Clarkesworld

The Eurocon Dead Dog Interview

~ Cheryl ~ 1 Comment

As I said on Twitter at the time, some people are daft enough to tweet while drunk, but I went one better: I agreed to be interviewed, on video, for a Croatian fan website, late into the dead dog party at the Eurocon in Zagreb. By that time I had consumed quantities of honey schnapps and Dalmatian sweet red wine, and I had moved on to whiskey supplied by some kind Czech fans. The results were therefore unpredictable. Having watched it, I’m pleased to see that I managed to plug the bookstore and say nice things about Clarkesworld, and did not fall over once. It helped that I was sat down in a rather splendid chair, but mainly I think the credit should go to Ana for some great questions, and to the camera crew who had to hold their cameras still despite having drunk at least as much as I had.

Here’s the whole thing. It’s just over 11 minutes long. If you click through to YouTube you should find it recommending other interviews with Charlie, Powers, Dmitry and Darko, all of whom got to talk when sober.

May Clarkesworld & Lightspeed

~ Cheryl

It’s that first of the month time again. Being somewhat travel-frazzled today, I’ve not paid a great deal of attention to the new magazines, but I have got them into the store. Here’s what we have.

The lead story in Clarkesworld is “Prayer” by one of my favorite SF writers, Robert Reed. As usual, that’s available in audio, read by the fabulous Baker girl.

Also available in fiction are “Synch Me, Kiss Me, Drop” by promising Canadian author, Suzanne Church, and “All The Things The Moon Is Not” by Alexander Lumans. Alexander got his first ever short fiction sale in Clarkesworld five years ago, and we are delighted to see how he has prospered since.

Jeremy’s interview for May is with fantasy author, Michael J. Sullivan. Jason’s column is “The Fairy Tale in the TV Age” by Alethea Kontis (hi Princess!). And the new Another Word column sees Elizabeth Bear sit speculative fiction down and have a little chat.

Neil’s editorial, fairly inevitably, focuses on the honors Clarkesworld has once again collected in the Hugos. And this month’s cover is “Sci-Fi Farmer” by Jessada Sutthi.

The new Lightspeed has new fiction from Linda Nagata, C.C. Finlay, Dale Bailey and Melanie Rawn. Charlie Finlay’s story is called “The Cross-Time Accountants Fail To Kill Hitler Because Chuck Berry Does The Twist”, which you pretty much have to read. There is also reprint fiction from Nicola Griffith, Dave Langford, Cat Valente and Kage Baker.

Lightspeed does that marketing thing of putting exclusive content in the ebook edition, which you have to pay for. This months offerings are extracts from the new novels by Paolo Baccigalupi and Kim Stanley Robinson.

Both magazines are available from the bookstore.

Clarkesworld #67

~ Cheryl

This is not an April Fool, Clarkesworld always comes out on the first of the month.

I’m writing this in a bit of a hurry because I’m off to London for the day early tomorrow so I need to get this done and get to bed. I haven’t had time to look at the issue much yet, but I do see a headline story from my friend Tom Crosshill. Also Jason has articles by Brian Francis Slattery and Daniel Abraham, who are both great writers. Hmm, do I detect an extra non-fiction column? I think I do. The magazine is online here, or…


You can get it in the Wizard’s Tower bookstore.

Clarkesworld #66

~ Cheryl

There are some fairly unfamiliar names in this month’s Clarkesworld. However, I have great faith in Neil’s judgement, so I’m sure this will be good stuff.

The lead story is “Sunlight Society” by Margaret Ronald who last featured in the magazine back in 2008. That story is already available in audio.

In addition we have “The Bells of Subsidence” by Michael John Grist and “From Their Paws, We Shall Inherit” by Gary Kloster. Those two will be in audio later in the month.

Jeremy has two interviews up: one with Nathan Long and one with John R. Fultz.

Jason’s buy this month is an article about that Gothic favorite, the ruined building (or better, city). It is by E.C. Ambrose who sprinkles it liberally with photos of actual ruins and examples of their use in fantasy. Naturally the piece is called “The Romance of Ruins”.

Neil has a brief editorial glowing happily about the Nebula nominations and intimating that more content will be coming soon.

And finally this month’s cover is “Dead Space Girl” by Sergio Diaz from Buenos Aires.

As ever, the issue is available in the Wizard’s Tower Store.

