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2005 Hugo Nominations

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the books-innn-spaaace dept.

COBOLgrrl writes " The 2005 Hugo Nominations have been announced. Books up for Best Novel include The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks, Iron Council by China Miéville , Iron Sunrise by Charles Stross, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, and River of Gods by Ian McDonald."

13 of 171 comments (clear)

  1. Hugo Lowdown. by sanityspeech · · Score: 4, Informative
    The Hugo Award® is the leading award for excellence in the field of science fiction and fantasy. The Hugos are awarded each year by the World Science Fiction Society, at the World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon). All members are entitled to make nominations and to vote on who receives the Awards, which are presented in a public ceremony which is always one of the highlights of the Worldcon.
  2. There should be more online awards given........ by CSMastermind · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Maybe I'm just not, "in the loop", but I don't know of many online awards given. I don't like the concept of afew select people voting on who to give the prize to, I'd rather have open online voting. I'd also like to see more writing contests (again maybe I just missed them). By the way Ian McDonald is amazing.

  3. Re:There should be more online awards given....... by FireballX301 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Remember, popularity != quality. Just because something is popular doesn't prevent it from being, for example, pandering tripe.

    And you know how english majors are.

  4. Melville is overrated by Silverhammer · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In my opinion, China Melville is overrated as an author. His Perdido Street Station was the "it" book of 2001, but after I finished reading it, I couldn't help but wonder what the big deal was.

    Granted, he has an excellent sense of the phantasmagoric and his worldbuilding skills are certainly impressive, but as an author, he just doesn't have the chops. His characters are almost too angst-ridden to move in a forward direction, and his plots read like a bad slasher flicks.

    Take away his word processor and give him a job as a conceptual designer. Everyone will be happier in the long run.

  5. At last, Iain M Banks gets a bit of recognition by daveed · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Everybody who likes SciFi should read a bit of Iain M Banks (Iain Banks (same author without the 'M') writes pretty dark, non-genre books, very good, but nothing compared to his SciFi).

    Most of his SciFi books are based on 'The Culture' which is basically the human race in a few thousand years. VCool tech. and Uber-Cool Space Ship names ('Meat Fucker') is the nick-name other ships have given to one particular ship, 'cause it likes to read the minds of humans.

    If you're going to read any of his books, read 'The Player of Games'. Amazing read. (Tiny spoiler...) There is a bit where the lead finds out about a very dark side to the race who he is 'Playing' with. From that point, he stops talking. Then only when he has taken apart the next few players does he speak. Iain M Banks is truely a very great under-appreciated author. READ HIM.

    1. Re:At last, Iain M Banks gets a bit of recognition by PxM · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Even though he wasn't nominated for a Culture novel, I agree with the parent that his writing kicks ass. I suggest his essay, A Few Notes on the Culture, as quick intro about it. IMO, the best book is Excession but all of his Culture novels are amazing. They detail life in a post-scarcity ("money is a sign of poverty") civilization which is utopian by many standards. When many sci-fi books show AI as being human level sophonts (Star Wars, Asimov, etc) Banks has his AIs operating orders of magnitude above humans yet he still makes humans feel like an important part of the universe. Of all the science fiction I've read, the universe created by Banks is by far the coolest.

      I haven't read the novel in question, but if his Culture books are any indication of this novel's quality, it will be just as amazing and worthy of the Hugo.

      --
      Want a free iPod?
      Or try a free Nintendo DS, GC, PS2, Xbox. (you only need 4 referrals)
      Wired article as proof

    2. Re:At last, Iain M Banks gets a bit of recognition by Wyatt+Earp · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Books and the setting are great. His is the only Sci-Fi I read these days.

      Some notes/corrections to your post.

      The Culture is NOT the human race. The Humanoids in the Culture are from across this Galaxy, but if they've made contact with Humanity on Earth is alluded to in a post-scrip to one of the early Culture novels. Basicly Humanoids that can inter-breed are widespread across the Galaxy, a reason for this is alcohol, mentioned while a character was drunk and in jest.

      There are many species in Culture, a large percentage of them are humanoid with various differences, but mostly like us.

      AI have been given full rights in Culture and it's late shards, on a sliding scale of rights vs. sentience.

      Player of Games is a good start for the setting, Extension I liked the least.

    3. Re:At last, Iain M Banks gets a bit of recognition by drxray · · Score: 4, Informative

      Banks is my favourite author, but I don't think his treatment of the super-intelligent AI characters is that impressive. To me they often come across somewhat like teenagers (they're always plotting and acting fairly immaturely) with minds that operate much faster rather than any smarter or wiser.

      I don't think this is Bank's fault... for quite a few reasons actually. Firstly, writing someone significantly smarter than you is close to impossible.

      He also postulates in one of his books that all intelligence past a certain level is equivalent with only differences in speed and capacity (a kind of Turing principle for sentience), which doesn't seem unreasonable. But his AIs should be at that level, whereas I often felt that they didn't have the situational mastery that you might expect - they sometimes completely understand a situation before it's even begun, but they can also act on crazy impulses and be singleminded. I would expect they would always be on perfect form.

      Finally, he says that AIs are coloured by the people who create them... and the people of the Culture are pretty immature. Perhaps he's saying something about them.

      Anyway, I understand that The Algebraist isn't a Culture novel, so perhaps Banks will get his Hugo since he doesn't have to write in the minefield that is super-intelligences.

      --
      Slashdot - Mutual Assured Discussion
  6. Time to Place orders on Amazon.com by DumbSwede · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Seriouslly, I went through Slashdot's Book Review topics last summer compiling a summer-reading list. I ordered 10 to 12 books and I'm still working my way through it. I know some minimum of a book a week types would be aghast I'm not done, but I do a lot of technical reading as well, plus I haven't been completely exclusive to the books I picked up over the summer.

    From last summer's reading list
    Finished:
    Perdido Street Station - China Melville
    Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman
    The Golden Age - John C. Wright
    Pattern Recognition - William Gibson
    Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson
    Manifold Series - Stephen Baxtor
    Currently Reading:
    King Rat - Neil Gaiman
    Still to Go:
    Oryx and Crake - Margaret Atwood

    Some other Authors I follow
    David Bin, Ben Bova, Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, Frederik Pohl.

    I find the quality of my reading much better on average following Slashdot suggestions rather than randomly picking books by title and pretty covers at Barnes & Noble.

    Didn't quite care for Pattern Recognition, so just one clunker for me -- maybe I just didn't get it, I wanted more of a well defined plot.
    Taking inordinate pride in making through all 1130 pages of Cyrptonomicon, but after you make it past the first 300 pages you'll find yourself screaming through it.

    --
    Letter To Iran
  7. Totally unsolicted review by dlasley · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm not done with Iron Sunrise yet, so I'll refrain (but it is really really good so far). I did finish Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, and found the core story was imaginative and the characters were pretty engaging. I thought Strange was actually more distant in terms of visualization than Norrell - for some reason I could picture the latter and hear his voice much more readily than the supposedly more approachable and contemporary Strange. She didn't rush the story (even at page 800) and there were not any useless passages: everything had a bearing on at least one aspect of each storyline.

    One book that is not mentioned here that I highly recommend is Dan Simmons' Ilium. This was a 12-hour read - problem was, it was 12 straight hours because I couldn't put the damn thing down!!

    --
    when it rains, it gets real soggy. when it pours, i'm under the tap just _waiting_ for the joy
  8. Re:There should be more online awards given....... by bitrodya · · Score: 5, Funny

    As an English major, I agree. With everything. Blindly. Because I have no idea what I'm talking about. But as a pretentious snob, if it's popular I say it has to be pandering tripe. I mean, most people want their books to be like TV. They want it to be a sort of entertainment that's passive; that is, they don't have to engage themselves with the work. Good books, independent of genre, are often overlooked because they don't appeal to a wide audience. Now, this isn't completely true. There are a lot of great books that are widely read and enjoyed, but for the msot part, the publishing industry is an entertainment industry no different from all the others. Now, since I've been repetitive and offtopic, I'll go RTFA.

  9. A Hugo First: The British Invasion by Justinian+II · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I believe this year marks a significant milestone in SF history. Unless I am very mistaken, this is the very first year that none of the Best Novel nominees are American. All of them are from the UK and we have representatives from Scotland, England, and Ireland. I'd vote for either Susanna Clarke or China Mieville but any of those novels are more deserving than some of the garbage that has won in recent years. I'm looking at you, "Hominids".

    This just reinforces my impression that American SF is stagnant while all the real action these days is taking place across the pond. Great stuff, and I hope American authors take this as a kick in the pants to stop rehashing the same old material and start showing a little imagination.

  10. Predictions, etc. by Pikathulhu · · Score: 5, Interesting
    A friend and I routinely bet on Hugo winners. Three months ago, I bet that Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell would win the Hugo for best novel in 2004. I'm glad to see it made the nominee list, and knowing the other novels, I still think JS&MN will win. It's fantasy, but that's OK under Hugo rules, and no other SF/Fantasy novel got 1/10th as many favorable reviews last year. If you enjoy fantasy, Jane Austen, and Neil Gaiman, then you'll definitely like it too.

    I also predict that the winner won't be American. Yeah, this is the first year that no American was nominated for best novel. Note that the Hugo is voted on by Worldcon members, and Worldcon is in Scotland this year. So a substantial portion of the voters will be able to travel to Scotland for the con, and I believe several of these nominees are more well-known in the UK. They're all really good--don't get me wrong--but location is probably a factor in this list.

    Incidentally, here's a really good round-up of the best SF/Fantasy novels published last year: http://groups-beta.google.com/group/rec.arts.sf.wr itten/msg/4ab6c83b0b234305