|
|
|
Let us know if you have read any of the nominated works. -krj
From: P Nielsen Hayden <pnh@panix.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.fandom,rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Hugo Awards Nominations
Date: 23 Apr 1999 03:28:24 GMT
Hugo Awards Nominations
Aussiecon 3, the 57th annual World Science Fiction Convention, has released
this year's nominations for the Hugo Awards and the John W. Campbell Award
for Best New Writer. Winners will be announced at the convention in
Melbourne, Australia, Sept. 2 - 6, 1999.
Best Novel
* Children of God, Mary Doria Russell (Villard)
* Darwinia, Robert Charles Wilson (Tor)
* Distraction, Bruce Sterling (Bantam Spectra)
* Factoring Humanity, Robert J. Sawyer (Tor)
* To Say Nothing of the Dog, Connie Willis (Bantam Spectra)
Best Novella
* "Aurora in Four Voices", Catherine Asaro (Analog, Dec 1998)
* "Get Me to the Church On Time", Terry Bisson (Asimov's, May 1998)
* "Oceanic", Greg Egan (Asimov's, Aug 1998)
* "Story of Your Life", Ted Chiang (Starlight 2, Tor, Nov 1998)
* "The Summer Isles", Ian R. MacLeod (Asimov's, Oct/Nov 1998)
Best Novelette
* "Divided by Infinity", Robert Charles Wilson (Starlight 2, Tor,
Nov 1998)
* "Echea", Kristine Kathryn Rusch (Asimov's, Jul 1998)
* "The Planck Dive", Greg Egan (Asimov's, Feb 1998)
* "Steamship Soldier on the Information Front", Nancy Kress (Future
Histories 1997; Asimov's, Apr 1998)
* "Taklamakan", Bruce Sterling (Asimov's, Oct/Nov 1998)
* "Time Gypsy", Ellen Klages (Bending the Landscape: Science Fiction
Overlook, Sep 1998)
* "Zwarte Piet's Tale", Allen Steele (Analog, Dec 1998)
Best Short Story
* "Cosmic Corkscrew", Michael A. Burstein (Analog, Jun 1998)
* "Maneki Neko", Bruce Sterling (F&SF, May 1998)
* "Radiant Doors", Michael Swanwick (Asimov's, Sep 1998)
* "The Very Pulse of the Machine", Michael Swanwick (Asimov's, Feb
1998)
* "Whiptail", Robert Reed (Asimov's, Oct/Nov 1998)
* "Wild Minds", Michael Swanwick (Asimov's, May 1998)
Best Related Book
* The Dreams Our Stuff Is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered the
World, Thomas M. Disch (The Free Press)
* Hugo, Nebula & World Fantasy Awards, Howard DeVore (Advent:Publishers)
* Science-Fiction: The Gernsback Years, Everett F. Bleiler (Kent State
University Press)
* Spectrum 5: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art, Cathy Fenner &
Arnie Fenner, eds. (Underwood Books)
* The Works of Jack Williamson: An Annotated Bibliography and Guide,
Richard A. Hauptmann (The NESFA Press)
Best Dramatic Presentation
* Babylon 5: "Sleeping in Light"
* Dark City
* Pleasantville
* Star Trek: Insurrection
* The Truman Show
Best Professional Editor
* Gardner Dozois
* Scott Edelman
* David G. Hartwell
* Patrick Nielsen Hayden
* Stanley Schmidt
* Gordon Van Gelder
Best Professional Artist
* Jim Burns
* Bob Eggleton
* Donato Giancola
* Don Maitz
* Nick Stathopoulos
* Michael Whelan
Best Semiprozine
* Interzone, David Pringle, ed.
* Locus, Charles N. Brown, ed.
* The New York Review of Science Fiction, Kathryn Cramer, Ariel Haméon,
David G. Hartwell & Kevin Maroney, eds.
* Science Fiction Chronicle, Andrew I. Porter, ed.
* Speculations, Kent Brewster, ed.
Best Fanzine
* Ansible, Dave Langford, ed.
