After Ike

Contrary to what you might think, SF Signal is not produced in a wormhole universe two doors down from the singularity, but on the Texas coast. And the popular blog now is gradually getting back up to speed after Hurricane Ike scattered its contributors to the winds. JP Frantz writes:

Myself and my family are ok, if tired. You might be surprised how difficult it is to sleep during a hurricane.

I’m certainly glad to hear you’re safe, and wish you all well as you get your lives back on track.

Is the Emperor Naked?

SF Signal’s JP Frantz has posted Why I Stopped Reading: The Yiddish Policemen’s Union by Michael Chabon, an iconoclastic slam against the Hugo-nominated and Nebula-winning novel. (I won’t call it a review – he didn’t finish reading the book, remember?)

I’ve been waiting for the Best Novel Hugo debate to “go negative,” as it’s termed in election-year jargon. And that choice of jargon is no coincidence, for this category turned into a campaign the moment the other four nominees (McDonald, Sawyer, Scalzi, and Stross) offered free electronic copies of their novels to 2008 Worldcon members, an unprecedented move. (We still have to buy Chabon’s.)

That brilliant gamble can only pay off if people like one of their books better than Chabon’s, and I’m sure they’ve anxiously been waiting for any sign they’re gaining traction against the perceived front-runner (thus playing Obama to Chabon’s Clinton?)

And they ought to worry. These are the same Hugo voters who gave a Neal Stephenson novel the award a couple of years ago. Those people might do anything!