The winners of the 2009 Hugo awards have been announced:
Novel - The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Novella - "The Erdmann Nexus" by Nancy Kress
Novelette - “Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear
Short Story - “Exhalation” by Ted Chiang
Best Professional Artist - Donato Giancola
Editor (Long Form) - David Hartwell
Editor (Short Form) - Ellen Datlow
Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form) - WALL-E
Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form) - Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog
Best Related Book - Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi
Best Graphic Story - Girl Genius Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones by Kaja and Phil Foglio; art by Phil Foglio; colors by Cheyenne Wright
Best Semiprozine - Weird Tales
Best Fanzine - Electric Velocipede
Best Fan Writer - Cheryl Morgan
Best Fan Artist - Frank Wu
The only winner that I called was WALL-E but at least with everything where I read the nominees it was something I enjoyed. I still haven't gotten around to reading The Graveyard Book yet and I definitely won't be taking it along as vacation reading; it's just too short for that.
Congratulations to all the winners and I'll be covering them all in turn soon enough.
Showing posts with label 2009 Hugo Nominees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 2009 Hugo Nominees. Show all posts
Sunday, August 9, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
2009 Hugo Nominees - Best Novella
The last of the best professional artists nominees is picture book illustrator Shaun Tan:
Once again in a category there is one nominee that is unavailable to me. Ian McDonald's "The Tear" has only been published in an Science Fiction Book Club anthology. I'm not a member so I haven't read it. It also has not been made available online like the other nominees have (though one other of them is currently unavailable). As for the rest:
“The Political Prisoner” by Charles Coleman Finlay - The phrase that comes to mind about this story is "average". An intelligence officer is swept up in a coup and finds himself locked away in a prison camp by his own side. There he's treated badly and left to die. Finlay takes this basic story of survival (which you can find plenty of real world parallels easily enough) and tells it well. He captures the feeling of a gulag well. The downside of doing this kind of story is that I was wondering why I was reading it as science fiction; I'd rather read a non-fiction account which would have the same themes and carry more weight. I never connected with Finlay's spy that is at the center of the story and without that it's mainly an account of life in a prison camp. It's not a bad effort; if "The Political Prisoner" was truly bad the real-world resonances wouldn't have bothered me as much.
“Truth” by Robert Reed - I didn't care for Robert Reed's story but I do have to give him credit for one thing: rather than simply giving the reader a "treating prisoners wrong is bad" message he builds a scenario where the more extreme techniques are hard to ignore. A man is found just across the US border with several pounds of uranium. In interrogation it comes out that the terrorist is a time traveler who came back with dozens of infiltrators who are waiting for the right moment. The story is about a replacement interrogator who takes up the job after the previous one committed suicide. I think from those details you can conclude where the story goes. The battle of wills between prisoner and interrogator is a powerful theme that could have overcome that but Reed just isn't able to portray it well. The prisoner is a cipher, the interrogator isn't really that interesting and the bulk of the interaction occurs away from the reader. Instead Reed fills the time in his story by telling the reader how terrible the world is. It's makes for an uninteresting story.
“The Erdmann Nexus” by Nancy Kress - Something strange is happening to elderly people around the world. In one retirement home in particular a physicist finds himself having strange attacks and flashes of other people's memories. Eventually he finds that their idle thoughts are changing the world. Kress doesn't bother playing with "What's happening?" to build up tension; she reveals that through an omniscient space intelligence early on. Instead she presents it as a situation where things will get worse and the human characters need to work it out before it is too late. I enjoyed the characters she created to populate the retirement home since none of them were precisely what one would expect.
“True Names” by Benjamin Rosenbaum and Cory Doctorow - This is the one story out of the novella category that I thought was genuinely terrific. It's the tale of three colonies of self-replicating quantum computer based nanomachines that each have their own design for the universe. One is a fragmented social intelligence that wants to replace all matter with colonies of itself and since those fragments might be considdered personalities they act as the protagonist. Then there is their direct adversary who acts as an solitary mind by only allowing one path of reasoning and how it wants to limit the consumption of the universe to just one percent of its mass. Finally there are a voratious swarm who consume all matter in its path and exist only for that purpose. The high concepts in the story are a lot of fun. The biggest problem with "True Names" for me was that it comes across as two stories jammed together. The climax to the first plot line is a strange deus ex machina that involves not only the reader not being provided fundamental information about the logic systems but for the logic systems themselves to not be aware of this fundamental aspect to their society. Since the story continues on past that point and the rest of it is completely engrossing I can forgive that but it was a stumbling block.
