One of my biggest worries about the Whitney awards is that the same people are nominated and win over and over again. Despite efforts to recognize debut authors and adding categories to recognize more authors there does seem to be a diversity problem. I wanted to wrap my head around how bad this problem actually is in a statistical manner.
The most egregious offender is the Mystery/Suspense category where two writers hold 66% of the Mystery/Suspense awards. If you add Kilpack, three writers hold 83% of the Mystery Suspense awards. I assumed the problem would be with the Speculative Fiction arena but the committee has seemed to actively combat that problem by adding new subcategories to recognize more writers. Does something similar need to be done with the Mystery/Suspense category?
What are your reactions to the graphs? Is the status quo good or bad? How can we change it?
Top Whitney Award Winners
Top Speculative Fiction Winners
Top Historical Fiction Winners
Top Mystery/Suspense Winners
Top Romance Winners
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