aka The Genre That Day Stood Still
In the roundup today: Craig R., L. Jagi Lamplighter Wright, Sanford Begley, George R.R. Martin, Sarah A. Hoyt, Brad K. Horner, Lis Carey, Patrick May, William Reichard, Fred Kiesche and mysterious others. (Title credit belongs to File 770 contributing editors of the day Daniel Dern and Glenn Hauman.)
Craig R. on Boston Progressive
“’Just this one teensy, tiny little change…’” – June 4
One of the great divides in SF/F right now is between groups of readers that want to claim SF and Fantasy as purely descriptive entertainment, the epitome of escape literature, just living in shared authorial moments of the storyteller entertaining us at the fair, or in the tavern, with no other motive express, implied or accepted. You pays your pennies on the drumhead for the entertainment and that’s all you want to see and hear.
On the other side of the table or those who say that all stories have some ulterior external dimension, some subtext, some “message.” There is no choice, there is always subtext, whether the author means for inclusion or not. It is inevitable.
In the Interests Of Full Disclosure, I will tell you that I belong in the second camp: not from any skill at analysis, nor any training in critical literature theory, just cause it seems like the way things are.
From my viewpoint, the very act of reaching for the ability to entertain, or the ability to make any kind of contact with the intended audience requires an assumption of commonality of fundamental background points.
L. Jagi Lamplighter Wright interview for Superversive SF
“Interview with Hugo Nominee: Arlan Andrews, Sr.!” – June 4
1) All the Sad Puppies selections came from a list of stories that fans felt were their favorites from 2014. What about your story do you think brought it to the attention of whomever suggested it?
Presumably, because they liked the setting, the characters, and the story of my novella, “Flow.” “Flow” was the sequel to 2013’s “Thaw,” (the cover for which won the Analog Reader’s Award for Best Cover of 2013). The whole series of stories takes place after the next Ice Age (a politically incorrect supposition in itself), and the protagonist, Rist, is himself quite politically incorrect, though dark-skinned; he is a diminutive, sexist smartass (as are most males in the primitive society in which he was raised) and his mouth gets him literally into deep shit. The story, actually a vignette, ends in a (literal) cliff-hanger that will be followed by “Fall,” where Rist descends into yet another kind of society existing some 30,000 years from now. It will likely be called non-PC as well, though I have to remind people that authors are not necessarily the same as their characters.
Alex on Ada’s Technical Books and Cafe
“Madeline Ashby: Fiction Writer and Futurist” – June 4
One particularly poignant statement we both picked up on was made in the context of the controversy surrounding the 2015 Hugo Awards. Madeline [Ashby] said that we all have a tendency to “presume people think like (we) do, but generally, they don’t.” Though perhaps a bit of an obvious statement, I think it is equally powerful. Whether positively or negatively, humans must regularly navigate the disparity between our processes of thinking. Imbuing your actions with a recognition of difference may be a way to bridge gaps between people approaching a conflict in different ways, or at least a way to mitigate frustration when questionable (or outright despicable) decisions are made.
Alanaburke.com
“Local editor earns prestigious science fiction/fantasy award nomination – Ottawaherald.com” – June 4
“I was quite stunned and surprised [when I first heard] frankly due to the fact that I’ve just been executing this for concerning 6 years and I’ve just got four anthologies under my belt,” Schmidt said. “I’m relatively new, so to me it seemed earlier in my job compared to I would certainly have actually expected for something adore that to happen. I was thrilled and humbled at the exact same time that people believe I’m great enough to receive a nomination due to the fact that it is a fairly prestigious award. There was a great deal of excitement and happiness mixed in there as well.”
That happiness will certainly travel along with Schmidt to Spokane, Washington, where the awards will certainly be presented Aug. 22 at the 73rd Globe Science Fiction Convention. The Hugo Awards, named after pioneering science fiction magazine “Incredible Stories” founder Hugo Gernsback, are provided annually for the very best science fiction and fantasy functions of the previous year, according to a news release.