And on that subject, we also have the new issue of Lightspeed which is also packed full of goodness. In particular I note that the ebook-only feature this month is “Cleopatra Brimstone”, a particularly creepy and wonderful novella by Liz Hand. There’s also an interview with Ian McDonald and other reprint stories from Kathleen Ann Goonan, Karen Joy Fowler and Gene Wolfe.

Clarkesworld #65

~ Cheryl

The new Clarkesworld went online yesterday and as usual is packed with good reading.

The lead story is “And the Hollow Space Inside”, a science fiction tale by Mari Ness. It is available in audio here.

The back-up stories are “A Hundred Ghosts Parade Tonight” by Xia Jia and “All the Young Kirks and Their Good Intentions” by Helena Bell. The former is translated from the original Chinese by Ken Liu.

Jeremy’s interview subjects are Lev AC Rosen and Lisa L. Hannett.

Jason’s column this month has an article on food in fantasy and science fiction by Matthew Johnson

Neil presents the results of the readers’ poll. Much as I love Julie Dillon, I’m proud to see that the winning cover artist is Bryn Jones who has a Welsh name and lives around here somewhere.

The winning story is “The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees” by E. Lily Yu, which had already earned a place on my Hugo ballot, as had the second-place work, “Silently and Very Fast” by Catherynne M. Valente.

This month’s cover is “Pilot” by Alexander Trufanov, which I suspect will do very well in next year’s readers’ poll.

Clarkesworld #64

~ Cheryl ~ 3 Comments

The first issue of Clarkesworld for 2012 is now available online. This one, issue #64, is 100% Cheryl-free, and therefore doubtless infinitely better than anything you have seen over the past few years. Let’s see what we have for you.

The lead story comes from the wonderfully talented Aliette de Bodard. “Scattered Along the River of Heaven” is science fiction, and there are no Aztecs that I can see in it. Chinese poetry, on the other hand… As usual, the story is available in audio, read by the inimitable Kate Baker.

The other two stories for January are “What Everyone Remembers” by Rahul Kanakia and “All the Painted Stars” by Gwendolyn Clare. Rahul has been in Clarkesworld before, so welcome back to him. Gwendolyn is new, but has apparently cracked Asimov’s so she’s hardly a newbie. These stories will appear in audio during the month.

Jeremy’s interview for this month is with Robert Jackson Bennett who is one of those authors everyone keeps telling me I should read. I’m delighted to be able to find out more about him.

Jason’s first column as non-fiction editor is “The Future Sounds of Yesterday: A Sequence of Synthesizers in Science Fiction” by Christopher Bahn. It does exactly what it says on the tin. And it includes material about Doctor Who, David Bowie and Thomas Dolby, amongst others. What more could you ask for?

The cover for #64 is “Rockman” by Arthur Wang. This fellow is a bit larger than Ben Grimm. Well, a lot larger actually.

Finally there is the annual Clarkesworld reader poll. Do please let Neil know what you thought of the 2011 output, it helps him provide more of the sort of thing you like in future.

As usual, the new issue is available for purchase through the Wizard’s Tower bookstore.

Clarkesworld at Last Short Story

~ Cheryl

You should all know by now that Australians tend to do crazy things. One of those insane projects is Not If You Were The Last Short Story On Earth, a group blog for which the members try to read as much as possible of the SF&F short fiction published each year. The end result of all this furious reading is a few weeks in an asylum some end of year recommendation lists. You can see the choices of various members via these links: Alex, Alisa, Tansy, Mondy, Sarah. Because I’m biased, I’m going to single out the Clarkesworld-published stories that they mentioned.

Thanks to all for some fine stories and dedicated reading.

The big discovery of the year appears to be Ken Liu who gets lots of mentions from several different venues. And the surprise anthology hit is Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling’s Teeth.

Robots Are Marching

~ Cheryl

Sean Wallace has been posting tables of contents for forthcoming Prime anthologies. Naturally I am looking out for Clarkesworld stories.

First up we have Robots: The Recent AI, which follows in the steps of Paula Guran’s anthologies, Vampires: The Recent Undead, and New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird. The book is edited by Rich Horton and Sean Wallace, and the Clarkesworld stories selected are:

  • “A Jar of Goodwill” by Tobias S. Buckell
  • “Silently and Very Fast” by Catherynne M.Valente

You can see the full ToC here. It looks excellent.

