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Nebula Award Winners, Hugo Nominees Announced
CBNobi writes "The 2002 Nebula Award winners have been announced this weekend. The winner for best novel was American Gods by Neil Gaiman (reviewed here at Slashdot), and the winner for best script was LotR:The Fellowship of the Ring. The nominees for the 2003 Hugo Awards have also been announced; Episodes of Enterprise, Firefly, and Buffy are all nominated for best short form dramatic presentation, and LotR and Spirited Away are among the nominees for best long form presentation."
Actually, Ken McLeod wrote Cosmonaut Keep. I haven't read it, but I imagine it can't be too different in political views from his other books like Stone Canal and The Cassini Division, both of which I didn't enjoy. Ian McLeod wrote other stuff, which I've never read.
Go Charlie!
Apart from writing great science fiction Charlie writes the Linux column in the UK's Computer Shopper magazine.
The Nebula Awards are selected by the writers themselves.
The Hugo Awards are awarded by members of that year's World Science Fiction Convention, which this year is Torcon 3 in Toronto.
If you just want to vote without attending the convention, you can buy a supporting membership. It's rather pricey ($40 US), but you get some other perqs. The attending membership is $185 US.
I went to the Chicago Worldcon a few years back. It was a blast! Expensive, but fun.
One relatively new author that I like is Alastair Reynolds. He is a scientist who works for the ESA currently and he is a reasonably good writer too. However, he is British and his books are generally released about a year earlier in the UK than in the US. His first two books "Revalation Space" and "Chasm City" are reasonably easy to find in the US. His third book "Redemption Ark" should be out in June in the US.
Impersonating Tycho from Penny Arcade since before there was a PA.
The "and others" leaves a lot of room but I'll try.
David Drake - Great Military SF.
Jerry Pournelle - But I'm sure he is one of the "others".
John Ringro - I just started on some of his stuff and he is *good*.
Neal Stephenson - Great just plain great.
David Brin, Greg Bear,
Cypherpunks: Civil Liberty Through Complex Mathematics. Those who live by the sword die by the arrow.
I thought it was a brilliant book that demanded a lot and gave a lot back. Also Ghodammned funny.
I'm not sure what you call old scifi. I put in that category authors not because I think their stories looks like watching 2001, but because I grew knowing them so I don't remember when I first read something from them. In that category I put maybe modern writers like Greg Bear, Samuel Delany, Daniel Keyes, John Brunner or Alfred Bester, and all of them have good books.
For a list of what I have in my bookshelf from not "old" writers and I think that are pretty good, I should say:
To my amazement, no-one has mentioned Vernor Vinge yet. His last two novels, _A Fire Upon The Deep_ and _A Deepness In The Sky_ are absolutely superb. They both won both Hugo and Nebula, iirc.
Another author I like is Greg Egan. Try _Diaspora_ and/or _Permutation City_. His ideas are way out there, but always very interesting.
I believe posters are recognized by their sig. So I made one.
First, you should check out the Internet Top 100 SF/Fantasy List, which does contain many of the classics you've read, but also has a lot of newer authors you haven't read. It also usually has a number of classics from authors such as Lem and Strugatsky that you may not know.
I agree with most of the suggestions given in this thread so far. I'd also suggest looking into: "Diaspora", Greg Egan; "A Fire Upon The Deep", Vernor Vinge; The Book of the New Sun series by Gene Wolfe.
It also has a disturbingly complete necrology of recently deceased members of the SF community. It seems like every other headline is "So & so dies," but that's to be expected with all the graying pulp era artists, writers, and fans.
"Prepare for the worst - hope for the best."
One caveat with Stephenson - "Big U" is an interesting attempt to satarize a behemoth of a university, probably his first book. He hadn't developed his amazing chops yet. I worship the man, but I think he'd agree this is not worth the time.
Zodiac was pretty good. Strong narrative, some good characters. You can see the emergence of some geek-friendly themes. It lacks the absolute truckloads of storytelling talent he lavishes on subsequent books, but for many writers this would be their best book ever.
Snow Crash was AMAZING. Has the aforementioned truckloads. Very funny, surprising consistency all the way through. Nothing sacrificed for a laugh, but many of them fit. And a fine backdrop of whimsical neurolinguistic mysticism driving it. Great characters. Absolutely great. Each is hip - or wants to be - in a different way. It's male dominated, but there is a very strong female character that feels real, like the author has actually met a female in person. Even minor characters are fully fleshed out in a few deft strokes.
Diamond Age - AMAZING Very good at pulling heartstrings, fascinating look at nanotach. More of a "realistic" feel than Snow Crash. (Neither good nor bad in itself, but some readers might find S.C. too enjoyable/easy)
Cryptonomicon - awesome. Staggering. (Especially if you have to carry it a long way) This is a more complex narrative, with two sets of characters in two time periods. Amazingly, they fit together and not just at a tangent point. It is rich with historical insight, and it has tons of stuff for those who get a hard-on for computer security.
On a side note - I may have spotted him at Norwescon this weekend. Not really sure. I happened to be raving about him at the time and may have invoked him.