Hugo/Nebula Nominees/Winners: Readings/Thoughts

[J-Sun]

AKA "Hugo and Nebula Award-Winning and -Nominated Novels: How Many Have You Read and What Did You Think of Them?"

After trying to attract modly attention to no avail, I'll try it this awkward way. Some digressions in the September reading thread seemed interesting to me and worth a separate thread. To point out those posts and recap: cgsmith posted about a project to read all the Hugo-winning novels and referenced Clifton/Riley's They'd Rather Be Right. I replied and @Victoria Silverwolf described her history. In passing, I'd mentioned the Potter thing and @Anushka Mokosh mentioned the nominees of that year, which I amplified. (Posts #72-#76). @j d worthington added a thought. Finally, @AndrewT wondered about the nominees being better than the winners, VS provided a link to the Hugo list and gave her opinions, and I added mine. (Posts #90-92).

Anybody else care to share their reading history from the lists (here's the Nebula list) and what they thought of winners (favorites, least favorites), nominees, winners relative to nominees, the overall eras of the awards, major omissions or anything like what we were talking about on the September thread?

 

[J-Sun]

In the September thread, I covered the Hugos but VS brought up the Nebulas, which I didn't cover. So, FWIW, here they go:

1966-1999

I've read all but Le Guin's Tehanu (1991), which is a fourth Earthsea book when I'd already read and didn't like the first three and McIntyre's The Moon and the Sun (1998) when I'd already read and didn't like her double-winning Dreamsnake (though I did love her story "Aztecs" and the expansion of it is in the Pile). I've never gotten along with the Nebulas even as well as the Hugos and I could list many more mild quibbles but will stick to fairly strong disagreements.

1967: Heinlein's The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress over Delany's Babel-17 (not bad, but not his best) and Keyes' Flowers for Algernon (I love the story but think the novel is a weaker version).

1969: Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep over Panshin's Rite of Passage. The Panshin isn't bad but just massively meh.

1979: As with the Hugos, Cherryh's Kesrith doesn't really stand alone, but I'd still pick it over Dreamsnake.

Only three problems out of sixteen so far, so not bad. But...

1982: Radix is in the Pile and I sure hope it tops Wolfe.

1983: Asimov's Foundation's Edge over No Enemy But Time. Yes, I'm hopelessly biased but Asimov's first two "comeback" novels get unfairly lumped in with the rest of the late novels when they are actually very good and, while Bishop can certainly do good stuff, I wasn't especially impressed with No Enemy.

1984: Perhaps the crime of the Nebulas thus far: Spinrad's The Void Captain's Tale is light years beyond Startide Rising. What's so weird is that, for once, I love a quintessentially Nebula-like novel and it loses to a quintessentially Hugo-like novel.

As with the Hugos, while some wobbling had started by the late 70s, the Card double symbolizes a major stage in the collapse. 1986 is a toss-up between Bear's Blood Music over Ender's Game (like the Hugos) and Schismatrix (which wasn't even a Hugo finalist). 1987 is Count Zero over Speaker for the Dead. And it continues from there - 1988, 1989, and 1990 all have better nominees than winners and 1991 has a better book that wasn't even a finalist and from there on, with an exception or two, almost everything is disagreement which becomes pointless to detail.

2000-current

I've read very little from the nominee lists and those are noted below, along with stuff in the Pile.

Winners

• Haldeman - Camouflage (because I like Haldeman and this sounded cool - of the noms, I've only read Polaris and both are good books I enjoyed but neither scream "Award Winner!")
• McDevitt - Seeker (because I like the Benedict series - this one is also good and doesn't seem to require an award but I read no other noms so can't compare)
• Leckie - Ancillary Justice (because misleading internet reviews got me to buy this - I read it, strongly disliked it, and watched in horror and amazement as it proceeded to rack up more awards than Neuromancer; again read no other noms from its year)

In the Pile

Butler - Parable of the Talents

Nominees

MacLeod - The Cassini Division (eh, okay, I guess)
Vinge - A Deepness in the Sky (excellent, award-worthy)
Carver - Eternity's End (not very good)
Emshwiller - The Mount (love her short fiction; not this)
McDevitt - Polaris (good)
McDevitt - Echo (good)
McDevitt - Firebird (good)

In the Pile

Landis - Mars Crossing
Buckell - Ragamuffin
Nagata - The Red: First Light

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

I think I have read all the Nebula winners from the start (1966) to 1982. I have certainly not read all the runners-up, but I'll offer some comments anyway.

It's hard to argue with Dune, but I am crazy mad in love with The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (much more so than Dr. Bloodmoney), so I'd lean in PKD's direction.

As much as I admire Delany, I'm not sure Babel-17 should have shared the glory with Flowers for Algernon.