So my ballot for the novella category would be:
"True Names"
"The Erdmann Nexus"
"The Political Prisoner"
No award
"Truth"
"The Tear"
Naturally "The Tear" is only at the bottom since I haven't read it. I happen to like Ian McDonald's work and I want to read it though I suspect it will be a while before I get that chance.
Once again in a category there is one nominee that is unavailable to me. Ian McDonald's "The Tear" has only been published in an Science Fiction Book Club anthology. I'm not a member so I haven't read it. It also has not been made available online like the other nominees have (though one other of them is currently unavailable). As for the rest:
“The Political Prisoner” by Charles Coleman Finlay - The phrase that comes to mind about this story is "average". An intelligence officer is swept up in a coup and finds himself locked away in a prison camp by his own side. There he's treated badly and left to die. Finlay takes this basic story of survival (which you can find plenty of real world parallels easily enough) and tells it well. He captures the feeling of a gulag well. The downside of doing this kind of story is that I was wondering why I was reading it as science fiction; I'd rather read a non-fiction account which would have the same themes and carry more weight. I never connected with Finlay's spy that is at the center of the story and without that it's mainly an account of life in a prison camp. It's not a bad effort; if "The Political Prisoner" was truly bad the real-world resonances wouldn't have bothered me as much.
“Truth” by Robert Reed - I didn't care for Robert Reed's story but I do have to give him credit for one thing: rather than simply giving the reader a "treating prisoners wrong is bad" message he builds a scenario where the more extreme techniques are hard to ignore. A man is found just across the US border with several pounds of uranium. In interrogation it comes out that the terrorist is a time traveler who came back with dozens of infiltrators who are waiting for the right moment. The story is about a replacement interrogator who takes up the job after the previous one committed suicide. I think from those details you can conclude where the story goes. The battle of wills between prisoner and interrogator is a powerful theme that could have overcome that but Reed just isn't able to portray it well. The prisoner is a cipher, the interrogator isn't really that interesting and the bulk of the interaction occurs away from the reader. Instead Reed fills the time in his story by telling the reader how terrible the world is. It's makes for an uninteresting story.
“The Erdmann Nexus” by Nancy Kress - Something strange is happening to elderly people around the world. In one retirement home in particular a physicist finds himself having strange attacks and flashes of other people's memories. Eventually he finds that their idle thoughts are changing the world. Kress doesn't bother playing with "What's happening?" to build up tension; she reveals that through an omniscient space intelligence early on. Instead she presents it as a situation where things will get worse and the human characters need to work it out before it is too late. I enjoyed the characters she created to populate the retirement home since none of them were precisely what one would expect.
“True Names” by Benjamin Rosenbaum and Cory Doctorow - This is the one story out of the novella category that I thought was genuinely terrific. It's the tale of three colonies of self-replicating quantum computer based nanomachines that each have their own design for the universe. One is a fragmented social intelligence that wants to replace all matter with colonies of itself and since those fragments might be considdered personalities they act as the protagonist. Then there is their direct adversary who acts as an solitary mind by only allowing one path of reasoning and how it wants to limit the consumption of the universe to just one percent of its mass. Finally there are a voratious swarm who consume all matter in its path and exist only for that purpose. The high concepts in the story are a lot of fun. The biggest problem with "True Names" for me was that it comes across as two stories jammed together. The climax to the first plot line is a strange deus ex machina that involves not only the reader not being provided fundamental information about the logic systems but for the logic systems themselves to not be aware of this fundamental aspect to their society. Since the story continues on past that point and the rest of it is completely engrossing I can forgive that but it was a stumbling block.
So my ballot for the novella category would be:
"True Names"
"The Erdmann Nexus"
"The Political Prisoner"
No award
"Truth"
"The Tear"
Naturally "The Tear" is only at the bottom since I haven't read it. I happen to like Ian McDonald's work and I want to read it though I suspect it will be a while before I get that chance.
Thursday, June 4, 2009
2009 Hugo Nominees - Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
It's John Picacio's turn to be showcased as a nominee for best professional artist:
In this case that's a scan from my copy of the magazine; unlike the other artists I've shown so far his website hasn't been updated since 2005.