Sanford Begley on The Otherwhere Gazette
“The Puppies need to thank these recruiters”
The Sad Puppies really do need to thank some people who are not of their number. I’ve been watching this fiasco as someone who is in sympathy with the SP movement without being one myself. The truth for the rank and file SP members is basically that they were informed that they could vote on the Hugos and actually get books they liked on the ballot. From the point of view of the rank and file Puppies this was information on how-to and some recommendations they could follow, but were not required to. Most of the rank and file used some of the suggestions and substituted others as they saw fit. Admittedly this did cause those who did not have enough recommendations in their own reading to use the list as a source for filling out the rest of the nominations. After all, they knew a bit about Brad Torgerson and Larry Correia and could rely on them to suggest good books. Which they could then read in the voter packet and vote upon.
[This author needs to correct a tendency to misspell everybody’s name – “Brad Torgerson,” “Teresa Nielson Hayden,” “Patrick Hayden Nielson,” “Betsy Wolheim,” “N.K. Jemison.” I leave aside one other that was clearly intentional, but always remember, intentional misspellings are meaningless when true errors abound.]
George R.R. Martin on Not A Blog
“Catching Up” – June 4
— Conquest was cool. The KC fen throw a great con. And I was heartened by all the people who came up to thank me for my posts about the Hugos. Even in the nation’s heartland, it seems, there is considerable fannish anger about the Sad and Rabid Puppies pooping on our awards,
— Yes, Puppygate has continued, though I’ve been too busy to post about it. The Sad Puppies continue to be clueless, moving their goalposts almost daily. The Rabid Puppies continue to be venomous. Lots of other people are reading the Hugo nominees and reviewing the finalists. That’s what I am doing myself, though I am way behind in my reading,
Sarah A. Hoyt
“The Condescension of the Elites” – June 4
In fact, if one wades into the Sad Puppy mess (here, wear galoshes. You’ll need it) the side that says things like “You’re not true fans” or “your tastes are just low” or “your writing is bad” or “Our opinion of what is good IS the maker of what is good” or “you’ll never work in this town again” or “for daring talk against us, you’ll never win a Hugo” is not the Puppy supporters.
This is because the “power” at least if understood as traditional publishing power, in this field is NOT from puppy supporters. The people opposing the puppies (not their lickspittles running around blogs shouting the crumbs that fall from their masters’ tables) are powers in the field: well established editors with power of the purse; writers who get publicity campaigns and push and huge advances; critics who have for years been reviewing the “well regarded” stuff and establishing a taste that is Marxism with a mix of glitterati, or in other words, positional good leftism.
You’d think that people who have been extensively indoctrinated in Marxism would understand the difference between “establishment power” and “economic power” and the revolutionaries who come in saying “But you’ve been going wrong by alienating the reading public; we don’t give a hot damn what your political opinions are, but you need to tell stories people want to read, and if you don’t people should be able to participate in the intervention to make you see why your print runs keep falling.”
I.e. they would understand that they are in fact on the side that is being condescending by virtue of having all the power in the field, including power of the purse.
Brad K. Horner
“Flight of the Kikayon: A Sci-Fi Novelette by Kary English” – June 4
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This is a crisp and gloriously clear adventure story of a woman trying to escape her abusive husband with the help of her clone. I was touched. It really had heart.
Of course, the planet where she eventually wound up, swiss family robinson style, had one hell of a fascinating sea monster in it, so that’s a huge plus.
The story made me think about love and children, but not exclusively, and not oppressively. It was warming, not frantic, and I really enjoyed the ride. Crisp and gloriously clear sums it up very nicely, from writing, to imagery, to themes. Nothing was out of place and it felt inevitable. Which is very strange, considering that she wound up stranded and losing everything. Who am I to argue about the vagaries of fate or authorship?
I read this in preparation for the Campbell nomination of 2015, and I’m proud to say I read it, regardless. It shines.
Lis Carey on Lis Carey’s Library
“The Sci Phi Show, presented by Jason Rennie” – June 3
The Sci Phi Show discusses major philosophers and schools of philosophy illuminated in science fiction, fairly broadly defined. In the sample episode, it’s Nietzsche and the movie The Dark Knight. It’s an intelligent, thoughtful discussion, with good production values, accompanied by odd, distracting sound effects. There’s also opening and closing theme music that tries hard to give me a headache.
