Ser Scot A Ellison Posted April 16, 2014 Share Posted April 16, 2014 Seli,How is "Hugo" speculative fiction? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alytha Posted April 16, 2014 Share Posted April 16, 2014 It's meta-speculative fiction ;) Because it's about Meliès, who made the first sci-fi movies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Richard II Posted April 16, 2014 Share Posted April 16, 2014 I'd be happy to not see a fan wank book win this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maester Llama Posted April 16, 2014 Share Posted April 16, 2014 Are there any fanwank books that stand a real chance of landing on the shortlist this year though?* I can't think of any at the moment. *For the record I quite enjoyed Walton's Among Others at the time, and still think it has some virtues. I'm totally willing to accept the argument that people probably voted for it for the wrong reasons, but I think it does have merit as a book. I found the win for Scalzi's Redshirts personally baffling, and I say that as someone who enjoys much of Scalzi's work and had some level of fun during the hours I was reading Redshirts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ser Scot A Ellison Posted April 16, 2014 Share Posted April 16, 2014 Alytha,I know. I still think that the connection is really thin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Richard II Posted April 17, 2014 Share Posted April 17, 2014 Hmm, is Ready Player One possible? That's like, the fan wank bible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maester Llama Posted April 17, 2014 Share Posted April 17, 2014 Good point. But the listings for Ready Player One I can find say 2011, so its too old, thank God. You by Austin Grossman, which is Ready Player One's depressed introspective cousin, still very immersed in gamer culture [this time of the 90s] and ready to point out its good sides but also ready to launch criticisms that cut quite deep and don't just get dismissed by the jumbled thing it calls a narrative, is technically eligible; it came out early last year. I don't think its really in the Hugo wheelhouse, though. I agree the fandoms cross, but I don't think they line up as closely as all that, and I haven't seen a lot of buzz for You in general. In a year with Ancillary Justice and The Adjacent and Neptune's Brood and On the Steel Breeze and The Human Division and The Ocean at the End of the Lane in it I don't think backslapping nominations for stuff that tells the community how great it is are gonna be a problem; I agree they're undesirable, but I'm not sure they're as big a problem as they're sometimes made out to be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Datepalm Posted April 17, 2014 Share Posted April 17, 2014 It's just been a run of a few - Among Others and Redshirts. This year is stronger, I should hope, and being in the UK might mix it up a bit. (Reynolds seems to be much better known in the UK than in the US.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seli Posted April 17, 2014 Share Posted April 17, 2014 Seli,How is "Hugo" speculative fiction?No idea, I haven't actually seen it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ColdDrake Posted April 18, 2014 Share Posted April 18, 2014 Redshirts winning last year kind of took some of the luster off of this award, Scalzi is kind of a hack and a blowhard. Hopefully a more deserving book wins this time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Richard II Posted April 18, 2014 Share Posted April 18, 2014 Pfft last year took the luster off the award? Iain M Banks was only nominated once, and he didn't win, and now he'll never win. Pretty sure Gene Wolfe doesn't have a Hugo either, meanwhile, orson scott fucking card. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alytha Posted April 18, 2014 Share Posted April 18, 2014 I really liked Redshirts, I freely admit that, but I also agree that it's not a book with the "literary qualities" you'd expect for the supposedly most importand award in the genre. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maester Llama Posted April 18, 2014 Share Posted April 18, 2014 I can definitely see how people are coming to see the Hugos as a bit inward-looking based on the content of the last couple novel winners, irrespective of whether or not the books are any good. But, I dunno, as an interested observer -- I hope to vote next year and maybe even go, but it wasn't happening this time -- I feel a bit optimistic about the upcoming list. And I agree with Datepalm that the award's positioning in the UK this year might well make a difference. Does the award end up not acknowledging major authors and works, both in hindsight and sometimes even at the moment? Totally. Is the fact that Iain M. Banks never won and that Gene Wolfe -- who I shudder to say I do not get, but who is, well, Gene Wolfe, I mean come on -- still doesn't have a novel Hugo either fucking criminal? For sure. But the award hits as often as it misses, and it makes a great conversation piece every year. And I think its testament to the field that there's enough good stuff that something great will always get left off the list. Having said all that, I will probably come back here tomorrow and whine my tiny opinion to the skies about how something or other didn't get nominated. I can't agree with the description of Scalzi as a "hack and a blowhard," by any means; I think he has a shtick, absolutely, and sometimes this makes his novels feel similar and his characters over-clever and always correct, but I find he writes fun, page-turning material that I have difficulty putting down, and that kind of propulsive, instantly accessible storytelling takes mad skills. Plus he can absolutely step outside the Scalzi shtick when he chooses to do so. There're definitely Scalzi signature moves and imo sometimes he leans into them a little too hard, but he's a long way from bad. That being said, while I'm in the middle on Redshirts -- its far from my favourite Scalzi but I had some fun while reading it, and I can actually see how a metafictional parody of Star Trek-type sf could make for a text that reflected on the genre in interesting, award-worthy ways -- I'm as baffled as a lot of other people by how so many voters looked at the Hugo nomination list that had 2312 on it*, among other things, and decided that Redshirts was the speculative fiction novel of the year. *A novel with problems of its own. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Richard II Posted April 18, 2014 Share Posted April 18, 2014 Well that's really what it comes down to, whether you think it hits or misses more. I, IMHO, let me stress that again, IN MY OPINION, think it misses almost constantly. Hmm. I should do some math and firgure that out. But I really, really, dislike most Hugo winners, and can almost always find at least 3 other books nominated that I feel should have won instead. So uh, TL;DR. RICHARD HATE HuGO. RICHARD SMASH. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edda van Heefmstra Ruston Posted April 19, 2014 Share Posted April 19, 2014 Is it that your nominations aren't making it to the final ballot at all? Or just that of the works/artists who do make the final ballot, you prefer the non-winners? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Selig Posted April 19, 2014 Share Posted April 19, 2014 A record number of Hugo ballots this year - 1923. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edda van Heefmstra Ruston Posted April 19, 2014 Share Posted April 19, 2014 Nice one. I realized the day after they were due that I had completely forgotten about all of the retro categories. Just under 5 hours until the nominations are released. C'mon, Sharknado! :p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Selig Posted April 19, 2014 Share Posted April 19, 2014 I am eagerly waiting for the yearly edition of "Why the Hugo nominees are terrible choices" on most SFF blogs and message boards I visit. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Datepalm Posted April 19, 2014 Share Posted April 19, 2014 Me too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seli Posted April 19, 2014 Share Posted April 19, 2014 That is the biggest part of the fun. edit: oooh an Ayn Rand nomination in the retro-hugo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.