More Hugo stuff
Jul. 29th, 2014 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kaberettCan't imagine I'm going to get any of the other categories read before the deadline, so this + Best Novel (previous post) is probably where we're at (unless I get my act together to the portfolios of fan artists).
Which does raise a point - I remain curious about my apparent intense reluctance to read anthologies/collection on ereader. I suspect it in part has to do with having it be difficult to tell in the moment how much of the particular thing you're reading there is left to go, and therefore whether to stick with it for completionism's sake or not; I suspect it also has to do with feeling simultaneously like a whole thing and like fragments, and that particular combination doing my how-do-I-approach-this decision-making process in.
The John W Campbell Award for Best New Writer:
1. Benjanun Sriduangkaew: yesss I am greatly enjoying the writing style and the worldbuilding and the slantwise how-things-work and the expectations and how you make choices and what you do when they don't turn out the way you intended.
2. Ramez Naam: read Nexus in one sitting and am kind of thinking about getting my hands on its sequel. I enjoyed the thing and was very relieved that the story didn't go several ways I was slightly concerned it might, but it didn't take my head to pieces and put it back together again the way Ancillary Justice did. (I rather suspect all the rest of my reading suffered in comparison to AJ.)
3. Sofia Samatar: EVERYONE WAS DUDES UGH (at least in Stranger); I just... was not sufficiently deeply invested in the story to really care at all.
4=. Max Gladstone: didn't care enough to make it past the end of the first chapter, but it didn't annoy me.
4=. Wesley Chu: sufficiently deeply annoyed by the obesity/weight-loss bullshit that I didn't make it more than 20% of the way through.
Best Novella
1. Equoid, Charles Stross: not my favourite flesh-eating monster-not-quite-horses book (I vastly prefer Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races) but certainly the thing I enjoyed most out of the bunch. I suspect the HP Lovecraft parodies were clever and well-done but I've never actually read Lovecraft (and have no intention of so doing) so I can't actually tell.
2. Wakulla Springs: I am a bit wary of this because it appears to be written by whitey, and the cryptozoology felt... massively incidental? I mean, I liked it as a work, I just... don't quite get why it's Hugo-nominated.
3. No Award
4. Six-Gun Snow White, Catherynne Valente: less heterosexist than and differently racist to (1) some of her other work and (2) the other two in this category.
5. The Butcher of Khardov, Dan Wells: the structure didn't work for me, I kind of like the semi-intelligent machines thing but have met them done better elsewhere, the sexism was astonishingly grating, and the pseudo-mental-illness got my back up. I didn't really get the point.
6. hahahaha racists, also I cared sufficiently little about this one that I didn't actually manage to finish it
Best Novelette
1. The Waiting Stars, Aliette de Bodard: yes yes yes good more of this please more of this. Hurrah sentient & sapient & family machinery hurrah interstellar political conflict hurrah containing multitudes hurrah plausible depiction of mental illness hurrah complexities.
2. The Lady Astronaut of Mars, Mary Robinette Kowal: uncomfortable reading for me for all of the obvious reasons; again, did not exactly take my head apart but nice observations on political realities & torn loyalties & hard decisions.
3. The Truth Of Fact, The Truth Of Feeling, Ted Chiang: mmm, on the one hand good for Nicole for standing up for herself, and on the other hand I... care very little about self-important men on self-important journeys of discovery about how much they've fucked other people up with a side-helping of pseudo-anthropological allegory.
4. No Award
5=. raciiiiiiiiiists [tried reading, absolutely could not get into, gave up after two pages]
Best Short Story
1. The Water That Falls On You From Nowhere, John Chu: YES GOOD. COMPLICATED FAMILY INTERACTIONS! HOW TO NAVIGATE COMMUNICATIONS! CHARMING AND ENDEARING AND ALL ABOUT CHOICE. YES.
2. Selkie Stories Are For Losers, Sofia Samatar: I hadn't previously thought about the hereditary nature of the thing! Am pleased by this.
3. If You Were A Dinosaur, My Love, Rachel Swirsky: not really sure what to do with this one? Liked the structure.
4. No Award
5. The Ink Readers of Doi Saket: yeah, I have limited-to-no patience for bullshit about weight and embodiment at the moment. Consequently metaphorically threw it across the room on about page three.