Patrick May
“2015 Hugo Award Novella Category” – June 4
[Each nominee is analyzed, then this conclusion — ]
My Hugo ballot for this category is:
- Flow
- Big Boys Don’t Cry
- The Plural of Helen of Troy
- No Award
- One Bright Start to Guide Them
- Pale Realms of Shade
Aside from the first two, the entries in this category are disappointing. There were far better novellas published in 2014 in Analog and Asimov’s alone. “Big Boys Don’t Cry”, while not as good as “Flow”, is certainly no worse than some nominees and winners in the past. I’m leaving “The Plural of Helen of Troy” slightly above No Award solely because Wright plays with (and occasionally loses to) some classic science fiction concepts. Overall it’s not really Hugo worthy, though.
William Reichard
“Apres Hugo” – June 4
After a lively day of schussing down the slippery slopes of unwinnable arguments, you’re pleasantly stupefied. Now you just want to relax and kick back, are we right?
That’s why when you get back to the toasty comfort of your own ideological hearth, you should reach for Hubik.
Hubik has everything a tired mind craves: a refreshing illusion of efficacy, a promise of persistent meaning, and a soothing anesthetic effect that will help you drift off to an untroubled sleep. Just spray a little around your armchair, and presto! The perfect ending to another day of lovely mountain sport.…
https://twitter.com/ShiftlessBum/status/606575118580482048
https://twitter.com/FredKiesche/status/606530903175778306
Discover more from File 770
Subscribe to get the latest posts to your email.
This. A thousand times this. I wish it wasn’t true, because I so want to be Pope of the Hugos. I’d get to wear a tiara and bright red shoes … but I digress. The most common ways to describe fandom are as anarchy or a market (depending on the speakers political leanings). There isn’t any central group, or formalized hierarchy to speak of. Even Worldcon is run by a different group of people, in a different city, each year chosen by a democratic process.
Camestros Felapton, that was wonderful.
I’d get to wear a tiara and bright red shoes
I was thinking the Pope of the Hugos would wear a silvery mitre….
This event later became known as the Defenestration of Sprague..
There goes the coffee. You owe me a new keyboard.
Craig:
>> If they want to “reclaim” the term and self-identify as “WrongFans” I certainly won’t deny them that option.>>
Can they “reclaim” it if they made it up in the first place?
The idea of wrongfans having wrongfun seems to be something Puppies invented as a charge they claim non-Puppies were making, though that doesn’t seem to have happened; the Puppies are overly defensive enough that when they don’t have enough to defend against, they’ll just make crap up.
Ironically, they often then go on to complain that non-puppies aren’t the right kind of fans and are claiming to like stuff for the wrong reasons. Apparently, there _is_ rightfun, as enjoyed by rightfans, in the eyes of some, but it’s not the non-Puppies who make that distinction.
And then we could explore which camp, to the extent there’s a camp on the non-Puppy side at all, is cliquish, holier-than-though, obnoxious, reactionary and fanatic…
Jack:
>> Since neither group issues membership cards and takes dues, I think it’s nearly impossible to identify if a puppy is also a gator. (Short of said puppy-gator announcing his support of both causes.)>>
As various of the Puppy leaders have done, of course.
Brian Z:
Every single one of those dog looks humiliated. What crummy owners.
</lurk>
Will –
With a sufficiently talented translator, much is possible.
Way back in the day, I did a paper for a translation theory class and dug into the haircut poem in The First Sally in The Cyberiad and was stunned to find the talent that he brought to the task. Although the subject poem was completely different in the original Polish (a cautionary tale about Caesar and Slavery, each word beginning with a soft ‘C’ instead of the ‘S’ in the English translation), he brilliantly captures the spirit of Klapaucius’ request by reframing it as a haircut while retaining the rest of the demand.
I have no doubt he brought the same mastery to Futurological Congress when bridging the language gap and preserving as much of the clever wordplay as possible.
@Jack Lint
I was thinking the Pope of the Hugos would wear a silvery mitre….
Indeed; with fins. You can tell you are boring the Pope in audience when he starts spinning the mitre so one of the fins runs down the length of his nose.
