206 thoughts on “A Fistful of Puppies 5/3”

1. @Alexvdl:

   So? Surely you are aware that’s true of mostly everyone who voted. (That their vote would have been different if they had read all eligible works, not that all of them would have nominated the biography).

   Regarding the “Chicks Dig Time Lords” win, I do not think that SJWs were the main cause of that result. Doctor Who fans traditionally have had a large voting bloc in the Hugos.

2. All Heinlein Groupies:

   Yes, the 2nd volume of Patterson’s biography of Robert A. Heinlein was on my list of nominees for best related work.

   Yes, I am a HUGE Heinlein fan and stand second to none in my defense of his work as “thought experiment” as opposed to “message fiction”.

   Yes, after reading the TWO PART Heinlein biography, I wrote a review titled “Robert A. Heinlein Was a Dick”; the information contained in the biography moved my personal opinion of the author (who I actually met in person, briefly) from believing him to be the penultimate SF author to believing him to have been a conflicted human being who changed his opinion (majorly) on a number of occasions during his life; a man who came to believe (some of) his own hype and a man who did and said pretty much what he wanted to, whenever he wanted to, regardless of how it was received (while at the same time being super-humanly careful at not allowing potential contradictions to reach the public) and an author of tremendous accomplishment who would have been well-served by a strong, equally opinionated editor. As a person, I don’t like the author after reading the bio as much as I thought I did before – but my passion for his works has not changed one iota.

   Yes, I have been labelled an SJW and one of the “dupes” who is falling for VD’s so-called plan to incense me to the point where I foolishly aid his destruction of the Hugo Awards by advocating for No Award (which reminds me of Karl Rove’s refusal to believe Fox News’ own pollsters when they announced an Obama win over Romney, but why let telling examples get in the way of a good story?)

   And YES, the SPs were obsessed by Heinlein and attempted to make him their standard bearer before dropping him in favor of VD (this goes back well before SP3, when I believe it was JCW or LC or maybe even BT – they’re becoming quite interchangeable of late – tried to suggest something about RAH that simply wasn’t supported by even the most casual examination of the facts.

   But again, why let that (facts/history/reality) get in the way of a good story?

3. AG: I haven’t said that I think all puppies are fans of Heinlein, so I decline to answer a question which asks me why I think that.

   I think that the second biography would be very likely to win because (a) Heinlein is still very, very well regarded; (b) http://www.thehugoawards.org/content/pdf/2011%20Final%20Ballot.pdf shows that it got the second largest number of votes on the first ballot and retained its second largest number of votes position right up until the very end, and (c) it’s not an uncommon thing for people to wait until a multi-volume book (or movie) is finished before being willing to vote to give it an award, so this volume should have more support than the first volume did.

4. Robert West @ 7:59 am- I loved Turncoat.

   Beware- SPOILERS:

   SPOILERS

   To correct something, there are two types of machine intelligence in Turncoat. The Uploaded, which is as you described, humans who have placed their consciousness into machines. The other is true artificial machine intelligence.

   The antagonist is Alpha 7 Alpha. He is one of the Uploaded. He also appears to have carried over many of the negative human emotions such as hate, etc.

   The protagonist is X 45 Delta. He is a 42nd generation true artificial intelligence. He’s never had a human body.

   What I loved about the story is that the Uploaded have lost their humanity (become inhuman) while the true machine intelligence becomes more humane. X 45 Delta committed his betrayal because, in his words, he “wants to decide the sort of man I will become.”

   You are right that he expresses annoyance with his human crew. They are inefficient and filled with inane chatter. He also expresses pride and protective instincts in them, and misses them when they are removed from his ship. All of these things are very human feelings.

   Alpha 7 Alpha removes the crew from X 45 Delta to make him more efficient in battle. Which is true, but also a lie, as X 45 Delta notes (he’s learned to lie from the Uploaded, mostly by omission). He deduces that they will be either terminated or uploaded against their will. This is when his metamorphosis from loyal warrior to turncoat begins.

   All in all, Turncoat was an excellent story and well worthy of a Hugo nomination. I haven’t read everything (yet), but it may well be my number one pick.

5. AG – ‘That’s why I do not see what you think you are proving with your Heinlein fixation’

   I’m not fixated with it, you asked and I answered. Again, it was said by Correia that Heinlein wouldn’t be able to get nominated today. Then SP3 managed to forget a book about Heinlein, which even Correia said he would’ve put on the list had he realized it but instead the SP slate locked it out. It’s not a fixation, it’s pointing out the inherent irony in the statements of those involved versus their actions. Why are you so fixated on Heinlein today?

   xdpaul – ‘was the Heinlein book on your recommendation list? Did you vote for it, or know to vote for it during the nomination process? Have you read it?’

