As I mentioned earlier, initially I was planning on reading all sixty Hugo winners in chronological order. This did not last past the first book. I quickly realized that being a Hugo winner doesn't guarantee that a book will sell well decades later, or even be considered important enough to be found in the local library. 1955's Hugo went to They'd Rather Be Right, which (as far as I can tell) was out of print from 1958 to 1981. After a brief and baffling resurrgence, it hasn't been in print since 1992. My local library didn't have a copy of it, nor did the local used book store. I didn't bother checking chain book stores; seemed like a waste of time. Fortunately, a town by some measures a tenth the size of my hometown has a library surprisingly well-stocked in old sci fi. The interlibrary loan said that it would take up to three weeks to get the book. I couldn't just abandon the Hugo Project so early on, so I decided to just skip Right for the moment, and go on to 1956's winner. I had hope that that would be the only deviation from the timeline I encountered, but it was not meant to be. I finished 1956's and was a good way into'57's Hugo winner before Right came through. And in the meantime, fearing similar breaks, I ordered 1965's and one of '66's Hugo winner through interlibrary loan, figuring that I might get them by the time I'd plowed through the earlier winners. It turns out that books on interlibrary loan cannot be renewed, and have a fifty cent a day late fee. The books came when I was still trudging through They'd Rather Be Right and, with their rather strict deadline, it made sense to read them in order of return date rather than publication order. So here's how I'm going to go through these:
1953: The Demolished Man
1956: Double Star
1959: A Case of Conscience
1955: …They'd Rather Be Right
1966: …And Call Me Conrad
1965: The Wanderer [currently reading]
1958: The Big Time [Not sure what happened to this one. I guess that'll be my next read.]
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