* File 770, Mike Glyer, ed.
* Mimosa, Richard & Nikki Lynch, eds.
* Plotka, Alison Scott & Steve Davies, eds.
* Tangent, David A. Truesdale, ed.
* Thyme, Alan Stewart, ed.
Best Fan Writer
* Bob Deveny
* Mike Glyer
* Dave Langford
* Evelyn C. Leeper
* Maureen Kincaid Speller
Best Fan Artist
* Freddie Bauer
* Brad Foster
* Ian Gunn
* Teddy Harvia
* Joe Mayhew
* D. West
John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer (Not a Hugo)
* Kage Baker*
* Julie E. Czerneda*
* Nalo Hopkinson*
* Susan R. Matthews*
* James Van Pelt*
* denotes second year of eligibility
--
41 responses total.
I've read _Darwinia_ (excellent book) and have just started _To Say Nothing of the Dog_ (the first 32 pages are good >8).
Boy, not only have I not read any of the nominees, I've never read anything written by any of the nominated authors until you get down to the "Related Work" category.. I sure don't read as much science fiction as I used to..
You've never read Asimov? Well, not that I can go around saying stuff like that, I haven't read anything on the list either... It's not my fault, I've been reading classics. All the newer novels and stories seem so overwhelming, and my favorite sf book is Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card). I think I've been spending too much time writing my own stories. Actually, I'm working on a novel!
I see plenty of stuff there from Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine, but nothing by Asimov (which would be quite a trick, anyway..) Am I missing something?
Way to go, Howard DeVore; local first fandomer.
Well, I always considered Asimov more or less of a pioneer in the scifi field... True, I'm not an obsessed fan, but he *invented* the word "robot". As one of my friends would say, the man was a god (he's dead, Jim). Also, Asimov wrote some non-fiction. It was darned good, too. He knew his science, and that's probably what made him such a great writer.
Uh, Capek invented the word "robot" in his novel "R. U. R.", according to Asimov, writing in a lot of his books. The concept of robots as we know them was invented by Eando Binder (Edgar(?) and Otto Binder, a pair of brothers who wrote about Adam Link). Asimov invented the 3 Laws of Robotics, and his robots were a lot more realistic than the Frankenstein-like robots other authors had in their stories. He probably wrote the best robot stories in science fiction, but he didn't invent the concept or the word. He was, as you said, he was very knowledgeable about science, a god among science fiction writers, and a pioneer of science fiction.
I really should make a stab at reading DARWINIA, as Robert Charles Wilson is an old acquaintance from SF fandom going back 20+ years. Dave Langford, who has his customary two nominations for Best Fan Writer and Best Fanzine -- he's won a reasonable-sized shelf of them -- is the brother of Jon Langford, of the Mekons and the Waco Brothers.
Really? I though Asimov invented the word. Learn something everyday :)
I haven't read any of the nominated prose either, but I did see all of the dramatic presentations.
I should get out more... (it wouldn't very hard to get out "more", though, in my case)
Let's see. I've read "To Say Nothing of the Dog" and "Children of God", in the novel category. I've read all of the novellas, novelettes, and short stories that have appeared in Asimov's, F&SF, or Analog, since I read those cover-to-cover every month... Have seen the Bab 5, Dark City, and ST: Insurrection, my GAWD, that's three dramatic presentations! (I usually might get one.) Read Locus and SF Chronicle and Ansible, have read lots of Langford and Evelyn Leeper, don't know the fan artists by name, and have read books by Kage Baker, Julie Czierdna, Susan R. Matthews (though not all of their work, but at least one each...) And I thought I was cutting back on my sf reading.... guess not. Comparatively speaking, of course.
Oh, Insurrection was up there? I didn't see that. That's one point for Chimera, then. I have see Babylon 5, if they're talking about the movie.