   Hi Paul! Hope your day is going well. Nope times three, though I do plan on reading it, I hear it’s quite good. Of course I never implied or suggested that Heinlein could or couldn’t get nominated due to his politics today and my own opinions weren’t the question at hand though I appreciate your concern and curiosity about my thoughts and reading habits.

   I’d love to share water with the both of you to help you grok what I’m saying but it’s like the saying goes, you can lead a thirsty puppy to water but you can’t make him drink.

6. Robert

   not to mention any extra boost it would have gotten because of Bill’s death (call it sympathy vote or whatever, but death does have a way of focusing legitimate attention) and the “last year to vote for the work” boost, which is similar to but not exactly the same as waiting for the series to complete.

7. I read the Heinlein biography (both parts), am a (moderate) Heinlein fan*, and put the Heinlein biography on my Hugo ballot. I also voted for Chicks Dig Timelords, though, because I read that and liked many of the essays therein.

   There you are.

   *I’m teaching The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress in my Utopian Lit class this semester, I love many of the juveniles, I dislike Friday, even though it’s a great read, I find Job an interesting book though ultimately a failure, and I think Star Beast might be his best book. Or maybe Between Planets.

8. Will McLean @ 8:32 am- It was the Ascendancy’s firewalls which were not effective. It is not surprising that a very talented 42nd generation Integral Core machine intelligence would be able to punch through the human created firewall of a non-AI Ascendancy ship.

   And note he planned and timed his effort at the height of battle, with all the confusion and chaos that would mean.

9. Matt, be careful about throwing that water-brotherhood and groking stuff around. Folks who know it are also known to discorporate voluntarily – or do the same involuntarily for others.

10. Steve Moss: thank you!

    I disagree and am left at the “fascinating idea that was poorly executed” level of response, and at the same time I really appreciate an attempt to talk about the *stories* rather than the *politics* 🙂

11. To be honest, I couldn’t even finish Turncoat. I read maybe a third of it, then I had to quit. Not sure if it was the writing skills or just the subject. It bored the hell out of me.

12. Btw, my favourite Heinlein is “The Door Into Summer”. It’s just great. I’m one of those Heinlein-lovers, even if they haven’t always held up to time.

13. Robert West @ 7:59 am

    At this point, SJBs bad reviews of stories on the SPs list do not impress me any more than bad reviews of Scalzi’s books by fanatic puppies. When you have an obvious axe to grind it’s very difficult to be objective, even if you are honest. For a work of fiction to have a chance, readers usually need to do their part.

14. AG – I can understand that perspective. People with axes to grind are unlikely to be able to formulate an opinion which isn’t biased by the angle of their axe.

    That said, do you have any evidence that I’m an SJB, or that I have an axe to grind? I feel like your response to my comment heavily implies that you believe both to be true, and given the relative paucity of my commentary here (or elsewhere), I think you’re inferring that on remarkably little evidence.

15. Robert West @ 9:40 am- We’ll have to agree to disagree about Turncoat, but we’ll agree to agree that it should be about the story.

    Hampus Eckerman @ 9:40 am- Turncoat was well-written, flowed well, and was short enough that most anyone could plow through it. If you left it part way through, I suspect it was the subject.

    As an aside, did you read any of the other Riding the Red Horse stories? The non-fiction analysis of Thermodynamics in space, The Hot Equations, was a good source of information and an easy read.

16. Come off of it, Hampus! We all know the real reason! You’re prejudiced!

    PREJUDICED AGAINST BORING STORIES!

    how dare you, sir. How dare you.

17. @Hampus Eckerman:

    I haven’t read Door into Summer yet, although I intend to. I was bored to tears by Stranger, but I have enjoyed Double Star and some of his juveniles.

18. The Heinlein point is irrelevant. Whether or not the second volume of a biography of him that inspires SJWs upon reading to believe that “Robert A. Heinlein Was a Dick,” it is patently obvious that the book was not written by Robert A. Heinlein and therefore provides no evidence that a living RAH would (or would not) be nominated in 2012 PPI (Pre-Puppy Improvement).

    Biography is a sub-set within the broad category of “related works” – it is certainly no crime for one to be left off.

    After all, every nominee pushes other worthy nominees off the list. That’s why it is called a nomination process. Considering that Volume One couldn’t muster the votes for a win during its eligible year, it is hardly surprising that its sequel didn’t land a nod.

    Jo Walton dismissed it as a fairly old-fashioned and somewhat trivial book. It was never nominated for a Nebula. If it was that universally regarded as the best of its kind, you wouldn’t find such faint praise for it in abundance.