Which does raise a point - I remain curious about my apparent intense reluctance to read anthologies/collection on ereader. I suspect it in part has to do with having it be difficult to tell in the moment how much of the particular thing you're reading there is left to go, and therefore whether to stick with it for completionism's sake or not; I suspect it also has to do with feeling simultaneously like a whole thing and like fragments, and that particular combination doing my how-do-I-approach-this decision-making process in.
The John W Campbell Award for Best New Writer:
1. Benjanun Sriduangkaew: yesss I am greatly enjoying the writing style and the worldbuilding and the slantwise how-things-work and the expectations and how you make choices and what you do when they don't turn out the way you intended.
2. Ramez Naam: read Nexus in one sitting and am kind of thinking about getting my hands on its sequel. I enjoyed the thing and was very relieved that the story didn't go several ways I was slightly concerned it might, but it didn't take my head to pieces and put it back together again the way Ancillary Justice did. (I rather suspect all the rest of my reading suffered in comparison to AJ.)
3. Sofia Samatar: EVERYONE WAS DUDES UGH (at least in Stranger); I just... was not sufficiently deeply invested in the story to really care at all.
4=. Max Gladstone: didn't care enough to make it past the end of the first chapter, but it didn't annoy me.
4=. Wesley Chu: sufficiently deeply annoyed by the obesity/weight-loss bullshit that I didn't make it more than 20% of the way through.
Best Novella
1. Equoid, Charles Stross: not my favourite flesh-eating monster-not-quite-horses book (I vastly prefer Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races) but certainly the thing I enjoyed most out of the bunch. I suspect the HP Lovecraft parodies were clever and well-done but I've never actually read Lovecraft (and have no intention of so doing) so I can't actually tell.
2. Wakulla Springs: I am a bit wary of this because it appears to be written by whitey, and the cryptozoology felt... massively incidental? I mean, I liked it as a work, I just... don't quite get why it's Hugo-nominated.
3. No Award
4. Six-Gun Snow White, Catherynne Valente: less heterosexist than and differently racist to (1) some of her other work and (2) the other two in this category.
5. The Butcher of Khardov, Dan Wells: the structure didn't work for me, I kind of like the semi-intelligent machines thing but have met them done better elsewhere, the sexism was astonishingly grating, and the pseudo-mental-illness got my back up. I didn't really get the point.
6. hahahaha racists, also I cared sufficiently little about this one that I didn't actually manage to finish it
Best Novelette
1. The Waiting Stars, Aliette de Bodard: yes yes yes good more of this please more of this. Hurrah sentient & sapient & family machinery hurrah interstellar political conflict hurrah containing multitudes hurrah plausible depiction of mental illness hurrah complexities.
2. The Lady Astronaut of Mars, Mary Robinette Kowal: uncomfortable reading for me for all of the obvious reasons; again, did not exactly take my head apart but nice observations on political realities & torn loyalties & hard decisions.
3. The Truth Of Fact, The Truth Of Feeling, Ted Chiang: mmm, on the one hand good for Nicole for standing up for herself, and on the other hand I... care very little about self-important men on self-important journeys of discovery about how much they've fucked other people up with a side-helping of pseudo-anthropological allegory.
4. No Award
5=. raciiiiiiiiiists [tried reading, absolutely could not get into, gave up after two pages]
Best Short Story
1. The Water That Falls On You From Nowhere, John Chu: YES GOOD. COMPLICATED FAMILY INTERACTIONS! HOW TO NAVIGATE COMMUNICATIONS! CHARMING AND ENDEARING AND ALL ABOUT CHOICE. YES.
2. Selkie Stories Are For Losers, Sofia Samatar: I hadn't previously thought about the hereditary nature of the thing! Am pleased by this.
3. If You Were A Dinosaur, My Love, Rachel Swirsky: not really sure what to do with this one? Liked the structure.
4. No Award
5. The Ink Readers of Doi Saket: yeah, I have limited-to-no patience for bullshit about weight and embodiment at the moment. Consequently metaphorically threw it across the room on about page three.
(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-29 02:42 pm (UTC)Also on the subject of Benjanun Sriduangkaew have you read Autodidact? http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/sriduangkaew_04_14/
(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-29 07:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-29 11:31 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-30 05:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-30 12:20 pm (UTC)We have the same top two for Novelette, although different after that :-)
(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-30 05:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2014-07-30 10:20 pm (UTC)