In resp:2 , Mike McNally said that he had read nothing by any of the authors nominated for the Big 4 fiction awards. I assume this includes Connie Willis. What a lot of people haven't realized is that Connie Willis has developed into one of the most honored writers in the SF field in the last dozen or so years. Here's a little clip that Evelyn Leeper wrote on Usenet, counting Hugo nominations and awards. > Current interesting statistics for fiction categories: > > Silverberg has the most nominations, 23. Ellison and Willis have 18 > each; LeGuin has 17. Niven has 14 solo nominations, 4 shared with > Pournelle, and 1 shared with Steve Barnes. > > Bishop and Swanwick have each been nominated 9 times (solo) without a win. > Swanwick also has a joint nomination with Gibson. Wolfe has 8. > (Waldrop has six nominations, no wins.) > > Anderson has the most Hugos, 7. Ellison, Leiber, Willis, and zelazny > each have 6. (Ellison also has a share in the DP Hugo for "City on the > Edge of Forever.") I'll see if I can grub around for the Nebula statistics.
Yep, her short story collection "Fire Watch" blew me away when I read it a few years ago. I think she's one of the best SF writers of this era, and it's a damn shame that so few people have read her works.
According to a number of Web pages, Connie Willis has six Nebula awards to go with her six Hugos. One page claims her total of 12 awards is exceeded only by Harlan Ellison with 14. I was glad to see that the FIRE WATCH collection came back into print. A reprint of a short fiction collection by a single author is not too common these days.
I've read "Factoring Humanity" and "To Say Nothing of the Dog". Robert Sawyer, is an author to watch. I think one of his previous novels, "The Terminal Experiment" was nominated or won a Hugo or Nebula. His first three novels (Fossil Hunter, Far-Seer, and Foreigner) were a trilogy set on a dinosaur planet. They looked so hokey that I initially passed them by. After "The Terminal Experiment" won some kind of award, I picked it up and found that it was a very solid and thought provoking piece of hard science fiction. Since then I've been reading all his books, which come out frequently - it seems like he is cranking out three or four novels a year. They all have very solid scientific foundations, and lots of very interesting ideas. The one nominated here, "Factoring Humanity," starts out sounding a bit too much like the movie "Contact" (female scientist decodes mysterious alien transmissions by non-planar thinking and finds instructions for building a device that takes her on a weird metaphysical journey), except that the weird metaphysical journey is actually weirder, more original, and more has much more profound implications than the one in Contact. I don't think it's a great book - not all that well built; some subplots that don't really tie in well - but it is definately worth reading. I'm kind of worried that at the breakneck pace this guy is turning out books, that he is going to burn out fast. So many writers seem only to have a few good books in them. He still seems to be doing OK. Maybe he's been saving up books for years. He claims to be "Canada's only full-time science fiction writer". Big deal.
about the library with the best SCI here? -Nishi
Hot off the press from the World Science Fiction Convention in Australia:
the Hugo Award winners! The nominees are listed in resp:0.
From: Gary Farber <gfarber@panix.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written,rec.arts.sf.tv
Subject: Hugos
Date: 4 Sep 1999 18:55:33 GMT
Organization: fwa pp
No one seems to have posted them here yet. Tsk.
* Best Novel of 1998
To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis
* Best Novella of 1998
"Oceanic" by Greg Egan
* Best Novelette of 1998
"Taklamakan" by Bruce Sterling
* Best Short Story of 1998
"The Very Pulse of the Machine" by Michael Swanwick
* Best Related Book of 1998
The Dreams Our Stuff is Made Of by Thomas M. Disch
* Best Dramatic Presentation of 1998
The Truman Show (Paramount)
* Best Professional Editor of 1998
Gardner Dozois (Asimov's)
* Best Professional Artist of 1998
Bob Eggleton
* Best Semiprozine of 1998
Locus edited by Charles N. Brown
* Best Fanzine of 1998
Ansible edited By Dave Langford
* Best Fan Writer of 1998
Dave Langford
* Best Fan Artist of 1998
Ian Gunn
* John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer of 1997 or 1998
(Sponsored by Dell Magazines)
Nalo Hopkinson
[. . . .]