In addition Rich has released the ToC for his 2012 Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy anthology. The Clarkesworld stories are as follows:

  • “Ghostweight” by Yoon Ha Lee
  • “The Smell of Orange Groves” by Lavie Tidhar
  • “The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees” by E. Lily Yu

Congratulations all, and I can see I need to re-read “Ghostweight”. The full ToC is here.

I don’t know when the books are due you, but I’ll let you know as soon as I have them in store.

More Year’s Best for Clarkesworld

~ Cheryl ~ 1 Comment

SF Signal has posted the Table of Contents for Gardner Dozois’ 29th annual Year’s Best Science Fiction. (Gardner posted it himself, but he did so on Facebook *headdesk*.) There are four stories from Clarkesworld included:

Congratulations to all, and of course to Neil for picking the stories.

Clarkesworld #63

~ Cheryl

The December issue of Clarkesworld came out on time at the start of the month, but I was rushing around the country at the time and I decided not post about it over the weekend as I get a lot less site visits then. Now it is Monday I can get back to work. Here’s what we have for you this month.

This issue has a science fictional air to it. The lead story is “Sirius” by Australian author, Ben Peek. It is a fairly grim tale, but very pointed. The excellent Kate Baker provides an audio version.

Story two for December is “In Which Faster-Than-Light Travel Solves All of Our Problems” by Chris Stabback, who also hails from Sydney (I have no idea whether this is by accident or design). This one is more creepy than grim. It will be available on audio later in the month.

Finally in the fiction we have the final part of Catherynne M. Valente’s novella, “Silently and Very Fast”. I’m hearing very good things about this one from various short fiction experts, so do check it out.

Jeremy’s column this month is an interview with French writer, Aliette de Bodard. I gather from her Twitter feed that she’s very pleased with it. It sounds like she needs Scrivener.

My final column for the magazine is “Where No Human Has Gone Before: Visiting Sci-Fi’s Exoplanets on Earth” by Brenta Blevins. It is a tour around various bits of eccentric geography in the USA that have been used as settings for alien planets in science fiction TV episodes and movies. Brenta has visited these places herself and provided some great photos to go with the article. The only one we got from elsewhere was the shot of White Sands, and that’s because Brenta only had print photos.

There’s no editorial this month, but Neil did make a Happy Holidays card. It has indeed been a great year.

The cover for December is “Reactor” by Berlin-based artist, Folko Streese. The detail is fantastic.

That’s my last issue of Clarkesworld. I’d like to wish Jason the best of luck with the non-fiction column. I’m sure he’ll be buying some great articles.

As always, the issue is available from the Wizard’s Tower Store. Yes, you can read it online for free, but buying a copy helps Neil pay for the material we publish. Your support is always appreciated.

Also in the store are the December issues of Lightspeed and Fantasy. As you are probably aware, John Joseph Adams is taking over the publication of the magazines from Prime, and I understand he’ll be merging them, carrying both SF and fantasy fiction.

And on the subject of magazines, congratulations to Lynne M. Thomas for her first issue at the helm of Apex. It includes an article on “The Australian Dark Weird” by Tansy Rayner Roberts. Who knew that Aussies could be so creepy? I blame the drop bears myself.

Best of the Year

~ Cheryl

I’m on the road in London most of today, so here’s a post I prepared earlier.

Over the weekend Jonathan Strahan posted the Table of Contents for The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume Six. Jonathan’s a friend, and we often like the same books, but I’m still always pleased to see that we are still in sync. There are many great stories on the list, and many more stories by great writers that I haven’t yet read, but now plan to. What I want to focus on, however, are the two stories that Jonathan picked from Clarkesworld. They are as follows:

This pleased me, because if you had asked me to pick my two favorite stories from this year’s issues, these two would probably be the ones I would have chosen. Of course I love Cat Valente’s “Silently and Very Fast” as well, but that’s a novella and therefore not likely to get into Jonathan’s anthology.

So, if you are looking for short fiction to read, and are wondering what Jonathan and I might recommend, click those two links and enjoy.

Clarkesworld #62

~ Cheryl

It is that time of the month again, and the new issue of Clarkesworld is online. Here’s what we have for you in November.

Our headline story is “A Militant Peace” by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell. David is a Marine combat veteran, which is a good start for writing stories about the military. There’s no audio version as yet. The east coast of the USA has been hit by some pretty bad weather and last I saw from Twitter Kate’s power was out, and not expected back on until Sunday. We’ll get the audio up as soon as we can.