    In other words, the argument that because someone somewhere liked Heinlein’s fiction, that person would be a fool for not nominating a less-than-award worthy 2nd volume of a biography is not a very good argument.

19. Steve, in the interest of making about the story, what did you think of _Totaled_? (So far, these are the only two nominated short stories I’ve read – I’m working through them but there are also other things going on in my life, and I’m not necessarily expecting to finish all of the nominated works until right up against the deadline.

    For me this story represents some of the best of what science fiction _can be_. It’s got atmosphere; it’s got character; it’s got an interesting idea and looks at the *social* and *emotional* implications of the implementation of that idea.

    I find the underlying political premise unlikely, but I don’t care; however unlikely the premise is, the resulting story is well crafted and well executed. The story drew me in; I *cared* about the protagonist.

    It’s *not* as well done as the famous 1960s story it most calls to mind; but that would be unreasonable to expect. 🙂

20. @Robert West on May 4, 2015 at 9:49 am:

    No, I don’t know you and I don’t know whether you are a SJW, SJB or whatever. I was talking about the reviews you were commenting on. To tell you the truth, I would not trust your reviews about the puppy nominations either, not any more than you should trust my reviews. At this point, all of us who are still commenting in these posts obviously have a strong opinion that makes our judgment a bit suspect.

21. (adding to my last comment): I should have said “almost all of us”. Obviously there’s always the possibility that a neutral party might still be around.

22. Robert West @ 9:54 am-

    SPOILERS

    SPOILERS

    I enjoyed Totaled. It isn’t my usual cup of tea considering it’s literally all taking place in the brain of dead scientist (or at least her body’s dead, the brain not yet), and I don’t normally enjoy emotion driven stories, but in this case, the juxtaposing of the despair and her sense of loss in relation to her love of her children and the hope that her loss would be a huge gain for future generations (including her kids) packed a punch. Despite being treated as an “it” by just about everyone now that she was only a brain in a jar, she kept her humanity and focus. Her eye was on the prize and I can respect that.

    Speaking for myself only (this isn’t a Puppy vs. non-Puppy thing, I think), I tend to enjoy action oriented stories. I like protagonists who do something as opposed to the passive observers. Yes, I admit a preference for swords and pistols as compared weeping into handkerchiefs wailing “O, the humanity!”

    So normally I wouldn’t pay attention to detached (it’s a pun!) protagonists like in Totaled. But she wasn’t passive, despite her circumstances, and the story was short enough that I didn’t get antsy and could enjoy something which would normally not have interested me.

    Totaled is, IMO, a worthy nominee. I prefer Turncoat, however, for the reasons I set forth above.

23. Steve Moss: No, I haven’t as yet. Might do it later on.

    AG: I liked his books up to the 70:s, then they become to boring for me. Same problem as with Asimov, a weird idea of tying together all works in to a single universe. Horrible. I haven’t read “The Door Into Summer” in 20 years, so not sure how well it has survived.

24. I thought Totaled was ok. Not something really on a Hugo-level (for me that is), but it was an ok read. I will not be angry if it wins.

25. Steve, thank you for the response.

    I have a theory which says that it’s a viable general stereotype that puppies “tend to enjoy action oriented stories”, “like protagonists who do something as opposed to the passive observers”, and generally are more interested in plot-driven fiction, while it’s a viable general stereotype that anti-puppies are more interested in atmospheric and character-driven fiction, and are less interest in action-oriented stories.

    With the caveat, of course, that viable stereotypes describe the mainstream of the group and do not describe every individual (and are not necessarily a reliable indicator of the preferences of any given individual).

    One of the secondary effects of reading all of the nominated works, for me, is that it helps falsify that theory.

26. Steve Moss,

    Door Into Summer is one of the best. I’m also partial to Starman Jones (first RAH read), The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Starship Troopers (no one will ever convince me that the franchise was reserved for military services alone), Glory Road, Tunnel in the Sky and numerous short stories, including All You Zombies.

    Yes, the patterson work was a biography. its publication generated a LOT of online Heinlein discussion, including what I mentioned that was related to SP.

    If you read the review I wrote, you’d understand why I used the title I did, and why “you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” applies.