--
Copyright 1999 by Gary Farber; For Hire as: Web Researcher; Nonfiction
Writer, Fiction and Nonfiction Editor; gfarber@panix.com; Northeast US
I'm glad to see Connie Willis win it. That is an excellent book.
Pleasant, but fluffy. On the other hand, comedy suits her: Willis's characters are consistently extraordinarily mentally dim. In a comedy, at least, this is appropriate and amusing; in her more serious works, it's somewhere between annoying and distressing. Bruce Sterling's novelette is in his new collection, _A Good Old-Fashioned Future_, which I just bought: I'm looking forward to reading it. Disch's non-fiction book was very thoughtful, but so provocative and iconoclastic that I'm not sure which surprises me more: that it won a Hugo, or that the author (presumably) was willing to accept one. "The Truman Show" was a fine movie (especially for Jim Carrey, who manages to play a nice guy without being sappy), much better than "Pleasantville", which had tedious spots and was never really thought through. I wonder if "Babylon 5" lost because everyone agrees the last season was a dog, or because the con was held in Australia where presumably fewer people saw the show?
Did a little web searching. Connie Willis Awards: Hugo, 1982 "Fire Watch" (novelette) Nebula, 1982 "Fire Watch" (novelette) Hugo, 1983 "A Letter From the Clearys" (short story) Nebula, 1982 "A Letter from the Clearys" (short story) Campbell Award, 1988 "Lincoln's Dreams" (novel) Hugo, 1988 "The Last of the Winnebagos" (novella) Nebula, 1988 "The Last of the Winnebagos" (novella) Nebula, 1990 "At the Rialto" (novelette) Nebula, 1992 "Doomsday Book" (novel) Hugo, 1993 "Doomsday Book" (novel) Locus, 1993 "Doomsday Book" (novel) Nebula, 1992 "Even the Queen" (short story) Hugo, 1993 "Even the Queen" (short story) Locus, 1993 "Even the Queen" (short story) Locus, 1994 "Impossible Things" (collection) Hugo, 1994 "Death on the Nile" (short story) Locus, 1994 "Close Encounter" (short story) Locus, 1996 "Remake" (novella) Hugo, 1998 "To Say Nothing of the Dog" (novel) Is this enough awards?
Hmph. (Scott enters some pointlessly sarcastic remark)
More to the point, does Willis' domination of the prominent science fiction awards during the 90s mean that she's the greatest writer to hit scifi in decades or does it point to the scarcity of other fresh writing talent in the genre? (or at least other talent with general appeal..) I never finished "To Say Nothing of the Dog" -- I abandoned it after about fifty pages because I found it particularly boring. I'm willing to try again if someone wants to assure me that it (or any of her other stories) is really worth the effort, but I am definitely wondering what all the hype is about.. (But then the only currently-writing science fiction authors I've been genuinely enthusiastic about in recent years have been Neal Stephenson and Tim Powers.. I just don't read science fiction like I used to..)
Who does? (Read science fiction like they used to, I mean.) If you like Stephenson and Powers, Mike, then you might just find Willis too, well, fluffy. Try _Doomsday Book_, which is her grittiest novel: time-traveling grad student lands in the middle of the 14th Century Black Plague without realizing it. Or some of her short stories: "Fire Watch" (middle of the Blitz) or "A Letter from the Clearys" (her most successful attempt at the kind of gut-wrenching story that the 1950s sf authors did so well).
Well, I like and read Connie Willis. I just don't think she is anything like the only game in town - I'd like to see more writers recognized. I think part of the reason that she wins so many awards is that she writes so many short stories - not that many short stories get published and they don't get very much attention, so I think it is a smallish clique of people who read them and vote on short story awards. On the whole I agree that there is a shortage of writers to be enthusiastic about. People I'm at least mildly enthusiastic about include Neal Stephenson, Pat Murphy, Sean Stewart, and Robert Sawyer. The last two may be pushing their luck - some of their recent work has been less impressive.
re #25: thanks for the suggestion, perhaps I'll try those.. re #26: care to go into further detail about the writers you like -- what sort of stuff they write, what would be a good starting point, etc..?
Luke: _All_ awards are nominated essentially by a small group of people, though not necessarily a clique (which implies a conscious, self-aware group). I counted three years' worth of Hugo ballots, so I've seen this in action. But fewer people nominate, or vote, for the Hugo short fiction awards than for Novel. Nomination, by the way, is a more critical filtering process than the actual voting, because it selects from a larger field and because fewer people participate.
Indeed. I remember the shock I felt a few years back when the awards were announced and I realized that I had already read the Hugo-winning short story!
janc in resp:26 :: Yes, it's true that working actively in the shorter fiction lengths can run up your award totals. See Harlan Ellison, who has never to my knowledge written a science fiction novel. The Hugos represent the economic structure of the SF field at the time the awards categories were fixed: in the 1950s, the pulp magazines were dominant, and there were probably less than 50 full-length novels published each year -- I'm guessing, based on things I've read in old fanzines. One might consider revising the awards categories to reflect the field in 1999: Roll together the Novella and Novellette awards, and then create some new categories for longer works. Best Short Novel, Best Big Honking Novel, and Best Trilogy, perhaps?
If I remember correctly, Harlan Ellison wrote a novel back in the 50s or 60s called Doomsman. It's one of those books that he'll rip up if you ever ask him to sign it. I have a problem with presenting awards for Best Trilogy. How do we handle a series whenone or more of the individual books had already won? Would these series be disqualified?
I'm not sure that Ken was literally suggesting a "best trilogy" award.. I took it as a snide comment on a perpetual trend in the science-fiction world..
I'm semi-serious and semi-snide.
This response has been erased.
aren't we all?
I used to run another award, the Mythopoeic Society Awards, whose rule is that only stand-alone novels are eligible by themselves; trilogies (or whatever) have to wait until the entire trilogy is out. This policy wouldn't work for the Hugos, since it requires an administrator to split the hairs, which would generate too much carping in the Hugo biz. Generally, when judging the eligibility of a book I hadn't read, I went by presentation: if it had a summary of its predecessor, it probably didn't stand alone, and if the t.p. had something like "Vol. 5 of the Celts In Space Trilogy", then it certainly didn't. But many books which don't stand alone are published with no indication of that fact. If I were revamping the Hugos, which I'm not (especially because it's impossible to get anything sensible through the Worldcon Business Meeting), I'd collapse the 4 fiction categories into either 2 (Novel and Short Fiction) or 3 (Long Novel, Short Novel/Novella, Novelette/Short Story, though obviously not with those names), replace Professional Artist with Original Artwork, and split Dramatic Presentation into Series and Stand-alone.
<MIke quickly digresses> I liked the comment on "Vol. 5 of the Celts in Space TRILOGY" because of the absurd ideas that spring to mind from the title. It also makes me think of _Mostly_Harmless_, the 5th book in the Hitchhiker's trilogy. <digression=off> I think narrowing down the fiction categories makes sense. Not too many people think of the distinctions between a short novel, novella and novelette. Creating a Short Fiction category makes more sense. I also like the idea of splitting Dramatic Presentation into Series and Stand-Alone. That would prevent episodes of the same series (like B5) from competing with each other. Plus,you wouldn't have to examine an episode out of context and rate it as a stand-alone.
IIRC, "Mostly Harmless" had a blurb on the cover proclaiming it something like "The Fifth Book in the Increasingly Inaccurately-Named Hitchhiker's Guide Trilogy" Do books from the middle of series ever seriously contend for the Hugo? Most of the winners I can remember either a) stood apart, or b) sparked a series later but weren't clearly "series books" at the time they won..
Both the first and second books of Orson Scott Card's (hideously awful, wretched, and nauseating -- but I digress) Ender Wiggin saga won Hugos. And I think that some of Lois McMaster Bujold's Hugo-winning novels were from the middle of a series (I haven't read any). The second and third, but not the first, books of Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy won Hugos.
|
|
|
- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss