2019 Campbell NotaHugo
Jun. 19th, 2019 11:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psocopteraThoughts/ballot/predictions behind the cut.
So, four of these people were on the ballot last year and lost to Roanhorse; I had thought Solomon might win, or possibly Arden, but Solomon didn't do particularly well and Arden did worse, so shows what I know I guess. (You can look back at those results here, or see my ballot from last year here.)
Relevant reading I've done since that ballot: here's me talking about book two and book three of Arden's trilogy, book one and book two of Chakraborty's trilogy, and I just wrote up thoughts on book one of Kuang's trilogy a few minutes ago. Prasad published one new short story, "Pistol Grip", which I did not particularly like, certainly not as compared with "Series of Steaks" and "Fandom for Robots", alas. Ng published one new short story (in the anthology Not So Stories, a reaction to Kipling's Just So Stories) about the history of Hong Kong that didn't grab me either.
I would be happy to see any of Kuang, Arden, or Chakraborty win, but I think Kuang is going to take it. Chakraborty's first book was enough of a slog in parts that it may have lost some of its audience before they could get to book two, and if Bear and the Nightingale wasn't enough to get people excited about Arden last year, I don't think the rest of the trilogy is going to get her much further. Kuang has a big new exciting book and I think Prasad and Ng can't help but feel like last year's news in comparison. Solomon might have gotten a boost if The Deep had come out (even though it wouldn't have been a 2018 work) but it's not out till November.
It pains me to have to rank one of my top three as low as third, but here's my ballot:
1 - RF Kuang
2 - Katherine Arden
3 - SA Chakraborty
4 - Vina Jie-Min Prasad
5 - Jeannette Ng
6 - Rivers Solomon
So, four of these people were on the ballot last year and lost to Roanhorse; I had thought Solomon might win, or possibly Arden, but Solomon didn't do particularly well and Arden did worse, so shows what I know I guess. (You can look back at those results here, or see my ballot from last year here.)
Relevant reading I've done since that ballot: here's me talking about book two and book three of Arden's trilogy, book one and book two of Chakraborty's trilogy, and I just wrote up thoughts on book one of Kuang's trilogy a few minutes ago. Prasad published one new short story, "Pistol Grip", which I did not particularly like, certainly not as compared with "Series of Steaks" and "Fandom for Robots", alas. Ng published one new short story (in the anthology Not So Stories, a reaction to Kipling's Just So Stories) about the history of Hong Kong that didn't grab me either.
I would be happy to see any of Kuang, Arden, or Chakraborty win, but I think Kuang is going to take it. Chakraborty's first book was enough of a slog in parts that it may have lost some of its audience before they could get to book two, and if Bear and the Nightingale wasn't enough to get people excited about Arden last year, I don't think the rest of the trilogy is going to get her much further. Kuang has a big new exciting book and I think Prasad and Ng can't help but feel like last year's news in comparison. Solomon might have gotten a boost if The Deep had come out (even though it wouldn't have been a 2018 work) but it's not out till November.
It pains me to have to rank one of my top three as low as third, but here's my ballot:
1 - RF Kuang
2 - Katherine Arden
3 - SA Chakraborty
4 - Vina Jie-Min Prasad
5 - Jeannette Ng
6 - Rivers Solomon