The second story for November is “The Smell of Orange Groves” by Lavie Tidhar. Not Florida oranges, of course, or even California ones. The story is set in Tel Aviv.

Also in this issue is the second part of Catherynne M. Valente’s “Silently and Very Fast”. The final part will appear in the December issue.

If that’s not enough Cat for you, then Neil is also publishing a short collection of her work titled Myths of Origin. The contents include two books that I reviewed in Emerald City: The Labyrinth and Yume No Hon. Cat’s much better at plot these days, and her writing is accordingly much more accessible, but these are two magnificently lyrical works and well worth getting hold of if you love words. I see that in the review of Labyrinth I compared Cat to Dylan Thomas. I didn’t know then that she was a huge fan of the Welsh master poet, but I guess it came across in the words.

I’m not sure about ebook availability for Myths of Origin, but you can bet I want to sell that book.

Jeremy has gone all weird this month, and that’s hardly surprising given the arrival of the VanderMeers’ massive anthology, The Weird. To celebrate we have a round table featuring K.J. Bishop, Ramsey Campbell, Steve Duffy, Jeffrey Ford, Stephen Graham Jones, Garry Kilworth, Kathe Koja, Leena Krohn, Michael Shea, William Browning Spencer, and Gio Clairval. All of them are contributors to The Weird.

My own column features an article by British writer, Nathaniel Tapley. It is called “Tea, Robot?”, and as you might imagine it focuses on that terribly proper but fearlessly resolute British hero, the middle class chap. Read it with a cup of tea in hand. And try not to giggle while drinking it.

Neil’s editorial introduces the new non-fiction editor who will be taking over from me, probably in January as I have one more article in the pipeline. I’m delighted to say that Neil has acquired the services of the author of one of my favorites from the articles I have published: Jason Heller, who gave us “Moonage Daydream: The Rock Album as Science Fiction”. I wish Jason all the best with his tenure on the magazine, and look forward to seeing what he produces.

Our November cover is by the magnificent Julie Dillon. “Planetary Alignment” is the work that won this year’s Unpublished Color category in the Chesleys. Well, I guess it is published now. Yet more fabulous artwork for our portfolio. So proud.

Clarkesworld Turns Five

~ Cheryl

Yes, it is October already. That means that a new issue of Clarkesworld is online, and it is our 5th anniversary issue. Neil has an editorial here saying how grateful we all are to you, our readers, for your support.

And talking of support, we did indeed reach our subscriptions target, so as of this issue we will be publishing three stories each issue. Huzzah! This month we have the following.

“Staying Behind” by Ken Liu is a story about the people who are still alive after the Singularity. That one is already available in audio form, read as ever by Kate Baker.

“Pony” by Erik Amundsen is not about anything cute, fluffy or pink. Kate will have that one in audio for you later in the month.

“Silently and Very Fast”, by Catherynne M. Valente, is a long story, and we are publishing it in three parts. Part 1 is in this issue. Parts 2 and 3 will follow in subsequent months. I’m not sure how having three stories each month affects the podcast schedule, but I understand we will still be bringing you audio versions of all of our fiction.

Jeremy has been very busy this month as well. He has two interviews for you. The first is with Steven Gould, and the second with Joan Slonczewski. Joan is one of the smartest women writing science fiction today, so I particularly recommend that one.

In my department we welcome back Mark Cole who is taking a look at the science fiction end of the independent films business. I’m pleased to see mention of the fabulous Sci-Fi London festival, and of the awesome silent movie version of The Call of Cthulhu, produced by the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society. Mark has a lot more good films to recommend, and information as to how you can find more.

Finally we have our cover, “A Sense of Importance” by Bryn Jones, who I see lives somewhere near me. Must try to get him to BristolCon.

As usual, the magazine is available in epub and mobi format at the Wizard’s Tower bookstore, and everywhere else the best ebooks are sold.

Clarkesworld Subscription Drive – Final Days

~ Cheryl

When we got to be able to sell subscriptions on the Kindle, Neil Clarke announced that if we got to 500 subscribers by the 5th birthday of the magazine then he’d add an extra story to each issue. That birthday is now just 3 days away. How are we doing? I have no idea. Neil hasn’t told me. But I do want to see that extra story added. So if you haven’t yet subscribed, you can do so here.