Also, at each Worldcon he is presented with new vestments, designed by a local, but the mitre remains the same.
(Now the question is, would BT wear the mitre if he was elected Pope of the Hugos, or his uniform?)
I read Flow after reading the interview. Andrews describes this as a vignette, and I think this is accurate; it’s certainly not a complete story.
We get a travelogue as a traditional naive protagonist gets everything explained to him by a convenient folky supporting character. There’s a spot of action, then we charge off towards the non-ending. I found it very unsatisfying.
The breasts thing was just silly.
It seemed the religion was supposed to be the defining feature of the new land, but it seemed very standard, and I was left wondering why the colder lands – where conditions were harder to explain – had a much less active religion.
Finally, the author has claimed the ice age setting is politically incorrect. I’m quite happy to have a SFnal setting with an unrealistic climate – it’s the SF element. On the other hand, an author who thinks climate change is just a political position makes my teeth grind.
So, not disastrous, just neither a story or particularly good.
Didn’t vignettes used to be shorter?
Andrews:
I don’t know what’s sadder–that Andrews feels the need to pander to his messagefic-hungry readers, or that he’s worried that they won’t notice.
And to whomever posted the “Command Unit” link — yes, reading that made BBDC even more of a pale, pale, pale imitation, and made “Turncoat” look even clunkier.
I definitely am going to read more.
I love the way that folks here are discovering all kinds of great fiction.
I am becoming more ruthless in my approach to the Hugo finalists; if they can’t even manage to produce work which is within the definitions then I do not feel obliged to read it.
I am baffled as to why a ‘vignette’ should be accepted by the Hugo people who check eligibility for the various criteria, though it may be that their brains just imploded under the sheer pressure of ineptitude displayed before them.
I am even more baffled as to why the toiling masses so ably led, in general, by the revolutionary cadre of comrades Hoyt etc. should be exposed to such an offensive term as ‘vignette’, reeking as it does of bourgeois misappropriation of the people’s art.
I should like to remind anyone who still cares that these are supposed to be Hugo finalists. Almost everything I have read so far shouldn’t have got past the slush pile, and the fact that melting glaciers are slush is no excuse.
It’s just a shame that the great fiction isn’t on the Hugo ballot.
@Whym –
To me it’s more of what “Big Boys Don’t Cry” wants to be when it grows up.
@Camestros “This event later became known as the Defenestration of Sprague..”
Men have been killed for less, Camestros.
On the topic of puppies vs gators, there’s at least one are where they differ in their approach.
When gators go after SJWs they tend to aim primarily at the people critiquing the works in question. There’s certainly a lot “that’s not a game” labelling being slung at Twine games and indie games that present what they consider “overly messaged” content, but the general refrain in that camp is: “Stop criticizing the game I like for not being diverse enough. If diversity is important enough to you, create your own content.”
The Hugos could be seen as the logical next step, I think. We’ve got a thriving industry that produces content for both the dreaded SJWs and the rest of the world, but that damned SJW message fic is too popular. Rather than create their own awards they’ve launched an assault to prove that they’re in the majority.
The overlaps are pretty plain to see, I think (anyone pointing out problems in their direction or tactics is “anti-gator” or “anti-puppy.” SJWs have a cabal in control of the review industry/publishing industry. One has Milo Y, the other Teddy B) but I view even the differences between them as being based on where in the current power structure they started out. Gators have numbers large enough to make some people in the industry fear them. It doesn’t really seem like puppies have that.
@cmm: “I would not have cared if the character in Flow fell down the ladder and died, or was crushed to death by the mighty breasts of the southern women.”
I dunno, that last one at least sounds like it could be briefly entertaining… 🙂
From a later comment:
I generally agree, but the Puppies do not. I’ll even say it’s theoretically possible for a tie-in gun porn novel to be Hugo-worthy, especially with the new Star Wars canon attracting talent like Chuck Wendig. He writes some fine stuff, and I wouldn’t want to exclude it from consideration simply on the grounds of being a tie-in work.
