Hugo Awards 2025 finalists announced

Sofia Samatar, Jordan Ifueko, and Kamilah Cole are among the Hugo Awards 2025 finalists announced on Monday, April 7, 2025.

The Hugo and Astounding Awards, organized by the World Science Fiction Society, are awarded for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year. Named after the founder of the science fiction magazine Amazing Stories Hugo Gernsback, they are handed out at the annual World Science Fiction Convention. Previous winners include Isaac Asimov, Larry Niven, Arthur C. Clarke, J. K. Rowling, Nnedi Okorafor (in 2020 and in 2023), N.K. Jemisin, and many more.

The finalists for this year’s awards were announced by Seattle Worldcon 2025, the 83rd World Science Fiction Convention, on Monday. It featured the following writers of African descent;

Best Novella

• The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain, Sofia Samatar (Tordotcom)

Lodestar Award for Best Young Adult Book

• The Maid and the Crocodile, Jordan Ifueko (Amulet)
• So Let Them Burn, Kamilah Cole (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers)

Best Semiprozine

• FIYAH Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction, publisher and executive editor DaVaun Sanders, poetry editor B. Sharise Moore, art director Christian Ivey, acquiring editors Rebecca McGee, Kerine Wint, Egbiameje Omole, Emmalia Harrington, Genine Tyson, Tonya R. Moore, sponsor coordinator Nelson Rolon

Jordan Ifueko said, “I’m ecstatic to announce that The Maid and the Crocodile is a finalist for the Lodestar at the Hugo Awards. That makes all three books in the RaybearerVerse (and all of my published novels) Hugo Lodestar finalists. Thank you so much to everyone who voted for my nominations. What an absolute honor. 🐊🌸”

Kamilah Cole said, “So Let Them Burn is a 2025 Lodestar Award finalist. I genuinely can’t believe that is a sentence I get to type. Forgive me for making a speech NOW, but I the sappiness must come out. I cried when I found out. I was in a state of shock. I couldn’t sleep. The Hugo Awards is the kind of thing a Jamaican girl like me doesn’t even try to aspire to, because it’s just so very unlikely, especially with a debut novel.

The winners will be announced at Seattle Worldcon 2025, which will be held from August 13–17, 2025.