1955 International Fantasy Award Nominees

The 1955 International Fantasy Award field of nominees for Best Fiction Book was also strong, and either book would have been a fine winner. This is one year in which the International Fantasy Award clearly got the better of the Hugo Awards, which selected the decidedly mediocre book They'd Rather Be Right by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley as its 1955 Best Novel winner.

The existence of the International Fantasy Award for this year coupled with the fact that there was something of a slate of candidates for this award gives us a valuable eye on the history of the Hugo Award. Even though the Hugo Awards did not maintain records of nominees from years before 1959, this slate of ballots allows us to see what books might have been nominated along with They'd Rather Be Right for the 1955 Hugo Award for Best Novel. And looking at these two novels we can shake our heads at the 1955 voters and wonder: what the Hell were they thinking?

Best Fiction Book

Winner:
A Mirror for Observers by Edgar Pangborn

Other Nominees:

Mission of Gravity by Hal Clement

What Are the International Fantasy Awards?

Go to previous year's nominees: 1954
Go to subsequent year's nominees: 1957

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