@Petréa Mitchell: (re: the Baen MilSF award)
What jumps out at me about that award is that it’s not about the Best MilSF Story of the year, but about the best in that book. That’s no award; that’s a publicity stunt.
rob_matic
It’s just a shame that the great fiction isn’t on the Hugo ballot.
The Puppies have made me read more of the Nebula nominees.
Not that this will surprise many non-Puppies readers, but….
In the short term – starting in the next few decades – it’s likely that there’ll be substantial cooling in eastern North America and western Europe thanks to loss of the Atlantic current system because of global warming. Reducing temperature gradients in the oceans weakens currents, which means less warm water coming north, which means all kinds of badness for areas that have been way warmer than they would otherwise have been. Even large-scale glaciation is something that can happen during a time of general, global temperature rise overall.
Heck, right in the present we’ve had more and more intense polar vortex stretches in recent years, and those trace back to jet stream shifts and Arctic ice melting that are, again, a product of the general climate change.
And then in the long term, on the scale of thousands to hundreds of thousands of years, the long-term consequences (including all sorts of fascinating possible disasters) will settle out, there’ll be cooling, and some kind of ice age is quite likely in the wake of it all.
All of this is a combination of accumulated observations and a lot of honest hard work at modeling and interpretation, and not at all controversial among climate scientists. There are uncertainties, but they rise because there’s stuff we just don’t know yet and changes keep being more intense than models predicted. There aren’t any cases where something that looked like a significant contributor turns out not to matter; it’s that the list of things that do matter keeps getting longer, and how much they matter keeps being a surprising lot.
This is stuff Andrews’ audience will generally not know because they’re willing to be fed lies. But the rest of us can know that, yeah, there are various ways extreme chill goes with climate change that includes overall warming.
Skin Game is the only Puppy-nominated work on the ballot I haven’t started reading yet. I’ve read or tried to read everything else. (Tried to read = I got partway through it but finally quit without finishing when it was obvious it wasn’t becoming less weak or less embarrassingly bad.)
I find all–ALL–of the Castalia House publications on the ballot so badly written, I will never again subject myself to anything from that publisher. The putrid and mostly unprofessional quality of the work was so consistent across CH nominees, all future CH nominees will automatically go under “No Award” on my Hugo ballots, as will “editor” Vox Day. I will never again let him or the Puppies waste my time as it has been wasted on reading the sheer drek that comes out of that company.
That said… I felt that way about almost everything else on the Puppy ballot, too. Only two items were NOT a waste of my time, “Totaled” and “Triple Sun.” Both of those were competent, professional stories I didn’t mind reading, but they weren’t great or award-quality IMO. And everything else was somewhere between very week and really awful. Although I have a lot of respect for Kevin Anderson, I also think the book of his they nominated is very weak. (Haven’t tried Skin Game yet.)
With this as a track record–a lot of weak-to-bad stuff and only two stories that I even find competent (but definitely not stuff that deserves an award, or even really seems to belong on an award ballot), that’s that. ALL Sad (and Rabid) Puppy nominees in future will automatically go under “No Award” on my ballots. I won’t let them waste my reading time like this again.
rob_matic: It’s just a shame that the great fiction isn’t on the Hugo ballot.
The only things I’ve read so far which have grabbed me are “Totaled” by Kary English and “The Goblin Emperor” by Katherine Addison. Everything else has been either adequate (which is not good enough for a Hugo) or weak. It’s really making me not want to continue reading if I’m going to have to plough through dreck day after day.
Kurt Busiek –
Sure they can reclaim from the interwebs they exiled it to
Rev. Bob says:
The book contains a curated list of stories that were originally published elsewhere that year, though; essentially, the nominees for the award are selected by judges and the winner by a popular vote among people who paid to participate.
It’s not the same as a completely popular-vote award, but it’s also not the same as “Best Story Submitted For This Anthology”.
Random thought: for at least some vocal Puppies, being angry at (and about) leftists fills in the part of experience that is, for me, filled by reading, viewing, and listening to great art.
@Dela: “With this as a track record–a lot of weak-to-bad stuff and only two stories that I even find competent (but definitely not stuff that deserves an award, or even really seems to belong on an award ballot), that’s that. ALL Sad (and Rabid) Puppy nominees in future will automatically go under “No Award” on my ballots. I won’t let them waste my reading time like this again.”
