Hugo-eligible short fiction, part 3
Mar. 9th, 2016 09:09 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cahnI think this will be the last one, because quite frankly I think I have reached the limit of the amount of short fiction I am willing to seek out of my own accord. (If there are other stories you really think I should read, that might be different.) But there are a bunch of interesting stories that I wanted to tell you guys about!
These are in order of most liked to least (within categories), and I have put an asterisk next to ones that are currently on my ballot.
Novellas
*The Citadel of Weeping Pearls (Aliette de Bodard) (available if you are nominating for the Hugo by contacting the author here) - oh! Yeah. This one's great. Interesting non-white-male worldbuilding/characters with what I thought was a satisfying arc, although I could totally see others differing on that.
*Quarter Days (Iona Sharma) - Fantasy (magic Britain with trains). I really liked this one, and I liked Sharma's short story set in the same universe even more — I liked that it was first about characters and second about solving a puzzle, with the worldbuilding something to be untangled as the characters went along.
*The New Mother (Eugene Fischer) - This is near-future SF with interesting ideas. I liked the journalistic bits a lot.
Novelettes
*Botanica Veneris: Thirteen Papercuts by Ida Countess Rathangan, Ian McDonald (in Old Venus) - Apparently this has been recced around everywhere, and I finally got it from the library, and it is in fact extremely good writing and a really interesting story that takes the tropes of old Venusian pulp and refashions them into something rich and strange. Definitely up there as Hugo-worthy.
*So Much Cooking (Naomi Kritzer) - Awwwww, this is a super cute and also kind of heartbreaking but also heartwarming story. Food blog during an epidemic.
"Another Word for World" (Ann Leckie) (Future Visions) - I mean, Leckie is a wonderful writer, and this story about two very different women who have to communicate over a language barrier is no exception. But I did feel that the resolution of the story was something that should have occurred to anyone who had ever studied a second language and not be this huge surprise to all the characters.
"Machine Learning" (Nancy Kress) (Future Visions) - So, like, there's this emotional story in here that is probably pretty good, and then there's this near-future machine learning stuff that… I just… okay, see, I know a little about the field from work and I kept saying, but… but it doesn't really work like that… people don't actually think about it like that… and it drove me batty. This is not a rec; if anything it's an anti-rec; I just had to rant about it.
Short Stories
*Game of Smash and Recovery (Kelly Link) - Families? Sort of. Kelly Link, anyway. So, this is a really interesting story, and the more I think about it the more I like it.
*"Hello, Hello" (Seanan McGuire) (Future Visions) - Have I mentioned I am a sucker for stories about families? I am a sucker for stories about families, especially parents and children, and this is a cheerful story about a family and machine learning and I found the family really well done, and I just really liked it.
*Nine Thousand Hours (Iona Sharma) - Set in the same universe as her novella above. I read this story and really didn't understand what was happening until the end, at which point I read the whole thing again. It's got to be good if you can get me to do that. I will warn you that not much actually happens in this story (the big action happens before the story). But it's still a cool story. I am definitely nominating Sharma for the Campbell, even if this gets knocked off my ballot.
Remembery Day (Sarah Pinsker) - About memory and war. I liked this a lot. Not on my ballot through lack of space.
These are in order of most liked to least (within categories), and I have put an asterisk next to ones that are currently on my ballot.
Novellas
*The Citadel of Weeping Pearls (Aliette de Bodard) (available if you are nominating for the Hugo by contacting the author here) - oh! Yeah. This one's great. Interesting non-white-male worldbuilding/characters with what I thought was a satisfying arc, although I could totally see others differing on that.
*Quarter Days (Iona Sharma) - Fantasy (magic Britain with trains). I really liked this one, and I liked Sharma's short story set in the same universe even more — I liked that it was first about characters and second about solving a puzzle, with the worldbuilding something to be untangled as the characters went along.
*The New Mother (Eugene Fischer) - This is near-future SF with interesting ideas. I liked the journalistic bits a lot.
Novelettes
*Botanica Veneris: Thirteen Papercuts by Ida Countess Rathangan, Ian McDonald (in Old Venus) - Apparently this has been recced around everywhere, and I finally got it from the library, and it is in fact extremely good writing and a really interesting story that takes the tropes of old Venusian pulp and refashions them into something rich and strange. Definitely up there as Hugo-worthy.
*So Much Cooking (Naomi Kritzer) - Awwwww, this is a super cute and also kind of heartbreaking but also heartwarming story. Food blog during an epidemic.
"Another Word for World" (Ann Leckie) (Future Visions) - I mean, Leckie is a wonderful writer, and this story about two very different women who have to communicate over a language barrier is no exception. But I did feel that the resolution of the story was something that should have occurred to anyone who had ever studied a second language and not be this huge surprise to all the characters.
"Machine Learning" (Nancy Kress) (Future Visions) - So, like, there's this emotional story in here that is probably pretty good, and then there's this near-future machine learning stuff that… I just… okay, see, I know a little about the field from work and I kept saying, but… but it doesn't really work like that… people don't actually think about it like that… and it drove me batty. This is not a rec; if anything it's an anti-rec; I just had to rant about it.
Short Stories
*Game of Smash and Recovery (Kelly Link) - Families? Sort of. Kelly Link, anyway. So, this is a really interesting story, and the more I think about it the more I like it.
*"Hello, Hello" (Seanan McGuire) (Future Visions) - Have I mentioned I am a sucker for stories about families? I am a sucker for stories about families, especially parents and children, and this is a cheerful story about a family and machine learning and I found the family really well done, and I just really liked it.
*Nine Thousand Hours (Iona Sharma) - Set in the same universe as her novella above. I read this story and really didn't understand what was happening until the end, at which point I read the whole thing again. It's got to be good if you can get me to do that. I will warn you that not much actually happens in this story (the big action happens before the story). But it's still a cool story. I am definitely nominating Sharma for the Campbell, even if this gets knocked off my ballot.
Remembery Day (Sarah Pinsker) - About memory and war. I liked this a lot. Not on my ballot through lack of space.
no subject
Date: 2016-03-10 02:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-10 04:47 pm (UTC)I also strongly recommend Quarter Days :) (I liked New Mother a lot too, but not quite as much as Citadel and Quarter Days.)
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Date: 2016-03-10 04:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-10 04:50 pm (UTC)(Any other stories I am missing?)
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Date: 2016-03-11 02:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-14 03:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-15 12:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-29 04:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-29 10:26 pm (UTC)...by which I mean she has SEVEN BOOKS coming out this year, with caveats like "a couple are anthologies/collections, so she didn't write all the material for them just last year" and "one is a novella". But still. SEVEN. *_* Plus lots of shorter fiction.
(The books of my heart are the main Newsflesh trilogy, written under her Mira Grant pseud. If you have any interest at all, I will gladly link you to my rec posts; if not, no worries!)
no subject
Date: 2016-03-30 10:36 am (UTC)I would love to be linked to your rec posts!
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Date: 2016-03-30 10:55 pm (UTC)I would love to be linked to your rec posts!
*happy wriggles* I have two, and neither is spoilery at all (I'm anti-spoiler in general, but have an extra horror of spoiling anyone for Newsflesh). This one is more of an overview of what the main trilogy is about, and this one is more focused on why I love Georgia, the female lead, so much. (I love the books for all kinds of reasons, but Georgia is at the heart of it.) That second post also includes a link to my post of content notes/warnings.
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Date: 2016-03-25 04:57 am (UTC)Thanks for the links!
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Date: 2016-03-29 04:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2016-03-30 03:21 am (UTC)