Science Fiction Writer
ROBERT J. SAWYER
Hugo and Nebula Winner

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Press Release
For Saturday, August 30, 2003

Hominids Wins the Hugo Award

Robert J. Sawyer's Hominids today won the Hugo Award — the world's top honour in science fiction — for Best Novel of the Year. The Hugos are nominated for and voted on by the 5,000 members of the World Science Fiction Society, and presented at that organization's annual conference, the World Science Fiction Convention — which this year is being held in Toronto.

The Hugos are the "People's Choice" award for science fiction writing. Sawyer has previously won SF's "Academy Award," the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America's Nebula Award, for Best Novel of 1995 (for his The Terminal Experiment).

That means Sawyer now joins one of the most select clubs in science fiction — the 16 people who have won both a Best-Novel Hugo and a Best-Novel Nebula:

Isaac Asimov
David Brin
Lois McMaster Bujold
Orson Scott Card
Arthur C. Clarke
Neil Gaiman
William Gibson
Joe Haldeman
Frank Herbert
Ursula K. Le Guin
Vonda N. McIntyre
Larry Niven
Frederik Pohl
Kim Stanley Robinson
Robert J. Sawyer
Connie Willis

Previous Hugo Award-winning novels include Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein, Dune by Frank Herbert, The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin, Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card, A Canticle for Liebowitz by Walter M. Miller, and Neuromancer by William Gibson.

Sawyer's Hugo Award-winning novel Hominids was published in June 2002 by Tor Science Fiction, New York, the world's largest SF publisher, following serialization in the January through April 2002 issues of Analog Science Fiction and Fact, the world's largest-circulation SF magazine.

Hominids was Sawyer's thirteenth novel, and is the first volume of his acclaimed Neanderthal Parallax trilogy. The second volume, Humans, was a top-ten mainstream bestseller in Canada, appearing on the Globe and Mail bestsellers list. The concluding volume, Hybrids, will be published next month (September 2003) by Tor, and distributed in Canada by H. B. Fenn and Company. Sawyer's trilogy tells of a parallel Earth where Neanderthals survived to the present day and our kind of humanity did not.

The full list of best-novel Hugo Award finalists this year:

1st place: Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer (Canadian)
2nd place: Kiln People by David Brin (American)
3rd place: Bones of the Earth by Michael Swanwick (American)
4th place: The Scar by China Miéville (British)
5th place: The Years of Rice and Salt by Kim Stanley Robinson (American)

Sawyer received his award at a gala ceremony hosted by renowned SF author Spider Robinson. The ceremony was held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, as the highlight of Torcon 3, the 61st World Science Fiction Convention. This is the third time the World Science Fiction Convention has been in Toronto; the previous times were in 1947 and 1973.

The full list of winners in all categories — best novella, novelette, short story, movie, TV episode, and more — is available on the Hugo Awards website.

During the Hugo Award ceremony, Sawyer also won Japan's top science-fiction award, the Seiun, for best foreign novel of the year. That win was for his Illegal Alien, which had its first Japanese edition in 2002. This was Sawyer's third Seiun win.

Sawyer, 43, was born in Ottawa and lives in Mississauga, Ontario.

Note on the trophy: the Hugo Award rocketship is a standard design, used every year. It's usually chrome-plated, but because this year was the fiftieth Hugo ceremony, the rocketships were plated with real gold. The trophy base changes from year to year, and is entirely at the discretion of the current World Science Fiction Convention. In recent years, it's become fashionable to have the base reflect the location of the convention; this year's base — designed by Franklyn Johnson of Edmonton — is made of maple wood and has a vertical maple leaf doubling as exhaust from the central rocket. The consensus of commentators worldwide is that this is one of the best-looking Hugo trophies ever.

Voting Details: