Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Forums

We do in fact list all the nominees, or rather, finalists.  What we don't list is all the books on the Locus recommended reading list.  Let me explain:

- The books on the list are not actually "nominees."  It's a "recommended reading" list put forth by Locus editors for Locus readers.  Those readers can vote for books other than what's on the list too which means that, at least theoretically, a novel not on the list could win the award.

From Locus:  "Locus publishes a "recommended reading" list in its February issue, when the poll ballot is distributed. Though poll voting is not limited to works on this list, some feel the recommendations are overly influential."

- Locus voters choose up to 5 ranked nominations per category.  This is where "recommended" books become "nominees."  We're following the convention that Locus eventually moved to and listing the top 5 as "finalists."

From Locus: "Readers make up to five ranked nominations per category; votes are tabulated according to the 'Carr' system, awarding a first-place vote 8 points, second-place vote 7 points, etc. The leader in each category is declared the winner. Beginning 2005, the top five finishers in each category were revealed as 'finalists' prior to announcement of the winners at a public event."

- There are just too many!  Some years there are up to 30 books listed for each category.  If it was still a combined SF and Fantasy award (the award split in 1978) that would mean 60 books on the list.  Can you imagine 60 Hugo nominees?  Can you name 30 other books that should have made the nominee list for any award? Even 10?  We look at the recommended reading list as a "long list" like the one put out for the Clarke or BFA.

Anyway, I hope that makes sense. You can read more about it all on the Locus site and see the full recommended lists.

As for The Dosadi Experiment, it came in 7th place so missed the finalists cutoff.  It was in the running in that it was on the recommended reading list but really any book published in 1977 was in the running since it was an open ballot. It might be interesting to see what books were written in over the years.

I do see that we have the Locus finalists labeled as nominees.  I'll change that to help clarify.  Let me know if you have any questions.  I'm really surprised that this has not come up before.

What I want to know is do you guys think we should put in the Young Adult Novel or First Novel categories?

@Blue gargoyle:  You bring up some good points that have always puzzled me too.  Crichton belongs in SF IMO.  I suspect he sells better outside the genre than in though.

He's not in our DB because we didn't think of adding him yet.  If you look closely you'll find lots of oversights which is why I love this thread.  I'm constantly surprised about the obvious books I've missed so keep telling us what you want to see added and we'll do our best to get 'em all in there.  I'll get you some Crichton soon! 

WWEnd's focus is on novels.  We started by collecting all the award nominated books for the 10 awards we cover then we expanded to iclude all the realted series books and other books by the nominated authors and finally we started adding "best of" lists like the Classics of SF and SF Masterworks etc.  The goal was/is to get to the best books first then fill in from there.  Our next expansion will be to start adding new awards like the Mythopoetic and Stoker awards and something more geared for Young Adults.

We HAVE added a lot of anthologies to the DB like Dozois' The Year's Best Science Fiction, the Eclipse series by Jonathan Strahan and Asimov's Before the Golden Age series.  In addition we have many collections like The Collected Stories of Roger Zelazny (6 volumes), The Collected Short Works of Poul Anderson (4 volumes) and of course 20 books of short stories by Harlan Ellison plus many other short story collections by various authors throughout the site.  Taken all together there are many thousands of short stories to be had even if, by volume, they are a rather small percentage of the thousands of books we have in total.

We're certainly not opposed to short fiction, I'm particularly fond of it myself, it's just not our focus.  But now that you've made me think about it, we should probably start adding some anthology awards or best of lists to help round things out a bit more.  Hmmm.  I'll have to think about that and do some research.  Do you have any in mind that you'd like to see?  Anybody else?  The Hugo Award for Anthologies springs to mind as a no-brainer.

Thanks for posting your question. You've given me lots to think about.  We love getting feedback and ideas from our members.  Afterall, it's your site too and we always try to add features and books that you guys want to see.  Keep 'em coming.

I combed back through this thread and collected all the titles you guys have requested.  The links are obviously the books I've gotten to so far - a little more than half.  Not too bad all things considered.  I'll keep plugging away at these and will periodically update this list with the ones I've added to the DB and other requests you guys submit.

• Schild's Ladder by Greg Egan
• Armor by John Steakley
• Chung Kuo by David Wingrove
  • The Middle Kingdom
  • The Broken Wheel
  • The White Mountain
  • The Stone Within
  • Beneath the Tree of Heaven
  • White Moon, Red Dragon
  • Days of Bitter Strength
  • The Marriage of the Living Dark
• Ebenezum by Craig Shaw Gardner
  • A Malady of Magicks
  • A Multitude of Monsters
  • A Night in the Netherhells
• Wuntvor by Craig Shaw Gardner
  • A Difficulty with Dwarves
  • An Excess of Enchantments
  • A Disagreement with Death
• The Cineverse Cycle by Craig Shaw Gardner
  • Slaves of the Volcano God
  • Bride of the Slime Monster
  • Revenge of the Fluffy Bunnies
• Arabian Nights by Craig Shaw Gardner
  • The Other Sinbad
  • A Bad Day for Ali Baba
  • The Last Arabian Night
• The Tripods by John Christopher
  • The White Mountains
  • The City of Gold and Lead
  • The Pool of Fire
  • When the Tripods Came
• The Case of the Vanishing Boy by Alexander Key
• Wave Without a Shore by C.J. Cherryh
• Needle Series by Hal Clement
  • Needle
  • Through the Eye of the Needle
• And Another Thing... by Eoin Colfer's
• Second Foundation Trilogy
  • Foundation's Triumph by David Brin
  • Foundation and Chaos by Greg Bear
  • Foundation's Fear by Gregory Benford
• The Man Who Fell to Earth by Walter Tevis
• Dirk Gently by Douglas Adams
  • Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency
  • The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul
• The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton
• Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton
• Prey by Michael Crichton
• Sphere by Michael Crichton
• Timeline by Michael Crichton
• Alien by Alan Dean Foster
• Splinter of the Mind's Eye by Alan Dean Foster
• Spellsinger by Alan Dean Foster
  • Spellsinger
  • The Hour of the Gate
  • The Day of the Dissonance
  • The Moment of the Magician
  • The Paths of the Perambulator
  • The Time of the Transference
  • Son of Spellsinger
  • Chorus Skating
• Jed the Dead by Alan Dean Foster
• Contact by Carl Sagan
• WorShip by Frank Herbert
  • Destination: Void
  • The Jesus Incident (with Bill Ransom)
  • The Lazarus Effect (with Bill Ransom)
  • The Ascension Factor (with Bill Ransom)
• Whipping Star by Frank Herbert
• The Dosadi Experiment by Frank Herbert
• Virtual Unrealities by Alfred Bester
• Burning Chrome by William Gibson
• Echo Round His Bones by Thomas M. Disch
• The Commonwealth Saga by Peter F. Hamilton
  • Pandora's Star
  • Judas Unchained
• The Compleat Traveller by John Brunner

I've got Turtledove on another list of books that I want to add already so stand by for those.

Vortex sure and certainly Lovecraft!  We were taken to task for not having any on the site by a couple people at Worldcon.  Oz is a little out of our demographic I'm afraid.