Dublin 2019 Opens Hugo Nominations, Names Award Designers

The nominating period has begun for the 2019 Hugo Awards and 1944 Retro Hugo Awards to be presented at Dublin 2019 – An Irish Worldcon.

Worldcon members are encouraged to nominate up to five works/individuals that they believe are worthy of a Hugo in each category. The six most popular nominees in each category will appear on the final voting ballot. Find information about the Hugo Awards, including details about how to submit a nominating ballot here.

The Hugos are the most prestigious award in the science fiction genre, honoring literature and media as well as fan activities. The awards were first presented in 1953.

All members eligible to nominate may do so online by using individual links, which will be e-mailed out over the next few days, or by paper ballot, included with Dublin 2019’s Progress Report 3 and also separately downloadable from the convention’s website.

All nomination ballots must be submitted electronically by March 16, 2019 06:59 UTC (11:59 pm Pacific Daylight Time on March 15) or, if paper, received by mail by March 15, 2019.

Eligible voters for the nominations process must have purchased membership in Dublin 2019 – An Irish Worldcon by December 31, 2018, or have been a member of Worldcon 76 in San Jose. Worldcon members who are uncertain of their status should contact [email protected] .

Dublin 2019 is inviting nominations in a special Hugo category this year: Best Art Book. Voters will also have the opportunity to nominate in two non-Hugo categories for 2019: the Lodestar Award for Best Young Adult Book, and the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.

The final ballot will be announced in early April. Only Dublin 2019 members will be able to vote on the final ballot and choose the winners. The 1944 Retro Hugo Awards will be presented on Thursday, August 15, the opening night of Dublin 2019, and the 2019 Hugo Awards, and the Lodestar and Campbell Awards, will be presented on Sunday, August 18.

The 2019 Hugo base will be designed by Jim Fitzpatrick. Based in Dublin, he is famous for his Celtic art, in particular for his publications The Book of Conquests, The Silver Arm, The Children of Lir (with Michael Scott) and Erinsaga; and also for his album covers for Thin Lizzy and Sinéad O’Connor. Perhaps his best known work is his iconic 1968 portrait of Che Guevara.

The 1944 Retro Hugo base will be designed by Eleanor Wheeler. She is an architectural and sculptural ceramicist who has created large scale art for public spaces including at the Market Square in Armagh and the Gasworks, the Mater Hospital and Drumglass Park in Belfast.  She lives in County Down and has had numerous solo exhibitions, drawing on her travels locally as well as throughout Asia, Africa and Europe for inspiration.

The 2019 Lodestar Award will be designed by Sara Felix. She is the current president of the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists, and created the 2018 WSFS Young Adult Award, as well as the 2018 and 2016 Hugo bases. Her home is Austin, Texas.

Artist websites:

Any questions about the Hugo Awards process should be directed to [email protected].

Dublin 2019 – An Irish Worldcon will take place in and around the Convention Centre Dublin from August 15 to August 19.

16 thoughts on “Dublin 2019 Opens Hugo Nominations, Names Award Designers

  1. Pingback: Hugo Nominations are open! | Camestros Felapton

  2. I have some surefire noms that are already in and saved.
    2018 was a relatively low year for me reading new, Hugo-eligible material, but I hope that just means I’ll be more focused on the shortlist this year 🙂

  3. If you were a member of San José 2018 but not of Dublin 2019 and have not received an e-mail, you may have not given San José permission to share your details with Dublin, because of EU data-privacy rules. (Ironically, I didn’t do so, although it’s moot because I’m a member of both.) If you fall into that class and still want to vote online, you’ll have to write to Dublin and sort it out with them.

  4. Hugo Eligibility:

    I need to get an official ruling on whether Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky is eligible this year or not. It was published in the UK in 2015 and in the US in 2018. OTOH, Goodreads lists it as published by both Tor UK and Tor in 2015, which may or may not be accurate. And the rules on international publishing are confusing.

    If this has been discussed elsewhere on 770, my apologies.

  5. Contrarius, If it was published in the USA in 2018 for the first time, it’s eligible.

    WSFS Constitution:

    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.

    The Hugo Admins rarely rule in advance. But in the absence of Nicholas weighing in, you could write to Tor or Tchaikovsky and ask them to clarify.

  6. So the Goodreads listing noting both a Tor UK (UK, obviously) and Tor (US) publication in 2015 is incorrect?

    P.S. @Ultragotha — Tchaikovsky himself has recently tweeted a question asking about whether it’s eligible or not, and somebody from Tor also tweeted with their opinion, but neither was definitive and neither was “from the horse’s mouth” as it were. The Tor rep did not comment on the Tor UK/Tor issue. I don’t generally tweet — these were pointed out to me by someone else.

  7. I would not rely on Goodreads for totally accurate dates. Tchaikovsky said it was published at the end of last year in the US, so that would make it eligible, yes.

  8. I agree with you about Goodreads, but I also would not rely on the self-interest of authors perhaps resulting in erratic memories. 😉 Which is part of the reason why I’m seeking an official ruling.

  9. Which seems awfully silly to me, since it can easily result in both a lot of wasted votes and a lot of votes that might be withheld in a mistaken belief about a given work’s ineligibility.

    Another current example — Rosewater, whose author appears to be claiming that it’s currently eligible even though it was originally printed by Apex Book Company in 2016 and by Orbit in 2017.

  10. Contrarius: I agree with you about Goodreads, but I also would not rely on the self-interest of authors perhaps resulting in erratic memories. Which is part of the reason why I’m seeking an official ruling.

    I wouldn’t recommend using GoodReads as an authoritative source of anything except peoples’ individual reactions to books. All the data is user-entered, as far as I’m aware is not verified by anyone, and I’ve seen lots of errors and duplications there.

    I’d recommend using the Internet Speculative Fiction Database (ISFDB). It’s not absolutely perfect, but there are only a small number of editors, they are rigorous about what and how data gets entered, and it goes through verification.

    Since Hugo Admins won’t rule in advance about things, it’s the best we can do.

    My investigation of the pre-2018 ISBNs listed there for Children of Time is that they are all UK in orgin, and that the book is eligible for nomination in this year’s Hugo Awards.

    As far as Rosewater, I’ll repost what I posted at Cam’s blog:

    It would have to be substantially different to be re-eligible — for example, if another 50,000 words were added, then it would probably re-qualify.

    But if all that’s been revised is the addition of a couple of scenes, re-wording of some sections, and/or better copy-editing, then no, it’s not going to be eligible again.

    It’s my understanding that the revisions were relatively minor. I don’t see how it can be eligible again this year. He’s better off promoting his sequel to it, which is coming out this year.

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