The 2025 Hugo Awards: My Hugo Ballot

Just recently Paul wrote about finding it impossible to focus, much less write about, anything but the current five alarm fire in your political system. I get that, but to be blunt, that sort of chaos has been a constant in my life for something like two years. At some point you have to decide that the things you care about, the things you’re good at, are still important and worth talking about. So this post is going to be about this year’s Hugo awards, the things I’m planning to nominate for them, and work by LGM contributors that is eligible for the award. If that’s not of interest to you, no hard feelings; there will no doubt be another post in a minute.

The nominating period for the 2025 Hugo awards opened earlier this week and will continue until March 14th. To nominate, you need to have either been a member of the 2024 Worldcon in Glasgow, Scotland, or to have become a member of the 2025 Worldcon, which will be held this August in Seattle, before January 31st, 2025. Nominating takes place through the Worldcon website, where there are detailed instructions about logging in and checking your eligibility to nominate.

Before I get to the work I’m planning to nominate this year, I would like to mention that my book, Track Changes: Selected Reviews, is eligible in the Best Related Work category. I’ve been very gratified by the reception the book has received. Earlier this month it appeared on the Locus Recommended Reading List, the long-running magazine’s comprehensive log of work from the previous year that its contributors find noteworthy (the list also functions as the foundation for the Locus poll, which is open until April 15th to subscribers and non-subscribers, though the latter’s votes count for half). Track Changes has also been longlisted for the British Science Fiction Association Award in the non-fiction category. That award is voted on by BSFA members and will be handed out at the 2025 Eastercon in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It would be lovely to add a Hugo nomination to these accolades, so if you’re nominating for the Hugo, I hope you’ll consider giving Track Changes your vote.

In addition, the late and much-missed LGM front-pager Steven Attewell is eligible for the Best Fan Writer category. The Hugos operate on a year-by-year basis so this is the last year Steven will be eligible for this award (unless someone puts together a collection of his work, which will be eligible in Best Related Work). In 2024, Steven continued writing his chapter-by-chapter analysis of George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire, to contribute to the comics blog Graphic Policy, and to post on matters various and sundry on his tumblr. There have been many times in the last year that I’ve found myself wondering what he would have to say on a certain topic, fannish or political. I would love to be able to honor him one last time with a Hugo nomination.

With those two topics out of the way, these are the books, films, comics, games, etc. that I’m planning to nominate for this year’s Hugo award. This is a preliminary ballot, so some of the categories are absent–in particular, the short fiction categories, where I’m hoping to do some more reading in the next month. In some places, I’ve noted potential nominees that I haven’t gotten to yet, but which have received attention from other awards, or been talked up by people whose judgment I trust.

Best Novel:
(A work of science fiction or fantasy fiction longer than 40,000 words)

• Private Rites by Julia Armfield – It’s always a bit of a struggle for me, whether to nominate literary SF novels that are unquestionably among the best work of the last year but have no chance of making it onto the ballot (it’s for this reason that I’m forgoing nominations for the equally deserving In Ascension and Cahokia Jazz). But Armfield’s second novel is too good not to recognize. A family drama set in a climate changed future, it persuasively argues for climate fiction’s place not just within science fiction, but horror. (review)
• The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley – It’s been months since I picked up Bradley’s debut expecting a disposable time travel romcom and discovered a sharp and disquieting meditation on immigration, refugeeism, and how the language of inclusion and social progress can conceal a naked desire to regress towards open colonial expansion. These are, of course, all issues that feel all the more pressing in the present moment, and make this excellent novel feel even more impactful. (review)
• Exordia by Seth Dickinson – At once core science fiction and full of gonzo inventiveness, Dickinson’s mind-bending novel delivers one of the most plausible, and terrifying, alien invasion stories I’ve ever read, featuring an utterly original alien species. It then proceeds with a tale of perhaps-doomed resistance, in the process of which it invents whole new branches of physics and mathematics, even as the characters debate morality and try to decide how, and whether, they can save the world. If the Hugos don’t recognize a novel like this, I don’t know what they’re even for.
• The Book of Love by Kelly Link – In her first novel after a quarter century as America’s doyenne of weird, sardonic, pop culture-inflected short stories, Link preserves many of those same qualities, as she follows the misadventures of three teens who return home after being absent (and in fact dead) for a year, and must protect themselves and their town from the predations of magical creatures locked in an ancient enmity. Though its baggy, meandering quality can sometimes be a challenge, it eventually comes to feel like the essence of the novel, as its heroes become distracted by town history, personal relationships, and just weird asides that are the very things that have made Link such a beloved author.

Books I’d like to read before the nominating deadline: Rakesfall by Vajra Chandrasekera, The West Passage by Jared Pechaček, Remember You Will Die by Eden Robins, Alien Clay by Adrian Tchaikovsky, Space Oddity by Catherynne M. Valente

Best Novella:
(A work of science fiction or fantasy fiction between 17,500 and 40,000 words long)

• The Proposal by Bae Myung-hoon, translated by Stella Kim – Honford Star continue to do excellent work in bringing top notch Korean science fiction to anglophone audiences. The Proposal is presented as a series of letters from an officer fighting a space war to his sweetheart, and delivers pitch perfect milSF alongside Catch-22-style cynicism and a very sweet love story.
• A Mourning Coat by Alex Jeffers – Neon Hemlock had a really great 2024, starting with this novella, a thoroughly mundane story about a man mourning his father and coming back to life after years spent caring for him, set in a thoroughly fantasized world. A Mourning Coat not only fires on all cylinders on both of these levels, but pushes the boundaries of what we define as fantasy, and what that genre can do. (review)
• The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain by Sofia Samatar – I’m sure it will come as no surprise that my one Tordotcom slot goes to Samatar and her return, after too long an absence, to writing fantasy fiction. A magnificent feat of worldbuilding, it approaches the common trope of a stratified, repressive future society by focusing on the role of the academy in such societies, and its ability to both prop them up and undermine them.
• The Dragonfly Gambit by A.D. Sui – The second Neon Hemlock novella on my ballot is a familiar tale of a voracious, endlessly expansionist space empire, a supposedly loyal officer from a conquered territory, and a plot to strike at the very heart of the empire’s power. In less than two hundred pages, Sui delivers a story that would have taken other authors three novels, while poking at some of the conventions of this form.
• North Continent Ribbon by Ursula Whitcher – Third time’s the charm for Neon Hemlock and their fantastic 2024 novella line, with this novella-in-stories that follow the colonization of an alien planet, and the society that develops on it, over the course of centuries. Issues such as AI rights, or the personhood of criminals sentenced to serve as shipminds, recur throughout the book, giving this mannered society a decidedly cyberpunk undertone.

Novellas I’d like to read before the nominating deadline: It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over by Anne de Marcken (which won the Ursula K. Le Guin award over a very strong shortlist), On the Calculation of Volume by Solvej Belle, translated by Barbara J. Haveland

Best Series:
(A multi-installment work of at least three parts and 240,000 words, with at least one qualifying installment published during the previous calendar year)

• Southern Reach by Jeff VanderMeer (qualifying work: Absolution) – The best series category didn’t exist when VanderMeer published the first three Area X book, which means this is our first opportunity to recognize this series as a multi-volume work of worldbuilding that combines environmentalism, gonzo SF, office satire, and profound political anger. It’s hard to imagine a work better suited for this category. (review)
• The Tyrant Philosophers by Adrian Tchaikovsky (qualifying work: either House of Open Wounds or Days of Shattered Faith, depending on if you go by UK or US publication) – I’m cheating with this nomination, because I still haven’t read the last two books in this series. But judging by how impressed I was with City of Last Chances, and how much work it did to build a multifaceted, New Weird-style science fantasy world, I feel absolutely confident in giving it my vote in this category.
• The Singing Hills Cycle by Nghi Vo (qualifying work: The Brides of High Hill) – Every novella in Vo’s series about a traveling monk who gathers stories in their fantasy world has received a Hugo nomination, and I think it’s maybe time to admit that what’s being recognized is the work as a whole rather than an individual story. I’m fairly certain that the publication of the most recent installment in the sequence places the Singing Hills Cycle above the word count requirement for this category, which is the more appropriate place for it.

