Chicon 7 Hugo Finalists to be Announced on Saturday, April 7

Chicon

Chicon 7, the 70th World Science Fiction Convention ("Worldcon"), is delighted to report that the finalists for this year's Hugo Awards and John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer will be announced on Saturday, April 7, starting at 3 p.m. CDT. We are also proud to announce that this year's number of nomination ballots set a new record.

The nominations announcement will be made simultaneously at five conventions in the United States and Europe. Science fiction fans around the world will be able to follow the announcement live and celebrate the authors, editors, artists, and works that have been selected as the best of 2011.

Conventions taking part in the announcement are:

• Norwescon 35, one of the Pacific Northwest's premier science fiction and fantasy conventions, at Seatac, WA (1 p.m. PDT)
• Leprecon 38, Arizona's annual science fiction and fantasy convention, at Tempe, AZ (1 p.m. MST)
• Minicon 47, Minnesota's longest-running science fiction convention, at Bloomington, MN (3 p.m. CDT)
• Marcon 47, the Midwest's largest annual convention, at Columbus, OH (4 p.m. EDT).
• Olympus 2012, the British National Science Fiction Convention (Eastercon) (9 p.m. BST).

Chicon 7 representatives will be joined for the announcement by special guests including authors George RR Martin at Eastercon and Joe Haldeman at Leprecon, and artist John Picacio at Norwescon.

Final arrangements are currently being made to broadcast all five convention presentations via Ustream. Details of how to follow the announcement online will be announced on the Chicon 7 website shortly.

This year's nomination process set a new record, with over 1100 ballots received for the first time in the long history of the Hugo Awards. Chicon 7 received a total of 1101 nomination ballots, compared to the 1006 nomination ballots received by Renovation (the previous record holder) in 2011.

The chair of Chicon 7, Dave McCarty, said "We are delighted to continue the momentum built up over the last few years in raising the profile of the Hugo Awards and the level of engagement in the nomination process. The Hugo Awards have a long record of highlighting the best in the genre and that relies on the active participation of the diverse membership of the Worldcon."

After the announcement, the final voting process will begin. Attending, Young Adult, and Supporting members of Chicon 7 will be able to cast final ballots until July 31, 2012, midnight PDT. The winners will be announced on Sunday, September 2, during the Hugo Awards Ceremony at Chicon 7.

For additional information, contact us at hugoadmin@chicon.org.