tentative Hugo nominees
Mar. 5th, 2021 11:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
psocopteraLots of blathering on, so it's all behind a cut.
NOVEL: Ok, so here's every 2020 novel I read that also got a "rec" tag when I wrote about it: Paladin's Grace, Deathless Divide, Empire of Gold, Network Effect, Return of the Thief, Harrow the Ninth, Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking (might be a novella?), Elatsoe, Bonds of Brass, Deadly Education, Storm the Earth, Burning God. And looking at that list, I'm not really excited about *any* of them for best novel. Some just weren't that good. Some of that is my general preference to nominate standalone or book-one novels... like, I really liked Network Effect, but it's also a book five. Harrow and Deadly Education were fun and I'm super hooked on their series, but best novel? really? One of my vague mental criteria for best novel is that I usually try to nominate or vote for things I'm genuinely excited about recommending pretty broadly, and I don't feel like they're quite there. So, I don't know. If I really think the best books of 2020 are not on this list, the logical thing to do would be to not nominate anything and hope to discover them from the eventual list of nominees. And yet I'd rather a slot go to Network Effect than, like, 88 Names or something. (I don't think there's actually much danger of that, I have picked 88 Names as a book I feel comfortable being mean about.) So... blah.
NOVELLA: Drowned Country, Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water, Empress of Salt and Fortune, Ring Shout, Seven of Infinities. I'm waiting on Four Profound Weaves and Flyaway from the library; if I get either in time to read them before nominations close and like them too, I guess I'll have to actually pick a top five. Real contrast to the novel category here. :/
NOVELETTE: I definitely want to nominate these three: An Important Failure, Rebecca Campbell, Clarkesworld.
How Quini the Squid Misplaced His Klobučar, Rich Larson, Tor.com.
A Stick of Clay, in the Hands of God, is Infinite Potential, JY Neon Yang, Clarkesworld.
And then two of: I Sexually Identify as an Attack Helicopter, Isabel Fall, Clarkesworld.
Exile's End, Carolyn Ives Gilman, Tor.com.
The Immolation of Kev Magee, L.X. Beckett, Clarkesworld.
My Sister's Wings Are Red, Christine Tyler, Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
Probably the Fall and the Gilman? The Gilman was memorable and difficult. The Fall is controversial - Fall asked Clarkesworld to pull it after backlash - and I worry that further attention to it would be unwelcome to her. Although she can always decline the nomination in that case.
SHORT STORY: Definitely: The Mermaid Astronaut, Yoon Ha Lee, Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
The Translator, at Low Tide, Vajra Chandrasekera, Clarkesworld.
Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse, Rae Carson, Uncanny.
And then two of: Custom Options Available, Amy Griswold, Fireside.
68:Hazard:Cold, Janelle C. Shane, Strange Horizons.
Never a Butterfly, Nor a Moth With Moon-Painted Wings, Aimee Ogden, Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
AirBody, Sameem Siddiqui, Clarkesworld.
My Country is a Ghost, Eugenia Triantafyllou, Uncanny.
Thank You For Your Patience, Rebecca Campbell, Reckoning.
Or possibly others, I'm still reading stuff from the spreadsheet, and at some point I need to decide if I'm going to try to tackle the New Decameron or what.
SERIES: Queen's Thief! Maybe also Daevabad and Poppy War.
RELATED: So, I feel like Mars Challenge, as a work of graphic nonfiction, would actually be a better Related than a Graphic, the category of which is actually called Graphic STORY and seems to me to be intended to be a fiction category, while Related is format-neutral (if videos, why not comics?). But someone has put it on the spreadsheet as a Graphic and not as a Related, so this is clearly not a universal conclusion.
GRAPHIC STORY: See above about Mars Challenge! I really, really want this to be the year for O Human Star. I had not been thinking of Magic Fish as SFF, but someone put it on Renay's spreadsheet, so clearly *they* thought it was. Witchlight has a prior edition but maybe could get obscurity-ruled 2020 eligible? But is not on the spreadsheet so nobody else thinks so? Anyways, I might as well nominate all of them, we all know the actual nominees are going to be Monstress 5, Die 2, and maybe some franchise/cape stuff. What's Vaughan been up to lately. Oh, wait, looking at the spreadsheet, looks like there was a Parable of the Sower graphic adaptation, Ryan North adapted Slaughterhouse Five, and Jemisin's writing something for DC. Well, that should be a nice ballot.
DRAMATIC LONG: Wolfwalkers and Old Guard. I haven't seen a lot of movies recently.
DRAMATIC SHORT: Hm, I see on the spreadsheet that someone's going for the "Save the Cat" and "Heart" episodes of She-Ra and the "Agony of a Witch" episode of Owl House. And the "I Am My Monster" episode of Steven Universe Future. I feel like all of these represent my TV interests pretty well and I might as well go ahead and back them.
ART: deferring this, separate post
ASTOUNDING: Emily Tesh
LODESTAR: Elatsoe, Return of the Thief, maybe Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking.