Best Graphic Story or Comic:
(A work of science fiction or fantasy fiction told in a graphic format)

• Star Trek: Lower Decks – Warp Your Own Way by Ryan North and Chris Fenoglio – The most surprising and delightful comics-reading experience I had in 2024 is a great Lower Decks story that perfectly captures the characters and humor of the show, and a brilliant use of the choose your own adventure format that finds new storytelling capabilities within it. I can’t think of a better award to recognize all of those accomplishments than the Hugo. (review)
• Coda: False Dawns by Simon Spurrier and Matías Bergara – Spurrier and Bergara’s Coda, in which the residents of a fantasy world have to cope with the disappearance of magic, was one of the most exciting works of epic fantasy of the last few years, with Spurrier’s wide-ranging worldbuilding, and Bergara’s chaotic artwork setting a benchmark that few works, in any medium, have matched. This new story in that setting, which finds cynical bard Hum and his retired berserker wife Serka struggling to adjust to post-adventuring life, and getting caught up in a new scheme to reignite the world’s lost magic, is no less clear-eyed about the genre’s allure and pitfalls.
• Damn Them All, Volume 2 by Simon Spurrier, Charlie Adlard, and Sofie Dodgson – In the early 2020s, Spurrier wrote an excellent Hellblazer run that was cancelled mid-story (he has since been invited back to continue it). In the interregnum, he created his own Hellblazer, with blackjack and hookers a female lead who is somehow even more of a lowlife than John Constantine. This volume concludes the arc in which occultist Ellie Hawthorne must discover why a multitude of demons have been set free on the earth, and why it’s all rich people’s fault.
• Rare Flavors by Ram V and Filipe Andrade – The superstar team of V and Andrade return with this standalone comic about a demon who is also a foodie, who sets out on a journey to document his favorite foods (while also eating some people along the way). A culinary odyssey and supernatural mystery, with gorgeous art that captures both the story’s remote settings and its fascination with food, this is an utterly unique fantasy story and brilliant use of the comics format.

Comics I’d like to read before the nominating deadline: My Favorite Thing is Monsters, Book 2 by Emil Ferris

Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form:
(A dramatized science fiction or fantasy production longer than 90 minutes)

An obvious question that might be raised by these selections is: where is Dune, Part Two? To which my answer is, first, that is not a movie that needs my vote to get on the Hugo ballot. Second, that is a movie that already has an Oscar nomination, so maybe the Hugos should be reserved for movies that don’t get mainstream recognition. And third, I’ve actually cooled a little on this film since my already-slightly-underwhelmed original reaction. I still expect Dune: Part Two to get a Hugo nomination, but it’s not something I’m particularly fussed about achieving.

• Delicious in Dungeon, Season 1 – Manga and anime are not fields that I know very well, but the concept for this series, adapted from the bestselling manga by Ryoko Kui, was too enticing not to check out: a party of adventurers exploring a dungeon decide to eat the monsters they encounter there in order to be able to venture even further into its depths. Beyond the thrilling, often hilarious story and compelling characters, what’s striking about Delicious in Dungeon is how serious and thoughtful it is about the dungeon as an ecosystem, whose monsters function according to biological imperatives rather than as mere plot tokens. It’s a highly original approach to fantasy that I think the Hugo, in particular, should be in the business of recognizing.
• Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, dir. George Miller – Unlike Dune: Part Two, this is a sequel that is not only worthy of its predecessors, but which hasn’t received anywhere near the acclaim and recognition it deserves. Full of thrilling set-pieces, gonzo worldbuilding, and one of the most distinctive and compelling villains ever seen on screen, Furiosa takes a concept that absolutely should not have worked and turns it into one of the best SF films of the last few years. Audiences and mainstream awards may have failed to acknowledge this, but the Hugo absolutely should not do the same. (review)
• I Saw the TV Glow, dir. Jane Schoenbrun – At the other end of explosiveness scale from Furiosa is this quiet, heartbreaking supernatural fantasy that is both an homage to, a commentary on, and an expansion of that beloved 90s nerd stalwart, Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Are the heroes of this movie really characters in their favorite fantasy TV show, or are they simply lost kids who have trouble distinguishing fantasy from reality? And does that really matter, when fantasy has the power to let you express truths that in your real life you may not be ready to face? Gorgeously shot and acted, this is another major SF filmmaking achievement that the Hugo must recognize. (review)
• KAOS, Season 1 – Unfortunately cut off mid-story by Netflix’s cancellation-happy tendencies, this retelling and remixing of the Greek myths is nevertheless one of the most delightful works of fantasy worldbuilding I’ve seen in some time. From the depiction of the afterlife as a black and white bureaucracy whose security guards are accompanied by three-headed dogs, to Orpheus as a Chris Martin-style pop idol, to Cassandra as a refugee from the ruins of Troy, there isn’t a choice made in this show that isn’t delightfully clever, turning these familiar stories into something new and exciting.
• Mars Express, dir. Jérémie Périn – I suppose there’s not much chance that a French-language animated film that got, at best, limited distribution in the US and UK will make it onto the Hugo shortlist, but nevertheless Mars Express is one of the top SF movies of last year. A tightly-crafted mystery in which a private detective and her robot sidekick investigate the disappearance of a student, it constructs an impeccable cyberpunk future, a colonized Mars in which robots are ubiquitous, dead people can be resurrected as holograms, and the poor can rent out their brains as temporary processing units. Even if you can’t get it on this year’s ballot, do try to seek this movie out.

Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form:
(A dramatized science fiction or fantasy production shorter than 90 minutes)

• “The Case of the Very Long Stairway”, Dead Boy Detectives – This gone-too-soon fantasy mystery series only got eight episodes, but it used them to the hilt, telling excellent standalone stories with a delightful cast of main and supporting characters. In this episode, Edwin, one half of the titular detective duo, is kidnapped into hell, forcing his partner Charles to venture there to rescue him. Along the way we get an imaginatively-conceived hell, some insights into Edwin’s past, and a step forward in the partners’ relationship.
• “Dot and Bubble”, Doctor Who – There was a stretch of very good episodes in the middle of Ncuti Gatwa’s inaugural season as the Doctor, but if I have to pick just one of them to nominate for a Hugo, my vote goes to “Dot and Bubble”, a sly, ultimately devastating hour in which the monsters menacing a group of oblivious, social-media-obsessed young people turn out to be far less terrifying than the things they believe in. Gatwa isn’t in the episode a whole lot, but his performance nevertheless speaks volumes, and culminates in a final scene that drives the episode’s message powerfully home.
• “Quids Game”, Futurama – The re-re-reboot of this beloved animated series was mostly inessential, but still managed to deliver one or two top-tier episodes. This Squid Game parody makes excellent use of the show’s wide, well-established cast, putting them through the wringer of increasingly sadistic games dreamed up by visiting aliens, while also making another foray into the past of hapless protagonist Philip J. Fry, recalling such classics of the series as “Jurassic Bark” and “The Luck of the Fryrish”.
• “Don’t Be Afraid, Just Start the Tape”, Interview With the Vampire – As I wrote in my review of the second season of this adaptation of Anne Rice’s novel, what’s at the heart of this show’s success is its furiously intelligent writing, fearless performances, and the metafictional games it plays with the conceit of a journalist interviewing a vampire. All are on display in this flashback episode, which recreates the original interview (the one familiar from the novel and 1994 movie), and turns it into a no-holds-barred marital spat between two immortals who are heartily sick of each other, but also can’t walk away.
• “Whistlespeak”, Star Trek: Discovery – The final season of NuTrek’s inaugural show was a bit of a damp squib, but this episode was a highlight precisely because it takes a break from the season’s (underwhelming) overarching storyline to tell as a classic, standalone Star Trek story, in which our Starfleet heroes must complete a mission on a pre-contact planet without disrupting the inhabitants’ lives. Both the aliens’ society, and the dilemma our heroes inevitably find themselves wrestling with, are very well done, and as a bonus the episode gives Michael Burnham a chance to break the Prime Directive, something every Star Trek captain should get to do at least once.