    It was largely a discussion of the conflation of artists and their works – of how the politics of a work did not necessarily reflect those of the author and vice-versa, particularly in RAH’s case; it was an indictment of those who would label him a “fascist” or a “mysognist” or a “bigot” based on cherry picking passages from one novel or another; a discussion of the loss of the SF novel as pure thought experiment and a compare and contrast with what was at the time the nascent puppy movement, and in particular their self-aggrandizement of a myth to be their standard bearer.
    I have no doubt that if Heinlein had been born in 1957, rather than 1907, and were writing today, his work would regularly be considered for and nominated for major awards, because I have no trouble believing that he would have reflected our times (mine anyway) as effectively as he did the era from ’39 thru ’84. And I also have no doubt that he’d be voting “No Award” for slated works this year – after reading everything. There’s plenty of evidence in the bio to support those contentions, largely based on the fact that the man did change with the time and circumstance, as opposed to some who would have us believe that everything is forever and ever black and white, amen.

27. Paul – ‘In other words, the argument that because someone somewhere liked Heinlein’s fiction, that person would be a fool for not nominating a less-than-award worthy 2nd volume of a biography is not a very good argument’

    No, but Correia’s insistence that Heinlein would be left out, and then to have SP lock that biography out, and later for Correia to say that he would’ve included it in the slate had he known about it if where the levity of the situation comes from.

    Much like Three Body Problem it’s once again shown that books they consider Hugo worthy ended up being removed from consideration (luckily 3BP got back in by others dropping out) thanks to the slate voting. They managed to keep out some of the very books that they accuse SJWs of denying a place for. (or SWBs, what’s that stand for anyway? Beaver? Battalion? Y’all shift acronyms and names for your nebulous enemies more than you shift who they’re targeted at)

    When a puppy chases it’s tail it sometimes catches it and by accident does harm to itself.

28. > SWBs, what’s that stand for anyway? Beaver? Battalion? Y’all shift acronyms and names for your nebulous enemies more than you shift who they’re targeted at)

    My understanding is that the new acronym is ‘SJBs’ and means ‘social justice bullies’.

29. >My understanding is that the new acronym is ‘SJBs’
    >and means ‘social justice bullies’.

    Yes, it seems the term SJW causes some confusion. People who are not bullies say, well, I’m in favor of justice, so I guess I’m a SJW. SJB just makes the concept clearer.

    By the way, anyone who is genuinely interested in what SJW/SJB are and what makes them tick, allow me to recommend this free book (at least it’s free in Amazon): “How to make a Social Justice Warrior: On identitarianism, intersectionality, mobbing, racefail, and failfans 2005-2014”, by Will Shetterly.

30. SJW, SJB… all these acronyms. To create a common strawmen enemy, make it easier to demonize them. To avoid giving example of who you are talking about, to make guilt by association easier and to make accusation against people as if they were part of a collective.

    Bah.

31. Boy oh boy. Hasn’t all this gotten to be a morass of opinions and opinion tossing.

    In the past couple of weeks I’ve talked to dozens of SF-F readers. Note I said readers, not “fans” because these are people who enjoy reading novels, novelettes and short stories in the genres. They aren’t involved in active fandom, they just love and read SF-F. They have all shared one common thought on all this: they no longer care. Not about the award or who “wins” the battle or the outcomes. These readers tell me what they care about is good books they will enjoy, and there is certainty such books will continue to be written.

    I agree, regardless of the subject and plot, whatever the characters or setting, there will be good, entertaining books written and read. That’s what matters.

32. @Hampus Eckerman:

    We have given plenty of examples. That you choose to be deaf to them is a different matter.

33. Steve Davidson @ 10;27 am- I think you meant the response about Heinlein for AG, not me. I’ve read a lot of RAH. My favorite is Glory Road.

    He’s not the best of the past Masters, in my opinion. That title is held by Roger Zelazny.

34. Yeah, by all means, let me read a book about what a horrible person I am because I don’t agree with Will Shetterly’s personal view on life. I’m sure it’ll be riveting.

35. “They managed to keep out some of the very books that they accuse SJWs of denying a place for. ”

    Excuse me, but we were reliably informed that I am the sole reason that Three-Body Problem is on the shortlist. The only reason Marko Kloos dropped out was because of me, after all.

    You really should be expressing your gratitude to me. Without me, Sad Puppies still nearly sweeps, but Kloos doesn’t withdraw his nomination. Frankly, I find your lack of appreciation for my contribution here a little churlish.

36. AG: I guess the people in your example all identify themselves as SJW:s? And all of these SJW:s share the same ideals and opinions? Otherwise it’s just an acronym with no use. Then you could just name the individuals and it would be much easier.

37. @steve davidson:

    You say that if Heinlein “were writing today, his work would regularly be considered for and nominated for major awards”. However in your review of the biography you wrote that “it is quite clear that Mr. Heinlein would have had a great deal of difficulty getting along in our social-networked age”. That seems to me a very large disadvantage when it comes to having your work regularly considered for major awards.

38. Beale:

    Go home, you’re drunk.