NOVEL: Ok, so here's every 2020 novel I read that also got a "rec" tag when I wrote about it: Paladin's Grace, Deathless Divide, Empire of Gold, Network Effect, Return of the Thief, Harrow the Ninth, Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking (might be a novella?), Elatsoe, Bonds of Brass, Deadly Education, Storm the Earth, Burning God. And looking at that list, I'm not really excited about *any* of them for best novel. Some just weren't that good. Some of that is my general preference to nominate standalone or book-one novels... like, I really liked Network Effect, but it's also a book five. Harrow and Deadly Education were fun and I'm super hooked on their series, but best novel? really? One of my vague mental criteria for best novel is that I usually try to nominate or vote for things I'm genuinely excited about recommending pretty broadly, and I don't feel like they're quite there. So, I don't know. If I really think the best books of 2020 are not on this list, the logical thing to do would be to not nominate anything and hope to discover them from the eventual list of nominees. And yet I'd rather a slot go to Network Effect than, like, 88 Names or something. (I don't think there's actually much danger of that, I have picked 88 Names as a book I feel comfortable being mean about.) So... blah.
NOVELLA: Drowned Country, Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water, Empress of Salt and Fortune, Ring Shout, Seven of Infinities. I'm waiting on Four Profound Weaves and Flyaway from the library; if I get either in time to read them before nominations close and like them too, I guess I'll have to actually pick a top five. Real contrast to the novel category here. :/
NOVELETTE: I definitely want to nominate these three: An Important Failure, Rebecca Campbell, Clarkesworld.
How Quini the Squid Misplaced His Klobučar, Rich Larson, Tor.com.
A Stick of Clay, in the Hands of God, is Infinite Potential, JY Neon Yang, Clarkesworld.
And then two of: I Sexually Identify as an Attack Helicopter, Isabel Fall, Clarkesworld.
Exile's End, Carolyn Ives Gilman, Tor.com.
The Immolation of Kev Magee, L.X. Beckett, Clarkesworld.
My Sister's Wings Are Red, Christine Tyler, Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
Probably the Fall and the Gilman? The Gilman was memorable and difficult. The Fall is controversial - Fall asked Clarkesworld to pull it after backlash - and I worry that further attention to it would be unwelcome to her. Although she can always decline the nomination in that case.
SHORT STORY: Definitely: The Mermaid Astronaut, Yoon Ha Lee, Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
The Translator, at Low Tide, Vajra Chandrasekera, Clarkesworld.
Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse, Rae Carson, Uncanny.
And then two of: Custom Options Available, Amy Griswold, Fireside.
68:Hazard:Cold, Janelle C. Shane, Strange Horizons.
Never a Butterfly, Nor a Moth With Moon-Painted Wings, Aimee Ogden, Beneath Ceaseless Skies.
AirBody, Sameem Siddiqui, Clarkesworld.
My Country is a Ghost, Eugenia Triantafyllou, Uncanny.
Thank You For Your Patience, Rebecca Campbell, Reckoning.
Or possibly others, I'm still reading stuff from the spreadsheet, and at some point I need to decide if I'm going to try to tackle the New Decameron or what.
SERIES: Queen's Thief! Maybe also Daevabad and Poppy War.
RELATED: So, I feel like Mars Challenge, as a work of graphic nonfiction, would actually be a better Related than a Graphic, the category of which is actually called Graphic STORY and seems to me to be intended to be a fiction category, while Related is format-neutral (if videos, why not comics?). But someone has put it on the spreadsheet as a Graphic and not as a Related, so this is clearly not a universal conclusion.
GRAPHIC STORY: See above about Mars Challenge! I really, really want this to be the year for O Human Star. I had not been thinking of Magic Fish as SFF, but someone put it on Renay's spreadsheet, so clearly *they* thought it was. Witchlight has a prior edition but maybe could get obscurity-ruled 2020 eligible? But is not on the spreadsheet so nobody else thinks so? Anyways, I might as well nominate all of them, we all know the actual nominees are going to be Monstress 5, Die 2, and maybe some franchise/cape stuff. What's Vaughan been up to lately. Oh, wait, looking at the spreadsheet, looks like there was a Parable of the Sower graphic adaptation, Ryan North adapted Slaughterhouse Five, and Jemisin's writing something for DC. Well, that should be a nice ballot.
DRAMATIC LONG: Wolfwalkers and Old Guard. I haven't seen a lot of movies recently.
DRAMATIC SHORT: Hm, I see on the spreadsheet that someone's going for the "Save the Cat" and "Heart" episodes of She-Ra and the "Agony of a Witch" episode of Owl House. And the "I Am My Monster" episode of Steven Universe Future. I feel like all of these represent my TV interests pretty well and I might as well go ahead and back them.
ART: deferring this, separate post
ASTOUNDING: Emily Tesh
LODESTAR: Elatsoe, Return of the Thief, maybe Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-07 10:29 pm (UTC)...as did all three seasons of Kipo apparently. (Maybe i should stop posting comments until i actually make it through my "tv watched in 2020" list, but where's the fun in that?
...also (i promise i'm really done after this, at least with TV) the last few episodes of The Good Place s4 seem to have aired in 2020 rather than 2019.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-08 01:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-03-10 04:40 am (UTC)