And if you would prefer not to deal with Amazon, or you want your Clarkesworld as an epub. Well you can always subscribe via Weightless Books instead.

Yeah, yeah, I know. Subscriptions is one of the things that the store software I use for Wizard’s Tower doesn’t do. Sorry.

Clarkesworld #60

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

So, what have we got for you this month?

Our lead fiction is from a favorite writer of mine, Robert Reed. “Pack” is about dogs, not any other sort of pack, OK? As usual, it is available in audio via the excellent Kate Baker.

The second story is “Signals in the Deep” by Australian writer, Greg Mellor. The “deep” in question is space, not the oceans, so please don’t expect giant squid. (Well, no one expects giant squid…) That one will be on audio later this month.

Jeremy’s interview victim subject for this month is Genevieve Valentine whose debut novel, Mechanique, is one of my favorite books of the year so far.

In my department there’s an article by Nancy Fulda all about the development (or lack thereof) of artificial intelligence.

The cover art is “Forest Spirit” by the Brazilian artist, Mike Azevedo.

And finally Neil has an editorial to say thank you because, you know, this:

CW Hugo 2011

I understand that a problem has been reported in the Kindle edition supplied to subscription customers. The problem appears to be at Amazon’s end, because the copy Neil sent me to put in the Wizard’s Tower store is fine. You can get it there, though obviously we’d prefer you to buy a subscription because predictable income is a Very Good Thing.

As Promised…

~ Cheryl

… yet more books.

I added a whole lot more books this afternoon — from ChiZine and Lethe, plus the September magazines. Here are a few highlights.

From ChiZine we have Isles of the Forsaken, a new novel from Carolyn Ives Gilman. I reviewed her feminist SF novel, Halfway Human, in Emerald City and found it fascinating, so I’m interested to see what she has done this time. The book looks like a fantasy, but what do I know. I finished the new Glenda Larke “fantasy” trilogy today and discovered, as I had rather suspected, that it was science fiction all along.

From Lethe we have the 2011 edition of Steve Berman’s Wilde Stories anthology series. These are year’s best books collecting science fiction, fantasy and horror stories about gay men. The 2011 edition includes work by Laird Barron, Richard Bowes and Joel Lane.

As usual we have the September issues of Fantasy and Lightspeed. Fantasy has a Jonathan Lethem story in it, and I love the steampunk version of David’s famous portrait of Napoleon that they have on the cover. Lightspeed features David Brin and Ursula K. Le Guin (I’m guessing those and the Lethem are reprints, but I don’t own them). As usual if you buy both magazines you get 25% off the cover price. And while I’m here, huge congratulations to John Joseph Adams and Christie Yant who got married at Worldcon.

Finally, of course, there is issue #60 of Clarkesworld, about which I shall have a lot more to say this evening.

One small word of warning. While I was uploading this lot I got an email from the hosting service to say that the bookstore site will be offline for about 3 hours from 11:00pm to 2:00am UK time tonight for server maintenance. So if you go there and you can’t see anything, don’t worry, it should be back soon.

Bowing Out

~ Cheryl

When I saw the nominations lists for this year’s Hugos & Campbell I was fairly pleased. We had four women on the Best Novel list, we had an African American and a French Vietnamese in the fiction nominations. Nick Mamatas was nominated for editing a line of translated Japanese fiction. There were a South African and, I think, a Muslim American, on the Campbell list. We also had record levels of participation in both the nominating and final ballot stages. I wasn’t too impressed with some of the winners, but hey, that often happens. Overall I thought we were continuing to make progress.

The reaction to this year’s results, however, has been the worst I can remember. Depressingly much of this has come, not just from outraged fans, but also from professionals in the field. And some of those people, accidentally or otherwise, have said things that can be taken to imply they think the process is corrupt.

I don’t want to go into individual cases. Some people were probably just careless with words. Some appear to genuinely believe that the Hugos are a blight on the industry. And a few, I suspect, are trying to stir up controversy in the hope of getting more traffic to their blogs. Ultimately it doesn’t matter much why people say what they do, it is that fact that they say it that everyone else remembers. Fling enough mud, and it sticks.

Nothing I have seen has been directed at me, which is a big relief after the ridiculous nonsense last year. However, all winners are tarred with the same brush. The same people who voted for Connie Willis, or Girl Genius, or Chicks Dig Timelords, or whatever winner someone is particularly incensed about, also voted for Clarkesworld. If the process is suspect, then we must have benefited from it as well.