So getting to the dramatic presentation nominees:
METAtropolis; written by Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder; edited by John Scalzi - I'm getting this one out of the way first because it's the one that I haven't heard. In this case it's an anthology that was designed for being an audiobook. There is a printed version available but the audiobook is what has been nominated so I have not read it. On top of that it is only available as a download; a CD release is scheduled for just after the awards have been handed out. I don't buy media if I can't have a physical copy it so I won't be listening to METAtropolis for a while.
WALL-E; story by Andrew Stanton and Pete Docter; screenplay by Andrew Stanton and Jim Reardon; directed by Andrew Stanton - I just reviewed this as a Nebula winner and my thoughts have not changed. It's brilliant. A richer story more subtly told than you'd be able to guess just from the premise.
Iron Man; screenplay by Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, Art Marcum, and Matt Holloway; based on characters created by Stan Lee, Don Heck, Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby; directed by Jon Favreau - I also kind of reviewed Iron Man already, though that wasn't much of a review since it was about how flawed the structure of the film was. I did not like this movie about an weapons manufacturer who turns altruistic after recieving a near-fatal injury and so builds a suit of power armor to bully third world nations. The action set peices were far too few and weren't interesting; when I'm watching an action movie I'll forgive flaws in all other areas than this since they're the reason the movie exists. I also found the main character to be completely unlikable.
The Dark Knight; story by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer; screenplay by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan; based on characters "created" by Bob Kane; directed by Christopher Nolan - I didn't review The Dark Knight because for two weeks after it was open you couldn't look at a website run by a nerd without being told how brilliant it is. I didn't need to add my voice to that. In this sequel (for the three of you who don't know about it) the Batman is still fighting crime in Gotham City and providing an inspiration but now the Joker has turned up intent on spreading chaos and tearing humanity down. This film is very effective mainly due to how Nolan split the hero and villain between morality and amorality instead of just immorality. Giving the villain equal time built him into an equal and the action set pieces were many and varied. It was the ideal superhero movie.
Hellboy II: The Golden Army; story by Guillermo del Toro and Mike Mignola; screenplay by Guillermo del Toro; based on the comic by Mike Mignola; directed by Guillermo del Toro - I found the first Hellboy movie to be a good effort but critically flawed in the pacing. A close but no cigar situation. This time around the pacing has improved, the art design has been pushed from "interesting" to "spectacular", but the story (which was never great to begin with) leaks out. The film is about a group of unusual beings who work for the US government to deal with supernatural threats. This time the threat is a group of elves who are seeking out an indestructable clockwork army so they can wipe out humanity. I enjoyed watching the film; the goofy characters are a lot of fun and the supernatural elements are terrific. I just something with a better plot.
So my ballot for this category would be:
WALL-E
The Dark Knight
Hellboy II
No Award
Iron Man
METAtropolis
Deciding between WALL-E and The Dark Knight was hard but I felt that WALL-E was the better production. METAtropolis is at the bottom solely because I have not listened to it and I won't be able to revise that opinion until after the award has already been handed out.
In this case that's a scan from my copy of the magazine; unlike the other artists I've shown so far his website hasn't been updated since 2005.So getting to the dramatic presentation nominees:
METAtropolis; written by Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder; edited by John Scalzi - I'm getting this one out of the way first because it's the one that I haven't heard. In this case it's an anthology that was designed for being an audiobook. There is a printed version available but the audiobook is what has been nominated so I have not read it. On top of that it is only available as a download; a CD release is scheduled for just after the awards have been handed out. I don't buy media if I can't have a physical copy it so I won't be listening to METAtropolis for a while.
WALL-E; story by Andrew Stanton and Pete Docter; screenplay by Andrew Stanton and Jim Reardon; directed by Andrew Stanton - I just reviewed this as a Nebula winner and my thoughts have not changed. It's brilliant. A richer story more subtly told than you'd be able to guess just from the premise.
Iron Man; screenplay by Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, Art Marcum, and Matt Holloway; based on characters created by Stan Lee, Don Heck, Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby; directed by Jon Favreau - I also kind of reviewed Iron Man already, though that wasn't much of a review since it was about how flawed the structure of the film was. I did not like this movie about an weapons manufacturer who turns altruistic after recieving a near-fatal injury and so builds a suit of power armor to bully third world nations. The action set peices were far too few and weren't interesting; when I'm watching an action movie I'll forgive flaws in all other areas than this since they're the reason the movie exists. I also found the main character to be completely unlikable.
