forthcoming June 2017)*
    “King of the Rats” (Cityread London video)*
    6: The Hanging Tree
    “A Rare Book of Cunning Device”*
    * = Short fiction.

    I mistyped above. Anything that came out after “A Rare Book of Cunning Device” should be counted for re-eligibility, IMO. (Assuming that was the last thing published.)

45. “A Rare Book of Cunning Device” was released in early 2017, and should count toward the series’ next eligibility (not that there are very many words in it).

46. JJ, I think any work available the year the series made the finals counts, whether in the list or not. Anything published after that year would count for the next period of eligibility. I don’t think it works if, for example, The Hanging Tree was available in 2016 and also counts for the word count to make the series eligible again. Even with it being published in the US in 2017.

    But yeah, the Hugo Committee should probably take a look at this and tidy it up.

    ETA: Ah, I didn’t know that re Cunning Device, so yes.

47. No, I agree the packet info shouldn’t be taken as the absolute final word on the series. Just curious about it as a possible indication of what was considered part of the series at the time. But since it had post-2016 stuff on it anyway, that doesn’t work.

    As I said earlier, it would be good to designate the last qualifying installment on the ballot with each series finalist.

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50. Wayfarer Series by Becky Chambers, Record of a Spaceborn Few published in 2018. Previous two were The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet and A Closed and Common Orbit. They are my favorites and I hope everyone put Becky Chambers in this category.

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