I guess this sort of thing is inevitable. The higher profile a set of awards, the more carping there will be. But I’m tired of having to worry about it. In particular I’m tired of worrying that projects I’m involved in, which I care deeply about, will suffer through their association with whatever mud-slinging is affecting me. And I have to face up to the fact that for a large segment of the community I will never be anything more than a fan who won fan Hugos in controversial circumstances.

So I am bowing out.

I’ll be retiring from Clarkesworld as soon as Neil can find a suitable replacement. So if you fancy editing non-fiction for one of the best magazines around, get in touch.

I’m also giving up SF Awards Watch. I still think it is a worthwhile project, but it needs someone else to take charge. Kevin and Petrea tell me that they are happy to stay on and help if someone wants to take it on, so again get in touch if you are interested.

I have resigned from the Board of Lavie Tidhar’s World SF Travel Fund. There’s a lot of money involved there and I don’t want there to be any controversy over my involvement in choosing next year’s beneficiary.

Finally, and most importantly, I have resigned from the Board of the SF&F Translations Awards. I’ll still be supporting these with my time and money, but I think it absolutely essential that any idea that these are in some way my awards be erased. We desperately need someone, preferably several someones, who can help promote the awards who is widely respected within the industry. I very much hope that we can get more help, because I think this is a hugely important initiative. I do not want to see it die because people associate it with someone who they think has won four more Hugos than she deserves.

I haven’t yet decided what to do with Wizard’s Tower. It is pretty obvious by now that nothing short of a lottery win is going to get me back to the US. However, if there are ways in which I can continue to help good writers sell good books then I want to continue doing that. Also I have obligations to people whose books I am already selling in some way or another.

I will, of course, continue to blog here occasionally, and I’ll continue working hard behind the scenes for various projects I believe in. I just won’t be lending my name to anything in future unless I’m sure I’m the only person who’ll be harmed by that.

Moving On Up

~ Cheryl

Neil Clarke has announced (via Twitter) that he is withdrawing Clarkesworld from consideration in the Hugos next year so that other semiprozines can get a look-in. I’m very happy with this.

I should note, however, that this doesn’t mean that you can’t show your appreciation for Neil and all that he does. This year he got 56 nominations in Editor: Short Form, which placed him 7th, above such luminaries as Ann VanderMeer and Gardner Dozois. What this says is that people are starting to think of Clarkesworld as a professional-quality magazine alongside the likes of Asimov’s and F&SF. If that’s where people think we belong, then I’m very happy for us to be judged in that company.

Of course if you do think we are that good, we’d also be very grateful if you could subscribe, or just give us money, because then we could afford to buy more stories.

Slightly Muted Celebrations

~ Cheryl ~ 2 Comments

So, it appears I now have four Hugos. That’s pretty amazing. If I seem to be somewhat less enthusiastic this time, it’s not because winning is getting old, it is because we were not supposed to win this one.

I am, of course, very pleased that Neil and Sean got an opportunity to go on stage, having not been able to make it to Melbourne last year. I’m absolutely delighted that Kate has got a rocket, as I think her readings are one of the main reasons why Clarkesworld is so popular.

On the other hand, I really wasn’t expecting us to win this. All of the pundits beforehand were predicting that Locus would win, because Charles Brown was a Guest Ghost of Honor at the convention. Everyone was expecting Liza to go up there and make a very emotional speech about how much we miss him. Maybe she’s relieved that she didn’t have to do it, but the audience wasn’t. During the commentary Mur commented on how muted reaction was to our win. The perception seemed to be that we had rained on Charles’s party.

Looking at the stats, Locus had a clear lead all the way through until the final round of voting when Lightspeed‘s votes were redistributed, so this was a classic case of a very popular nominee failing because a majority did not want it to win, and were prepared to accept any other winner. I guess that’s what’s happens when you have won as many Hugos as Locus has.

For my part, I knew Charles fairly well and was proud to call him a friend. I had been the recipient of his generosity on many occasions. Like Gary and Jonathan, I miss chatting to him about books. All I can say is that I hope, wherever he is now, that he’s getting plenty of good meals, and is still getting all of the good new novels before anyone else. If that’s the case I suspect he won’t mind too much about losing this one.