Hugo awards 2017: NK Jemisin wins best novel for second year in a row | Books | The Guardian

The last two years of the Hugos have been plagued by block-voting campaigns from conservative lobbies calling themselves the Sad Puppies, and the more politically extreme Rabid Puppies. The two factions were out to combat a perceived tendency to reward books described by one disgruntled writer as "niche, academic, overtly to the left in ideology and flavour and ultimately lacking what might best be called visceral, gut-level, swashbuckling fun". In 2015, this led to "no award" beating the Puppies' slate of nominees in an unprecedented five categories, in order to avoid giving prizes to the group's nominations. In 2016, candidates put forward by the so-called Puppies also dominated the ballots, but only two "no awards" were given.