Worldcon, the traditional host of the Hugos, is a travelling convention, with a new location every year. The Best Related Work category was won by Maria Dahvana Headley for Beowulf: A New Translation. Other awards this year went to T Kingfisher – a pen name of American writer and children’s book creator Ursula Vernon – for best short story with Metal Like Blood in the Dark, which appeared in Uncanny magazine. The prize had previously been dominated by writers such as Robert A Heinlein, Fritz Leiber, Philip K Dick and, in 1966, Frank Herbert for his novel Dune, recently filmed for the second time.Īnnounced at the weekend at the annual Worldcon convention in Washington DC, the Hugos also saw Nghi Vo awarded best novella for her fantasy story inspired by Chinese and Vietnamese culture, The Empress of Salt and Fortune, while Two Truths and a Lie, an eerie mystery about a half-remembered TV show by Sarah Pinsker, won best novelette.

It was not until 1970 that the first woman would win best novel, when Ursula K Le Guin took home the award for The Left Hand of Darkness. It’s a far cry from the first Hugo winners roster announced in 1953, an all-male lineup in which Alfred Bester won for his classic The Demolished Man. This is the sixth year that a woman has taken the best novel award, with Wells following Arkady Martine last year, Mary Robinette Kowal in 2019, and – for the previous three years – NK Jemisin.

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