Aaron's 2011 Hugo Recommendations :: Best Novel

Hugo nominations are due in just a week, so it's past time to list my favorite SF/F of 2010, starting with best novel. These are the five novels I'm planning to nominate:

Paolo Bacigalupi, Ship Breaker
Aliette de Bodard, Servant of the Underworld
Guy Gavriel Kay, Under Heaven
Nnedi Okorafor, Who Fears Death
Catherynne M. Valente, The Habitation of the Blessed

I expect the Bacigalupi novel to make the final ballot, and I think the others all have at least a chance at nomination, except perhaps Servant of the Underworld. (If de Bodard is nominated this year, it will be for one of her outstanding pieces of short fiction.)

As usual when selecting novels to nominate for the Hugo, I am dismayed to realize how many books from last year by some of my favorite authors I've yet to read. If I could stop time and read everything I'd like to before the nominating deadline, these are the ones I think would be most likely to elbow their way onto my list:

Iain M. Banks, Surface Detail
Greg Egan, Zendegi
Ian McDonald, The Dervish House
China Miéville, Kraken
Connie Willis, Blackout/All Clear

Whether you agree with any of my choices or not, I hope you find time to nominate by next week.

Aaron's Top Five Neglected Stories

Jeff VanderMeer asks: What are your top five underrated short stories of all time? This naturally had me looking through my list of favorite stories, where I spotted eight that had not received major award nominations or similar accolades. Two were by the same author, so I culled out one of those, then I dropped the two stories that were later expaned into novels to get my list:

Walter M. Miller, Jr. - Crucifixus Etiam (1953) Most of my favorites from the Golden Age are on the usual suspects list, "Flowers for Algernon," "The Star," etc., but "Crucifixus Etiam" has been largely forgotten. In a way, that's appropriate; the story is about brave pioneers whose heroic efforts will surely be forgotten by the later generations who benefit from them.

Orson Scott Card - Holy (1980) Card is known for Ender's Game and sequels, but much of his best work is in his early short fiction. Some of his best short stories were well received at the time, such as "Unaccompanied Sonata" and "Lost Boys," but "Holy," from Robert Silverberg's New Dimensions series of anthologies, was almost entirely ignored. Card must have written it on a dare -- the story is about a man trying to get to a particular rock to smear human feces on it, and by the end Card actually has you caring about whether that happens.

Connie Willis - Chance (1986) For all the awards Connie Willis has won, "Chance" somehow slipped through the cracks, but it's one of her very best, emotionally powerful albeit not as funny as, say, "Even the Queen."

Greg Egan - The Moral Virologist (1990) Originally published in Pulphouse: The Hardback Magazine, this is a great thought experiment story. What if you tailored a virus to kill people who commit adultery?

Susan Palwick - Sorrel's Heart (2007) This is one of my favorites of this century, from Palwick's collection The Fate of Mice. It didn't get the attention it deserved, although Jonathan Strahan picked it up for his year's best anthology.

Aaron's Story Recommendation of the Week :: Crystal Nights by Greg Egan

My story recommendation of the week is "Crystal Nights" by Greg Egan, a novelette from the April 2008 issue of Interzone.

From what I have read recently, I am not sure that Interzone is quite as strong overall as it was a few years back. Still, the occasional presence of Greg Egan, the leading hard science fiction author of this age, is more than enough reason to keep an eye on the magazine.

"Crystal Nights" is a modern updating of Theodore Sturgeon's "Microcosmic God." A very wealthy man corners the market on an advanced form of crystallized processor, which allows computations at such tremendous speeds that he believes he can use it to evolve artificial intelligence through an electronic version of natural selection. Hopefully it is not too much of a spoiler to say that after some false starts the system succeeds, but the resulting digital beings are not as deferential to their creator as he might wish.

"Crystal Nights" examines moral issues surrounding the creation of artificial intelligence -- for example, is it all right to alter or erase a computer program that is showing signs of becoming self-aware? -- issues that may not be so far in the future as you think. By drawing his title from the terrible persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany, Egan lets us know that he does not regard these as trivial concerns.

Aaron's Take on the 2008 Hugo Nominees :: NOVELETTES

As is often the case, the novelette nominees strike me as the best of the short fiction Hugo categories. All five of the stories are very good, and I find three of them particularly strong.

The two I would rate a half-notch below the others are Dark Integers by Greg Egan, which is a sequel to Luminous and to my tastes too much of a retread of the earlier story, and Finisterra by David Moles, which has some terrific SFnal scenery but does not come together quite as well as the top stories in this category.

I only wish the remaining three novelettes could all tie and share the Hugo, for they are all award-caliber tales. Two of the stories are rather similar, The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate by Ted Chiang and The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairytale of Economics by Daniel Abraham, both of which have the feel of fantasy but are so rigorously developed as arguably to qualify as science fiction. Ted Chiang has long been noted as an author who writes very well even if he does not write very much; meanwhile, with his terrific series The Long Price Quartert, Daniel Abraham has emerged as one of the best fantasists in the business. Both tales make for thought-provoking reading, and even if you have a sense where the stories are going it is great fun watching these two outstanding authors get there.

It is a close call, but my favorite of the novelette nominees is Glory by Greg Egan. This is far-future hard SF as only Egan can do it, combining interesting hard science speculations, including a method of interstellar travel I’ve never seen before in the first two pages, with thought-provoking human issues. After several years away from the field, Glory is a wonderful return to form for Greg Egan.

Aaron's Ballot:
1. Greg Egan – Glory
2. Ted Chiang – The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate
3. Daniel Abraham – The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairytale of Economics
4. David Moles – Finisterra
5. Greg Egan – Dark Integers

Aaron's Hugo Recommendations :: Novelette

FIVE FAVORITE NOVELETTES OF 2007:
John Barnes, “Rod Rapid and His Electric Chair” (Helix, Winter ’07)
Ted Chiang, “The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate” (F&SF, Sept. ’07)
Greg Egan, “Glory” (The New Space Opera)
Mike Resnick & Nancy Kress, “Solomon's Choice” (Fast Forward 1)
Rachel Swirsky, “The Debt of the Innocent” (Glorifying Terrorism)

OTHER VERY GOOD NOVELETTES FROM 2007:
Daniel Abraham, “The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics” (Logorrhea)
Keith Brooke, “The Accord” (The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction)
Paul Di Filippo, “Wikiworld” (Fast Forward 1)
Hal Duncan, “The Whenever at the City's Heart” (Interzone, April ’07)
Jeffrey Thomas, “In His Sights” (The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction)
Harry Turtledove, “News from the Front” (Asimov's, June ’07)
Robert Charles Wilson, “YFL-500” (Fast Forward 1)

NOTES:
As with the short stories, I will update this if I encounter other worthy pieces this month, and I welcome other suggestions.

Unlike the novella and short story categories, there was no single novelette that was a clear favorite for me. Forced to pick one, I would probably go with “Glory” by Greg Egan, far-future SF as only Egan can do it, combining interesting hard science speculations (including a method of interstellar travel I’ve never seen before in the first two pages) with thought-provoking human issues. I have always been a big Greg Egan fan, and of the three stories of his I read last year (I never saw a fourth, from the magazine Foundation), this was my favorite.

Incidentally, anthologies generally don’t identify whether a piece is a short story, novelette, or novella, and it’s not always easy to tell. Apologies if I mislabeled any of these.