Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book wins Hugo

Neil Gaiman’s children’s fantasy book The Graveyard Book has won the coveted Hugo Award for best novel released in 2008; beating off a strong challenge during the voting by Cory Doctorow’s Little Brother.

The awards were handed out in a ceremony at Anticipation, the 67th World Science Fiction Convention, held the past few week in Montreal, Canada.

“Fuck! It won!” said Gaiman on Twitter today. “Also the Hugo is really heavy this year. Also fuck!” The author’s twitter account has more than 895,000 followers.

On his blog, Gaiman said he thought the best novel award “would and should” go to Neil Stephenson’s Anathem, which was also in contention:

“and still think that it might have done if that book had actually been included in the Hugo Voters Reading Packet that John Scalzi organised, where every Hugo voter was able to read all the Hugo nominated stories etc, thus, at least in theory, giving a much more educated voting base, who would vote on the basis of things they had read, rather than on name recognition or without having read things that were published in out-of-the-way places”

The award is Gaiman’s second for best novel, having won the 2002 prize for American Gods. However, Gaiman declined to allow his Anansi Boys into contention back in 2006, despite the book collecting enough votes for a nomination.

The complete list of winners is below, and more information is available on the Hugo Awards site.

• Best Novel: The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK)
• Best Novella: “The Erdmann Nexus”, Nancy Kress (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)
• Best Novelette: “Shoggoths in Bloom”, Elizabeth Bear (Asimov’s Mar 2008)
• Best Short Story: “Exhalation”, Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)
• Best Related Book: Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008, John Scalzi (Subterranean Press)
• Best Graphic Story: Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones, Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
• Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director (Pixar/Walt Disney)
• Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon, & Maurissa Tancharoen, writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant Enemy)
• Best Editor Short Form: Ellen Datlow
• Best Editor Long Form: David G. Hartwell
• Best Professional Artist: Donato Giancola
• Best Semiprozine: Weird Tales, edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal
• Best Fan Writer: Cheryl Morgan
• Best Fanzine: Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
• Best Fan Artist: Frank Wu
• And the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer (presented by Dell Magazines): David Anthony Durham