Hugo winners you didn't like

[Cathbad]

Dune. Tried reading it years ago and couldn't finish it.

I couldn't either, the first time. After some prodding by friends, I forced my way through it.

It's a novel that must be read in its entirety to be appreciated. I was not disappointed - it was an excellent space opera.

 

[psikeyhackr]

For me it has to be Speaker For the Dead by Orson Scott Card. I read this before his whole anti-gay stance and whatnot. After Ender's Game this one was a huge let down for me.

The other is Forever Peace by Joe Haldeman. I really wanted to like this book, but it never captured me the way Forever War did.

Yeah, I never finished Forever Peace.

I read all of Speaker but could never see why so many people liked it so much.

Man in the High Castle - Philip K. Dick. I don't really "get" it.

And that beat A Fall of Moondust!

 

[picklematrix]

Dune didnt quite do it for me either. Decent read i suppose.
I like man in high castle, but ive met far more people who prefer other Dick books. A lot of them have become pillars of pop culture to a greater extent.

 

[psikeyhackr]

Dune didnt quite do it for me either. Decent read i suppose.
I like man in high castle, but ive met far more people who prefer other Dick books. A lot of them have become pillars of pop culture to a greater extent.

It is as though we need a study of the psychology of books and reading. What is the relationship between personality and liking versus disliking certain books. I liked Dune, probably read it 3 times, but The Mote in God's Eye is better in my opinion though I doubt that most Dune fans agree. I bet most have not read it and would not consider it.

I wonder how we would even collect data to do an analysis. Have people specify their 5 best and worst books, then do a Minnesota Multiphasic?

Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)

LOL

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Well, if it helps at all, I also liked The Mote in God's Eye better than Dune.

I have taken the MMPI thing. I test very low on all forms of psychopathology (hypochondria, paranoia, and so on) except for a tendency toward depression and EXTREME social introversion. I also test exactly halfway between masculine and feminine.

On the Meyer-Briggs Type Indicator test, which I have taken more than once, I always come out as an INTJ.

Myers–Briggs Type Indicator - Wikipedia

INTJ - Wikipedia

I am 100% Introvert and 0% Extravert. My other scores are not so extreme, although I do lean toward Intuition over Sensation, Thinking over Feeling, and Judging over Perception.

Five best Hugo-winning novels (of the ones I have read, obviously):

The Demolished Man

A Canticle for Leibowitz

Stand on Zanzibar

Rendezvous with Rama

Startide Rising

(I hate to leave out The Forever War and Neuromancer, but that's the best I can do.)

Five worst Hugo-winning novels (and let me add that hardly any of these are really bad):

They'd Rather Be Right

Foundation's Edge

Ender's Game

Speaker for the Dead

Doomsday Book

Does all this information tell you anything about me?

 

[picklematrix]

It is as though we need a study of the psychology of books and reading. What is the relationship between personality and liking versus disliking certain books. I liked Dune, probably read it 3 times, but The Mote in God's Eye is better in my opinion though I doubt that most Dune fans agree. I bet most have not read it and would not consider it.

I wonder how we would even collect data to do an analysis. Have people specify their 5 best and worst books, then do a Minnesota Multiphasic?

Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)

LOL

I probably would have liked Dune a lot more if i had read it earlier in life, but i read it only a few years ago, so some of the ideas and tropes were already old hat by that point.

 

[Parson]

@Victoria Silverwolf, I don't think that your scores and the books you like have any real equivalency, but your scores probably do indicate why you like books so much. Pastors/preachers who most would think would be predominately extroverts and entrepreneurs, however the majority are introverts, and do not do well in situations like planting churches where entrepreneurship is a very large asset.

 

[williamjm]

I really didn't like Ringworld when I read it a couple of years ago. It has some interesting ideas, but I disliked the characterisation and didn't find the story compelling.

To Your Scattered Bodies Go is another example which has a fantastic premise but I felt the potential of the story was squandered and Farmer seemed more interested in squeezing as many historical characters into the book than telling a story.

I think I've liked all the other Best Novel winners I've read, even if there are a few I wouldn't give an award to (much as I liked Bujold, The Vor Game is one of her lesser works).

I haven't gone through the shorter fiction categories, but one I remember hating was Tomas Olde Huvelt's The World Turned Upside Down which essentially won by default a few years back due to being the only nominee not from the Rabid Puppies. It's a story where I'm honestly not sure if it was meant to be serious, or if it was a comedy that failed to be funny.