I might have gone with Thorns (the first "mature" Silverberg novel, in my not-so-humble opinion.)

Rite of Passage underwhelmed me; Heinlein pastiche. I have often said that Stand on Zanzibar is my favorite SF novel (best? No, but favorite) so I'll give it the honor.

Maybe The Lathe of Heaven by just a hair.

As I said in my Hugo comments, either Silverberg over the Asimov.

It's also hard to argue with The Forever War, but there's a special place in my heart for The Female Man.

As I said with the Hugo, On Wings of Song is a masterpiece.

Beyond this point, I can only comment on those few winners I have read compared to those few runners-up I have read.

All four volumes of Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun are brilliant.

I really liked Startide Rising.

Can't argue with Neuromancer.

As with the Hugo, Blood Music over Ender's Game.

I didn't care for Doomsday Book, but I have not read any of the other contenders.

I liked Red Mars and Parable of the Talents.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

MacLeod - The Cassini Division (eh, okay, I guess)

Meh. I have it on the shelf. I doubt I'll ever re-read it.

 

[J-Sun]

It's hard to argue with Dune, but I am crazy mad in love with The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (much more so than Dr. Bloodmoney), so I'd lean in PKD's direction.
...
Maybe The Lathe of Heaven by just a hair.

These were a couple of the ones right on the bubble of mentioning for me. It is so hard to argue with Dune that I didn't feel like it but I agree: Three Stigmata could easily win (also agree relative to Dr. Bloodmoney - I actually mildly disliked that one and would give it to Dune easily between those two).

Meh. I have it on the shelf. I doubt I'll ever re-read it.

It was the first book published in the US despite not being the first book in the series, so I thought that might not be fair and I'd give it a re-read in order if I ever get around to reading the first one(s). But I don't think I'd re-read it otherwise, just based on itself, either.

I think I have read all the Nebula winners from the start (1966) to 1982. I have certainly not read all the runners-up, but I'll offer some comments anyway.

Oh yeah - in case I gave a misleading impression, when I said I'd read "all," I meant all winners and I only comment when I have read some stronger nominee than winner (or some un-nominated work that springs to mind). I've read a bunch of nominees but nowhere near all of those.

 

[olc]

I've read all the Hugo winners (novels) but two (you can probably guess which 2 - hint you need to read one non-winner first).

It is a great to-read list if you are looking for great books to read. That said, I have lost some enthusiasm for the winners in the last few years. This year’s controversies did not help.

The list includes many of what I would consider the best SciFi available plus some very good ones (plus a few not so good).

 

[J-Sun]

I've read all the Hugo winners (novels) but two (you can probably guess which 2 - hint you need to read one non-winner first).

I guess that's Brin because of Sundiver.

It is a great to-read list if you are looking for great books to read. That said, I have lost some enthusiasm for the winners in the last few years.

That's exactly what I think and miss: it used to be a required reading list that didn't feel "required" at all because it was so enjoyable and now it feels pretty purely arbitrary and not very enjoyable at all.

Nagata - The Red: First Light

Digression, just to update: I've now read this 2014 nominee (self-published by an established author in 2013; pro-published in 2015) which was opposite Leckie. For a good chunk of this book, I was loving it: Lt. James Shelley gives a funny anti-defense contractor speech to a newly arrived squadmate and we receive an amazingly realistic portrayal of future counter-insurgency war in Africa. Things don't always go well and the LT ends up getting increasingly cyborged despite the little voice in his head (PoI fans will recognize the "analog interface") that makes one of his squadmates think he's divinely protected. However, the novel kind of loses its way with the later terrorism angle which gets a little under-realized and melodramatic and I actually got distracted from it because I had to read a different book quickly to see if I wanted to buy others at the used store. I ended up finishing it with no problems and it was still pretty good but I'll probably only pick up the sequel if I find it used rather than buying it new as I did this one. (Tired of series, anyway.) (Totally irrelevant, but I hate these stupid "Saga Press" books which are oversized not-entirely-mass-market-paperbacks which charge you an extra buck for nothing but a lot of whitespace in oversized margins.) Anyway - all this aside, I liked it a lot better than Leckie.

If anyone's interested, Nagata's free online story, "Codename: Delphi" is a short about a remote "handler" who "meets" Shelley in the course of the story and covers her point of view while the novel is about Shelley and Delphi is only referenced a few times but it gives something of the feel and style of the book - it and "Light and Shadow" made me buy the book anyway.

 

[olc]

I guess that's Brin because of Sundiver.

It fits but no. Startide Rising is great and The Uplift War is very good (I haven't read Sundiver). I think they work as stand alones though.
Startide Rising is a good example of (me) using the list for a to-read list. I saw the book at the book store for years wondering if it was about flipper. Finally I read it because it was a hugo winner.