I’ve said it before: this was the Puppies’ one big chance to impress the Hugo-voting community, and they’ve squandered it. From here on out, the answer to “why doesn’t Puppyfic get considered for awards?” is going to be “because we saw what they had to offer in ’15 when they flooded the ballot, and it was crap.” The lead Puppies can bloviate all they want, but they’ve peaked. The rest is just a matter of watching the downhill slide and wincing as they collide with various rocks and trees, and I think the next of those will be the actual voting results.
I would say that the smart move is to quietly cancel SP4, but the smart move would have been either not to start SP1 in the first place, or to load SP3 with the very best stuff in the field. If the goal was to promote the fiction they like, the only thing I can conclude from SP3 is that their taste is execrable. A couple of exceptions are insufficient to redeem their slate. (Yes, I’m a Dresden Files fan. Yes, I read Skin Game when it came out. No, I wouldn’t have nominated it for a Hugo.)
I am open to suggestions, btw.
@Rev Bob
My gut tells me that, in the wake of the Hugo voting results, the Puppies of both sides will look at the data, and move forward. I am also curious what will come out of the business meeting.
I do think that the Puppies nominating friends and fellow travelers, primarily, without thinking of the quality and appeal of the works to a general voting audience, has done them no favors. To give them the benefit of the doubt, a lot of them may like the Nutty Nuggets on the ballot and think its the best out there. De gustibus non est disputanum and all that. It’s my belief that to the wider Hugo electorate, and SF in general though, it most certainly doesn’t hold up in most cases.
But the voting will tell all, eh?
@Steve
There is all kinds of good Bolo short fiction out there. I very much enjoyed ‘As our Strength Lessens’ by David Drake. It has the added bonus of making you want to go read ‘The Battle of Maldon’ when you finish it.
The Last Command is one of the classics, try to find it.
Stevie at 3:16:
“I am baffled as to why a ‘vignette’ should be accepted by the Hugo people who check eligibility for the various criteria, though it may be that their brains just imploded under the sheer pressure of ineptitude displayed before them.”
There’s nothing in the Rules that would exclude “Flow”. A Novella only has to be “A science fiction or fantasy story of between seventeen thousand five hundred (17,500) and forty thousand (40,000) words.” and the Hugo Administrators generally take a very broad approach as to what qualifys. If it’s not up to scratch, the final vote will sort it out.
Scott Frazer at 3:44 pm:
At this point, I self-identify as non-Puppy and anti-slate. (And most of what the Puppy inner circle are posting is propaganda, with little that is verifiable or of substance.)
Rev. Bob at 3:45 pm:
I find it s useful reminder to read what Torgersen wrote (was it only six months ago?):
Compare that with the Puppy slate works that made the final ballot. How many tie-ins were included in the Puppy Slates? How many comics?
Actions speak louder than words.
Soon Lee: That’s such a quote. I mean, where in the Puppies’ nominations are any of that stuff? There are more action sequences in “If You Were A Dinosaur, My Love” + “The Rain That Falls On You From Nowhere” than in all of Wright’s nominated works combined, and like that.
This song has been on my mind of late.
https://youtu.be/JHYIGy1dyd8
Soon Lee
I know.
I was being rhetorical.
It was either that or defenestrating myself.
Aristotle!
How many tie-ins were included in the Puppy Slates? How many comics?
Well as I’ve pointed out before not only didn’t they nominate much in the way of comics, they didn’t even nominate any Marvel comics. Weird to make an appeal to readers of Marvel comics and then not nominate any.
While in Chorfysmorfysejwoocliquee* land Ms Marvel, a comic book that HAS THE PUBLISHER’S NAME in the title and is overtly tying into aspects of the MCU (e.g. Inhumans) and features as the central character A FAN OF MARVEL SUPERHEROES who writes fan-fiction online, is nominated. Oh and at least some RP’s want to No Award it. It’s almost like, well like there is something about that book that they may have some unexpressed dislike about…
*{Is their an agreed pronunciation for SJW? I’m getting tired of thinking ES-JAY-DOUBLE-YOU in my head. I’m saying sejwoo.}
@Petréa Mitchell:
The blurb disagrees with you: “selected by editor David Afsharirad.” No judges, no Nebula-like jury. Just read the preface. The nomination process appears to be “what David Afsharirad liked” – he does not allude to any other judges or criteria. Moreover, his preface is full of, well, Puppy dog-whistle language. Just click the link and start reading at “In fact, with so much short science fiction being published” – it’s practically the Puppy manifesto:
Now, where have I heard that before? But back to your comment:
You’re technically correct, but only because I’d change “Submitted” to “Selected,” as there is no evidence that there was a submission process. The fact remains that the “award” is a sham. It’s not picking from the whole field, but from what one guy says is the best of that field.
In other words, it’s exactly what Brad Torgersen did with the Sad Puppy slate, but without even an ELoE helping him find stuff. One guy makes a slate, and everyone else is supposed to just accept its validity and vote from it.
+1 to what Rev. Bob said above.
On the matter of what they might have nominated, it struck me that the complaint behind Hieroglyph, looks, if you squint at it right, rather like the Puppy complaints about old-time SF. But did they nominate anything from it? No. (Stories from it have showed up on other shortlists, though.)
@Camestros Felapton:
I’ve seen comments where it’s written Sock-Juice and now I can’t get that image out of my head.
You’re welcome.
Thou hast called me into Narnia, Soon Lee. Here I am. What hast thou to say?
Edgar Rice Burroughs died in 1950.
So, the editor is pitching it at kids born around 1940, reading Edgar Rice Burroughs under the sheets together with a torch.
I’m glad that Baen is in there catering for the 75 year olds, but I’m somewhat younger than that, and I soon discovered more interesting things to do under the sheets, though not, to the best of my recollection, involving torches.
It’s all Aristotle’s fault.
I, Master Stevie, blame Plato. And Obama.
To be fair to Afshirarad/that preface, as a child I read books whose authors had died before I was born, some of them before my parents were born.
Camestros Felapton on June 5, 2015 at 4:51 pm said:
I usually just go with: \stro?\-\?man\
Foiled by unicode again.
Laertes, et al:
Laumer’s The Last Command is available online.
Soon Lee: This song has been on my mind of late
Then it’s easy to perceive
Somepuppy’s been lying to me
‘Cause when the wrongfans
Are pushing badfic,
I know they been lying to me
For good MilSF, I would nominate Gene Wolfe’s The HORARS of War, The Blue Mouse, and The Citadel of the Autarch.
Vicki
Yes, I know; I still read Shakespeare, and Jane Austen, and a lot of other people who died before I was born.
However, the editor deliberately chose to frame it as referring only Burroughs, with the implicit assumption that nobody since Burroughs had written adventurous tales of daring deeds, with the added bonus that nobody had written stories sufficient to grip a child’s imagination to the ‘must keep reading this’, which is absolute nonsense.
Has he never heard of Harry Potter? Does he live in an alternate Universe where the remarkable creator of adventurous tales of daring deeds, read by both children and adults, is not a billionaire?
When an editor insults his readers by talking to them as if they’d been marooned on a desert island for the last fifty years, then, in my view, there is nothing there of interest to people haven’t spent the last fifty years marooned on a desert island.
Fortunately, if we want Golden Age stories written well we’ve got the ‘Old Mars’ and ‘Old Venus’ anthologies, and the latter I think can be nominated for next year’s Hugo’s. And neither GRR Martin nor Gardner Dubois insults their readers’ intelligence, which is yet another plus point…
@Kurt Busiek:
Every single one of those dog looks humiliated. What crummy owners.
What color is the sky on your planet?
None of the dogs in the pictures I looked at there looked even remotely “humiliated.” Happy dogs.
Sarah Hoyt seems to assume that everyone on the left is a Marxist. (I suspect she’s also unclear on the distinction between “Marxist” and “Marxist-Leninist;” but like the distinction between Protestants and Mormons, that’s a minor detail.)
This is no more true than that everyone on the right is a monarchist.
Not to mention that Marxism has mostly gone out of style on the American left, while apparently many Russians on the right are Marxists.