World of the Five Gods brings home a Hugo for best series
I am extremely pleased to report that The World of the Five Gods (aka the Chalion books) was granted my second Hugo Award in the category of best series, tonight at the Worldcon in San Jose.
The whole list is here:
http://www.thehugoawards.org/2018/08/...
Many thanks to Catherine Asaro for being my representative at the ceremony, to my editors at HarperCollins especially Jen Brehl who launched the series so many years ago, and to my long-time agent Ms. Eleanor Wood for, now, decades of support.
My thanks, read out by Catherine:
"Lois says: You have surprised me.
I’ve said elsewhere that I think the series is as distinct an art form from the novel as the novel is from the short story. Series employ different structures (and meta-structures), different techniques, and different demands on -- and rewards for -- their readers than single-volume works. I am pleased that this award recognizes something readers have long known, that series are as much worth comparing as novels. Even though, from the practical side, the nominations are bit like trying to squeeze a giant squid, a camel, a catamount, a whale, and an elephant all alive into the same box, and people will certainly stick by their favorite animals, the whole menagerie is still worth a visit.
Thank you!”
Ta, L.
(Ah, I see the details of the voting process are now up:
https://www.worldcon76.org/images/pub... )
The whole list is here:
http://www.thehugoawards.org/2018/08/...
Many thanks to Catherine Asaro for being my representative at the ceremony, to my editors at HarperCollins especially Jen Brehl who launched the series so many years ago, and to my long-time agent Ms. Eleanor Wood for, now, decades of support.
My thanks, read out by Catherine:
"Lois says: You have surprised me.
I’ve said elsewhere that I think the series is as distinct an art form from the novel as the novel is from the short story. Series employ different structures (and meta-structures), different techniques, and different demands on -- and rewards for -- their readers than single-volume works. I am pleased that this award recognizes something readers have long known, that series are as much worth comparing as novels. Even though, from the practical side, the nominations are bit like trying to squeeze a giant squid, a camel, a catamount, a whale, and an elephant all alive into the same box, and people will certainly stick by their favorite animals, the whole menagerie is still worth a visit.
Thank you!”
Ta, L.
(Ah, I see the details of the voting process are now up:
https://www.worldcon76.org/images/pub... )
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Marie
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Aug 19, 2018 10:51PM
Congrats!! I was very excited to hear this!
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I absolutely love The Curse of Chalion and Paladin of Souls. I have yet to read further in the five gods world, but goodness me I'm pleased just because of those two fantastic books!That makes you 2 for 2! what an amazing honor. You've set a really high bar for anyone else to try and match now.
A well-deserved and overdue accolade, in my opinion. Your works are both highly readable and rereadable, something many authors are not. I can’t reread Heinlein, for instance, for several reasons. You have my sincere congratulations!
This recognition is so well deserved!I read "The Curse of Chalion" when it came out on audio because others in the Goodreads audio group were praising it and then went on to devour every book by LMB. What has enchanted me over the years is how well most of the books not only hold up well upon rereading, or listening but improve.
The new "Penric" novellas are a total delight. Thank you.
It is very well deserved! Congratulations !
Congratulations! I love the entire series, and the Penric and Desdemona are my new favorites! I can't wait for the next 'installments.' I hope there will be more!
Congratulations! Paladin of Souls is a transcendent work, I can reread The Curse of Chalion every year, and Penric is just as worthy an addition.You are right up there with Heinlein as one of the giants of SF.
Great news. I hope winning a series award doesn't mean that the series is over! I hope for more Penric and Desdemona.
Jerri wrote: "Great news. I hope winning a series award doesn't mean that the series is over! I hope for more Penric and Desdemona."Thank you, all above!
More Pen & Des is certainly not impossible, though not promised. One of the charms of the ala carte e-novella format for me is the great flexibility for adding new work, of any length or subject and at any point in the timeline.
Writers of shorter tales for the pulps had this, of course, since way back, but indie e-pub has the added advantage of not having to fit in any particular target magazine's very limited slots.
Ta, L.
OK... I've just deleted two comments, something I've never done before.Please treat this blog as you would my living room, a personal space to which you have been invited as a guest. You have the entire rest of the internet to go be internetty on.
bests, Lois.
Congratulations!! These are some of my favorite books of all time!
Sorry, Lois. I was trying to defend you and the other winners. But I did go overboard on my response.
I hope all your awards are excited about their new sibling/cousin and am looking forward to the new family photo in a few weeks.And congratulations, of course.
If I weren't already in the middle of a reread, this would be a great reason for one! Congratulations <3
Woo-hoo! Curse of Chalion is my absolute favorite book, of any genre, so the Five Gods universe will always hold a special place in my heart, but in addition to that, I love how *different* the various works in this series are. You really don't repeat yourself, which is absolutely refreshing in this day and age.
Fabulous news and well deserved, in my opinion. The Curse Of Chalion is one of my top 3 favourites of yours, and you're one of my top 3 favourite authors. Where do I put my vote in for The Sharing Knife series for next year...?
Congratulations! :) And WOW! Agree with Kosigan, the members of the jury should finish the job next year. Surely you are going to mark the occasion?
Kosigan wrote: "...Where do I put my vote in for The Sharing Knife series for next year...?"Heh. The Sharing Knife is not eligible next year, because it has no new piece published this year.
Working out rules for an award for something so amorphous as series has not been an easy challenge for the Hugo folks, especially as series will almost never fit tidily into an award year. There are also all the multitude of completed (and uncompleted) series of the past. Really, who wants to go up against Lord of the Rings every year? Current rules are an attempt to wrestle all this into some sort of order.
To keep the focus on current work one requirement is that any series being nominated have at least one new work in the award year. The Penric novellas squeaked the Five Gods in under that rule, and Gentleman Jole and the Red Queen, pubbed 2016, did it for the Vorkosigan series last year in 2017.
Two more rules are, if a series has won it is not eligible again (makes sense to me) and that if a series has been shortlisted, it is not eligible again until it has clocked at least 250,000 words more story, in some form.
So no one should mistakenly waste future nominating votes on the VK series or the Chalion series, henceforth. Spread the fun around next year, folks.
Ta, L.
Hmm, looks like Varley will be eligible for his 8 Worlds series.
Lois wrote: "Kosigan wrote: "...Where do I put my vote in for The Sharing Knife series for next year...?"Heh. The Sharing Knife is not eligible next year, because it has no new piece published this year. ."
I thought there might be something like that. But anyway, you've won the first 2 Hugos for best series - something that can never be repeated. Someone else may win 2 series Hugos (not that many other people who write a series have more than 1), but how likely is it that they'd be in consecutive years again?
I think I may just have to reread them all again, as soon as I've read all of Douglas Adams's books as it's the 40th anniversary of the first Hitch-Hiker's radio series this year.
