Hugo Question

[nonionay]

Here's a question for the internet.
So over on Making Light, a guy in the comment thread asked about how people voted for the Best Editor Hugo, since it's not like we get to see before and after shots of their work. He got a bizarrely scathing non-reply from one of the editors. Now, this is something I'm curious about myself. Is it really such an insulting question? Short Form Editor seems easy, since it's more about assembling a larger work from different authors than just tinkering with the gears beneath the hood of a novel.

Any feedback from those who've actually voted?

My response, which hasn't yet received any comment, was "I'm curious too. If I were voting on the Best Long Form Editor Hugo, I figure I'd mainly base it on my knowledge of what books they edited--if I even know which those are--aren't badly edited, since good editing is of course supposed to be invisible. Then I'd throw in my own personal encounters with said editors as well as what my published friends have told me about their experiences. It seems to require a lot more insider knowledge than little old unpublished me possesses."

(If only I were voting on the Hugos, then casacorona would win every year, since she's the only editor I've had any extensive contact with, and she seems to edit all my friends. If she wasn't on the ballot, I'd probably abstain from that category.)

Comments

[mimerki.livejournal.com]

Editors are also responsible for acquiring and, in so doing, for molding lines. This can be less notable with a fairly large/robust org like Tor, moreso for a small line like Baen. If Jim Baen deserved an award as an editor (I do not know if he received one or not), it was for creating a line of books to fill a fairly specific niche *without* making all of his authors sound alike. Baen as a company also did a fine job with line edits (I say "did" because I don't think I've read anything from the line that was acquired after Jim's death) but that probably wasn't actually Jim at all.