 

[kythe]

I probably should add another Hugo nominee to my list of books I didn't like: Ringworld Engineers by Larry Niven.

I really liked Ringworld. It has excellent world-building for a unique and intriguing idea. But I think Ringworld Engineers is going the direction of Xenocide by OSC - which is boring. I've been "reading" Ringworld Engineers for a few months now and am only halfway through because I keep putting it down in favor of other material. It starts off well, attempting to correct some of the scientific errors in Ringworld. But the story plods along at such a slow pace this book no longer has anything going for it.

 

[psikeyhackr]

I really didn't like Ringworld when I read it a couple of years ago. It has some interesting ideas, but I disliked the characterisation and didn't find the story compelling.

Ringworld was really impressive in 1970. The Ringworld totally overpowered the characters. Now it's old hat. Damn, almost 50 years.

That is the one I bought.

 

[williamjm]

Ringworld was really impressive in 1970. The Ringworld totally overpowered the characters. Now it's old hat. Damn, almost 50 years.
View attachment 46079
That is the one I bought.

I think if I'd read it before having read some of the later novels which build upon its ideas (like the Culture books), I'd probably have been more impressed with it. As it is, I can appreciate its importance in the history of the genre but that doesn't make me enjoy reading it.

 

[psikeyhackr]

I think if I'd read it before having read some of the later novels which build upon its ideas (like the Culture books), I'd probably have been more impressed with it. As it is, I can appreciate its importance in the history of the genre but that doesn't make me enjoy reading it.

Yeah, you young whippersnappers have no concept of AWESOME!

 

[SilentRoamer]

...although I loved the Kim Stanley Robinson Mars trilogy, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (sorry, SilentRoamer),

No apologies necessary - variety is the spice of life as they say. It's hard for me to place why I don't like the style, I do like sometimes dense or poetic prose, I guess it just feels a bit tedious - which has always been one of my criticisms of the sort of style it is based on.

Not necessarily in this instance but I always find it odd when someone whose reading tastes I know very well doesn't like a book I expect them to like or vice versa, it rarely happens with films in the same way as I don't think they tend to garner the same strength of reaction (I expect this is due to the effort involved).

...best Hugo-winning novels (of the ones I have read, obviously):

Stand on Zanzibar

I have Stand on Zanzibar on my shelf and the blurb has really drawn me to it. I think I'm going to try and read it this year, it just looks really different and I love novels that are like that. I haven't seen it mentioned before so thought it was worth a comment.

Ringworld was really impressive in 1970. The Ringworld totally overpowered the characters. Now it's old hat. Damn, almost 50 years.
View attachment 46079
That is the one I bought.

I read Ringworld in the last few months for the first time and I think the Ring itself was a fantastic concept and I really liked how it was all left mysterious. I think it was one of those books where the characters are secondary to the Big Idea, I can see where criticisms of characterization might come in but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

[psikeyhackr]

I read Ringworld in the last few months for the first time and I think the Ring itself was a fantastic concept and I really liked how it was all left mysterious. I think it was one of those books where the characters are secondary to the Big Idea, I can see where criticisms of characterization might come in but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

1970 was so different from now. The Moon landing had just happened rather than being ancient history. Computers were big clunky mainframes in glass rooms and we programmed with punched cards.

No Star Wars! YAY!!

No Harry Potter! Draft lottery for Vietnam.

Are you sure this is still planet Earth? Oh yeah, global warming, we are eliminating planet Earth. Deterraforming!

 

[Matteo]

Some years ago I made a concerted effort to get the Hugo winners and so own and have read all up to 1980 (apart from They'd Rather be Right). I also own 1982-94 but have not read the 86-92 novels and couldn't get through Startide Rising so the latter would be one that I would list as "didn't like" (sorry Victoria - and I liked Doomsday Book, sorry again!). I own and have read the 1996, 97, 99 winners and have read Goblet of Fire and finally own and have read American Gods and Jonathan Strange. I also see that I have quite a few of the nominated books (at least those up until 1980).

It's probably an offense that is almost worthy of finding myself ejected from Chrons but I didn't rate the two Le Guin novels. As I think I've said before somewhere here, I found it difficult to swallow that dogs could be so advanced in Fire Upon the Deep (but liked the novel overall). And it took me three attempts over the years to finish Dune but enjoyed it when I did. And I seem to be in the minority by liking Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang.