Best Game or Interactive Work:
(An interactive work in the fields of science fiction or fantasy released to the public in the previous calendar year)

• Riven – I wouldn’t normally nominate a remaster of a game from 1997, but the revamped Riven is almost a whole new game, changing vast parts of the game world and its puzzles in ways that are clearly designed to reflect on some of the problematic assumptions of the original game. At the same time, it preserves the original Riven‘s beautiful graphics, thrilling story, and compelling characters, setting a high bar for remastered gaming classics. (review)
• The Rise of the Golden Idol – I missed my chance to nominate The Case of the Golden Idol in this category, but happily its creators have quickly delivered a sequel that is a huge leap forward in the complexity of the game’s logic puzzles, while also spinning a new story, in which the rediscovery, by unscrupulous scientists, of the titular idol in the 1970s creates a terrifying new technology. (review)

Games I’d like to play before the nominating deadline: Lorelei and the Laser Eyes, Pacific Drive

Best Fancast:
(A non-professional audio or video presentation with at least four installments released during the previous calendar year)

As I did last year, I am leaving off the Ranged Touch podcasts from my ballot, because my understanding of the eligibility rules is that they are too commercial to qualify (now might be a good time to talk about whether such distinctions make sense). But I certainly want to call these podcasts to attention: Just King Things continues to be a fascinating journey through the works of Stephen King, and Shelved By Genre delivers in-depth looks at various genre series (their current season, on William Gibson’s Sprawl trilogy, has been absolutely excellent).

• Critical Friends, hosted by Dan Hartland and Aishwarya Subramanian – I’m a bit biased here, since I appeared on an episode of the Strange Horizons reviews department’s podcast last year. But nevertheless I believe this is an essential resource if you’re interested in the state and purpose of criticism in the fantastic fields, presented by two knowledgeable and entertaining people.
• Going Rogue, hosted by Tansy Gardam – I continue to be wowed by this podcast, which so knowledgeably and intelligently discusses the behind the scenes antics of various Hollywood projects, and how they ended up the way they did. In 2024, it delivered, as well as several standalone episodes, a mini-season on the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy, which is full of charming enthusiasm for this better-than-it-should-be series, and an in-depth look at the curiosity that was Rebel Moon, which manages to be incredibly even-handed and generous while still conveying the inescapable conclusion that Zack Snyder just isn’t a very good writer.
• A Meal of Thorns, hosted by Jake Casella Brookins – Hands down the most exciting new podcast project of 2024, this virtual book club from the Ancillary Review of Books sees host Brookins sit down with a different guest every week for an in-depth discussion of a particular book. Topics have ranged from acknowledged classics (The Scar by China Miéville, Pattern Recognition by William Gibson), to lesser-known gems (The This by Adam Roberts), to works on the very boundary of the fantastic (The Passion by Jeannette Winterson, Tainaron by Leena Krohn). The conversations are always fascinating and insightful, and have also inspired me to pick up some excellent books.

Podcasts I’d like to listen to before the nominating deadline: Strange Horizons @ 25, hosted by Kat Kourbeti and Michael Ireland, a series of interviews in honor of the magazine’s twenty-fifth anniversary; Eight Days of Diana Wynne Jones, hosted by Emily Tesh and Rebecca Fraimow

Astounding Award for Best New Writer:
(Awarded to writers whose first science fiction or fantasy publication occurred within the previous two calendar years)

• Sylvie Cathrall – With her 2024 debut, A Letter to the Luminous Deep, Cathrall delivered a thrilling epistolary romance, in which scientists on a water planet come together to explore the mysteries of its depths.
• Holly Gramazio – The success of The Ministry of Time has perhaps eclipsed the excellence of Gramazio’s novel The Husbands, which like it takes a romcom premise – a woman who gets a new husband each time she sends the old one into her attic – and uses it to think seriously about relationships and the difference between romantic fantasy and mundane reality.
• Justinian Huang – In Huang’s debut The Emperor and the Endless Palace, a group of souls reincarnate endlessly, trying to lay to rest an ancient betrayal. The result is a thrilling historical mystery and a touching, melancholy romance.
• Anton Hur – The renowned translator of superstars of Korean literature like Bora Chung, Hur proved himself a double-barreled talent in 2024 with his debut novel Toward Eternity, in which a technology that permits people to live forever in a robot body gives rise to a new kind of human, who find themselves grappling with their new nature, and with their biological predecessors.

Authors I’d like to read before the nominating deadline: Bethany Jacobs, whose novels These Burning Stars and On Vicious Worlds have gotten a lot of praise from people I trust.