Here is a guide to the work of this year’s six Hugo Finalists for Best Editor, Short Form.  Wherever possible, I’ve added links to full text, excerpts, or more details on the short fiction they edited during 2017.  Please let me know if you have any additional information or corrections.

 

John Joseph Adams has been a finalist in this category seven times.  As editor of Lightspeed Magazine, he has won two out of five nominations for Best Semiprozine.  (Lightspeed is now a professional magazine and no longer qualifies as a semiprozine.)  Adams edited the following magazines and anthologies last year:

• Lightspeed Magazine
• Nightmare Magazine
• Cosmic Powers
• The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2017 (with guest editor Charles Yu)

 

Neil Clarke has been a finalist in this category six times.  As editor of Clarkesworld Magazine, he has won three out of four nominations for Best Semiprozine.  (Clarkesworld has also graduated from semi-pro to pro and no longer qualifies in that category.)  Two novelettes from Clarkesworld, “The Secret Life of Bots” by Suzanne Palmer and “A Series of Steaks” by Vina Jie-Min Prasad, are Hugo finalists this year.  Clarke edited the following magazines and anthologies last year:

• Clarkesworld Magazine
• Forever Magazine
• Galactic Empires
• More Human Than Human
• The Best Science Fiction of the Year, Volume 2
• Touchable Unreality

 

Lee Harris was a 2014 finalist for Best Editor, Long Form.  This is his first time as finalist in this category.  He edited three of the Best Novella finalists:  All Systems Red by Martha Wells (Murderbot Diaries #1), Binti: Home by Nnedi Okorafor (Binti #2), and Down Among the Sticks and Bones by Seanan McGuire (Wayward Children #2).  Harris also edited the following short fiction from Tor.com last year:

• Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day by Seanan McGuire
• Idle Ingredients by Matt Wallace (Sin du Jour #4)
• Greedy Pigs by Matt Wallace (Sin du Jour #5)
• Gluttony Bay by Matt Wallace (Sin du Jour #6)
• Brother’s Ruin by Emma Newman (Industrial Magic #1)
• Weaver’s Lament by Emma Newman (Industrial Magic #2)
• Buffalo Soldier by Maurice Broaddus
• Acadie by Dave Hutchinson
• A Long Day in Lychford by Paul Cornell (Lychford #3)
• “Persephone” by Seanan McGuire

 

Jonathan Strahan has been a finalist in this category nine times.  As co-host of The Coode Street Podcast, he has also been nominated five times for Best Fancast.  One of the novelettes he edited for Tor.com, “Extracurricular Activities” by Yoon Ha Lee (The Machineries of Empire), is a Hugo finalist this year.  Strahan also edited the following anthologies from Solaris and short fiction from Tor.com last year:

• Infinity Wars (The Infinity Project Vol. 6)
• The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume 11
• Passing Strange by Ellen Klages
• Agents of Dreamland by Caitlín R. Kiernan
• Proof of Concept by Gwyneth Jones
• “Uncanny Valley” by Greg Egan
• “The Old Dispensation” by Lavie Tidhar
• “Sanctuary” by Allen Steele
• “The Martian in the Wood” by Stephen Baxter (The War of the Worlds)
• “The Future of Hunger in the Age of Programmable Matter” by Sam J. Miller

 

Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas are two-time finalists in this category.  As co-editors of Uncanny Magazine, they are also finalists for Best Semiprozine this year and the winners of that category for the previous two years.  As former editors of Apex Magazine, Lynne has three additional nominations for Best Semiprozine, and Michael has two.  Lynne has also won one of two nominations for co-editing Best Related Work finalists, won twice in Best Fancast as a moderator of SF Squeecast, and additionally been a finalist in Best Fancast both this year and in 2014 as a contributor to the Verity! Podcast.  Michael was also a co-editor of another Best Related Work finalist.  The following six stories from Uncanny Magazine are Hugo finalists this year:

• “And Then There Were (N-One)” by Sarah Pinsker
• “Children of Thorns, Children of Water” by Aliette de Bodard
• “Small Changes Over Long Periods of Time” by K.M. Szpara
• “Clearly Lettered in a Mostly Steady Hand” by Fran Wilde
• “Fandom for Robots” by Vina Jie-Min Prasad
• “Sun, Moon, Dust” by Ursula Vernon

 

Sheila Williams became the editor of Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine in 2004 and has won two of eleven nominations in this category.  She was also a one-time finalist for Best Professional Editor just before the category was split into Long Form and Short Form.  One of Asimov’s novelettes, “Wind Will Rove” by Sarah Pinsker, is a Hugo Finalist this year.  Some of Asimov’s other notable stories from last year are currently available at the following links:

• Asimov’s 2017 Readers’ Awards Finalists
• Asimov’s stories on the 2017 Locus Recommended Reading List

 

I imagine I will probably rank Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas first since they were my only nominees which made the finalist list in this category.  I’m a regular reader of both Lightspeed and Clarkesworld so John Joseph Adams and Neil Clark will probably be second and third.  I nominated stories edited by Lee Harris and Sheila Williams and enjoyed most of the online Tor.com stories edited by Jonathan Strahan, but I really need to read more before making my final decisions.  What are your thoughts on these finalists?