So, to answer the OP's question; those in bold above.

 

[psikeyhackr]

couldn't get through Startide Rising so the latter would be one that I would list as "didn't like"

Yeah, The Uplift War is way better. It is the only book in the Uplift Series that I suggest to anyone.

 

[Vince W]

There are actually a number of Dramatic Presentation winners that I can't stand. Sleepers. F**K I hate Woody Allen. I don't actually hate 2010, but I can't believe it won over The Last Starfighter. Who Framed Roger Rabbit? WTF? The Truman Show. I hate this film with a passion. Gravity. Terrible film on many levels. And I love Sandra Bullock.

 

[Al Jackson]

They'd Rather Be Right (1954) by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley is notorious as the worst novel to ever win a Hugo. It's also probably the least read. I managed to track down a copy, and it's not very good at all.

It's all about a god-like computer that can make you perfect in every way, including immortality, but only if you give up your prejudices and accept that it is right and you are wrong. I don't like the theme (which brings echoes of every cult to mind) and the story isn't very interesting.

I've read all the Hugo winning novels from the first (The Demolished Man) to 1981 (The Snow Queen) and didn't dislike any of them. After skipping a couple of years, I didn't dislike any until I got to Ender's Game, which I thought was overrated at best. I have read very few since then, although I loved the Kim Stanley Robinson Mars trilogy, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (sorry, SilentRoamer), and The Three-Body Problem. I'd agree that The Doomsday Book is overrated.

Had not looked it up for a long time , in 1954, there was Caves of Steel by Asimov, I Am Legend by Richard Matheson , Martian's Go Home by Fred Brown, A Mirror for Observers by Edgar Panborn.
(Pangborn, boy, there is an unjustly unknown fine SF writer.)
Gad! It's a bit boggling that They'd Rather be Right is trumped any of these novels.
I am Legend is the best novel that Matheson ever wrote (with three is it four? movies , only one of which approximated the novel, the others are wrong headed rejigging a great story.)
Caves of Steel is Asimov's best ROBOT novel , people should read it.
A Mirror for Observers occurs on best SF of all time lists , I am sure most , these days, have never heard of it!!
You know , on that list, the one novel that sticks with me all the time is Martians Go Home. This is the damnedest crazy story about an alien invasion I know of. The Martians invade , in a teleportation kind of way, all they do is annoy everyone! They vanish as mysteriously as came. I have never read another SF novel like this , goofy and funny it is a gem.

Boy that Hugo was a sows ear among a pile of pearls.

 

[Al Jackson]

There are actually a number of Dramatic Presentation winners that I can't stand. Sleepers. F**K I hate Woody Allen. I don't actually hate 2010, but I can't believe it won over The Last Starfighter. Who Framed Roger Rabbit? WTF? The Truman Show. I hate this film with a passion. Gravity. Terrible film on many levels. And I love Sandra Bullock.

Last Starfighter is an unusual film caught a lot of fancy because of the 'gaming' framing, but for a sort-of-young adult movie it had an intelligent screenplay , Robert Preston (doing a kind of Music Man thing was outstanding) , also Dan O'Herlihy under a lot of prosthetics. Story was a little too thin for me. I thought 2010 was better. (Funny thing about that film it was offered to Kubrick , who did read the novel, but told Clarke that he had made the Monolith Makers into Cosmic Diddlers , which he didn't like, but Kubrick would have not done it anyway, not his style).

Gravity is a good alternate universe story. Putting it on a parallel world line takes care of a lot of improbable physics. The story is crisp and straight forward. A problem solving story. I loved it. Some of the best zero g I have ever seen, attention to the no-sound in a vacuum , some details they got right are understated , like fire in free fall, and Soyuz cockpit is exact. I saw it 5 times when it came out. Best use of 3D I know of after Avatar.

 

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Looking over the Dramatic Presentation winners, I note that I have seen all of those listed from the start to 1988. There aren't any I actively dislike, although I might quibble over some of them. The Twilight Zone winning three times in a row is a bit much. I probably would have picked Soylent Green over Sleeper and Phantom of the Paradise over Young Frankenstein. What really alarms me, however, is the fact that "No Award" was chosen a few times, when very good films like The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Night of the Eagle AKA Burn Witch Burn, Colossus: The Forbin Project, and The Man Who Fell to Earth were nominated.