39. @Alexvdl: The recommendation was not directed at you. I said those who were genuinely interested in learning more, instead of being happy with their prejudices.

40. Robert West-

    Here’s a link to the Parliament of Beasts and Birds:
    http://voxday.blogspot.ch/2014/12/the-parliament-of-beasts-and-birds.html

    Here’s a link to On a Spiritual Plain:
    http://louantonelli.blogspot.com/2015/03/on-spiritual-plain.html

    The only short story nominee I have not yet read is a Single Samurai. I haven’t been able to find it on the internet so I’ll have to wait for the packet.

    This is entirely my individual opinion, but so far I would rank them this way:

    TBD A Single Samurai
    1. Turncoat
    2. Totaled
    3. A Parliament of Beasts and Birds
    4. On a Spiritual Plain

41. I found “Totaled” kind of meh.

    It bothered the hell out of me that people were eating in the laboratory. What kind of laboratory is this anyway? Does the future not have cleanroom protocols?

42. ‘My understanding is that the new acronym is ‘SJBs’ and means ‘social justice bullies’’

    SMOFs, CHORFs, SJWs, SJBs, Anti-Whatever, those guys need to send out a memo when they’re going to fire up the label maker.

43. VD – ‘Frankly, I find your lack of appreciation for my contribution here a little churlish’

    My apologies. I absolutely appreciate your presence in helping Kloos decide to drop out and allow a non-slate book take his place. Though thanks to your slate we were this close to Ancillary Sword (assuming of course Butcher/Anderson/Kloos would’ve suffered from No Awarding) taking the award in a year when a book like 3BP was available. That I can’t forgive 😉

44. “My apologies. I absolutely appreciate your presence in helping Kloos decide to drop out and allow a non-slate book take his place.”

    De rien. I am pleased I could be of service in this small way.

45. “They aren’t involved in active fandom, they just love and read SF-F. They have all shared one common thought on all this: they no longer care.”

    So what? It has always been the case that a lot of SF/F readers don’t care about fandom or fandom institutions like Worldcon and the Hugo Awards.

    But without fandom things like the Hugos don’t exist at all. A lot of readers whose only contact with the awards is to see “Hugo Winner” on a cover still derive benefit from it because the winners are generally excellent.

46. That many SFF readers don’t care about the awards is their choice and just fine. No one needs to know or care the slightest about any awards to enjoy reading. May they have happy untroubled reading lives.

    The Hugo is an award given by fans who do care, many of them deeply.

    So that many people don’t care is … not relevant to the discussion, I guess?

47. See, which is the Hugo? A “best of fandom” award or a “best of Science Fiction” award? Clearly there is a difference, and as you indicate, Peace, it can’t be both.

48. Theo commented to Nigel: I’m very curious to see if you all can actually pull it off or not. Because if you can’t, well, sending an impotent message will certainly be informative.

    I propose that we take the pronoun ‘you’ out and execute it, as it appears to cause nothing but trouble. Proper languages like Norsk at least distinguish singular and plural (du / dere), not to mention being generally unlikely to prompt frustrated outbursts like Voltaire’s ‘May the plague take half the English language and the ague the other half’.

    As you’re well aware, your possible singular-‘you’ addressee Nigel is just one bloke with one vote. As you’re doubtless equally aware, your (more likely) plural-you addressee of Worldcon fandom is a figurative herd of cats, each with one vote. Not only is it a practical impossibility to align Worldcon fandom into a conspiracy of unified purpose, it’s not even possible to get them to do a singalong[1] or a parade.

    You might manage, if greatly talented, to cheese off most of them severally and eventually jointly, a spectacular achievement that you, sir, might just have been the first to pull off.

    [1] Which is a shame, as I’d like to get the Hugo Awards auditorium during warmup signing sprightly round songs like the one my mother got a bus full of tourists to sing while on a New England fall leaves tour:

    I’ve got a submachine gun in my violin case
    And a .45 in my shoe.
    There’s a Bank of America on my block
    I’lll meet you there at two.

    (Apparently this has been Done Before Elsewhere.) But maybe I can coax the Sasquan crowd into a sing-along of Tom Smith’s ‘Sad Puppies Aren’t Much Fun’. That could be epic.

    Rick Moen
    [email protected]

49. But if people do not care enough about the Hugos to vote for them, how is their *not* participating an invalidation of the Hugos?

    It seems thin gruel to complain that the Hugos don’t include representation of people who will not vote for them.

50. Steve Davidson, why would anyone try to convince you that military service is the only way to citizenship when it is plainly stated in the book that if you are physically unfit some suitable non-military service will be found.

    However, physically fit conscientious objectors are right out.

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