The Dark Knight; story by Christopher Nolan and David S. Goyer; screenplay by Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan; based on characters "created" by Bob Kane; directed by Christopher Nolan - I didn't review The Dark Knight because for two weeks after it was open you couldn't look at a website run by a nerd without being told how brilliant it is. I didn't need to add my voice to that. In this sequel (for the three of you who don't know about it) the Batman is still fighting crime in Gotham City and providing an inspiration but now the Joker has turned up intent on spreading chaos and tearing humanity down. This film is very effective mainly due to how Nolan split the hero and villain between morality and amorality instead of just immorality. Giving the villain equal time built him into an equal and the action set pieces were many and varied. It was the ideal superhero movie.
Hellboy II: The Golden Army; story by Guillermo del Toro and Mike Mignola; screenplay by Guillermo del Toro; based on the comic by Mike Mignola; directed by Guillermo del Toro - I found the first Hellboy movie to be a good effort but critically flawed in the pacing. A close but no cigar situation. This time around the pacing has improved, the art design has been pushed from "interesting" to "spectacular", but the story (which was never great to begin with) leaks out. The film is about a group of unusual beings who work for the US government to deal with supernatural threats. This time the threat is a group of elves who are seeking out an indestructable clockwork army so they can wipe out humanity. I enjoyed watching the film; the goofy characters are a lot of fun and the supernatural elements are terrific. I just something with a better plot.
So my ballot for this category would be:
WALL-E
The Dark Knight
Hellboy II
No Award
Iron Man
METAtropolis
Deciding between WALL-E and The Dark Knight was hard but I felt that WALL-E was the better production. METAtropolis is at the bottom solely because I have not listened to it and I won't be able to revise that opinion until after the award has already been handed out.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
2009 Hugo Nominees - Best Graphic Story
First, here's another nominee for best professional artist, Donato Giancola:
The nominees for the new best graphic story category are interesting since they can be easily broken into three blocks of two books. We have two licensed comics based on already popular SF properties, two climaxes to long running Vertigo series, and two webcomics. I don't usually read licensed comics since they usually disappoint so those were the two I had not read before. The two webcomic nominees are one third of all the webcomics I follow and of the remaining webcomics there's only one that might even be considdered for the award. So I'm going to break it down by those blocks.
The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle; written by Jim Butcher; art by Ardian Syaf - Though I'm aware of Butcher's novel series about a hard boiled wizard detective in modern Chicago I haven't read any of them. The books have been recommended to me a few times but I'm always hesitant to pick up any book that's described as part of a "series". After reading this comic series I think I will try one of the novels. This comic had the advantage of being written by Butcher and unlike some writers from other mediums Butcher used the comic format well; his dialog is tight and complements the images. In this story the wizard/detective is called in to consult on a murder at a zoo that is being blamed on a gorrilla. Naturally there's evil magic involved and the detective gets in over his head. I don't want to discount Syaf's contribution to this work; most memorably he drew the title character in an overshadowed hard-boiled rough style while his unwilling sidekick is much lighter. The whole thing made for a charming book that made me smile.
Serenity: Better Days; written by Joss Whedon and Brett Matthews; art by Will Conrad; color by Michelle Madsen; cover by Jo Chen - In contrast with the previous book this is exactly why I don't read licensed comic books. While all of the common beats from the Firefly television series are here this comic is like a faded photocopy. The scruffy rogue characters are there but they're a bit off. It's a plot that you might see in the show (the crew makes a large pile of money while they're being hunted by someone looking for veterans of the war) but it doesn't come across well. There are moments that are effective and they are fleeting. The main storyline is disjointed and jumps from big moment to big moment. Given how the dialog just falls flat I strongly suspect that Whedon's involvement with this comic was just to say "Hey, let's make a Firefly comic!" and putting his name on it to increase sales. Conrad's art isn't bad but is nowhere near smooth enough to make up for that story.
Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores; written by Brian K. Vaughan; pencilled by Pia Guerra; inked by Jose Marzan, Jr. - I never thought I would enjoy a series about all the male mammels on earth dying except one man and his monkey. Instead of taking the obvious route Vaughan turned it into a journey into a post-apocalyptic world as the last man wandered the face of the earth looking for the girlfriend he was about to propose to over the phone when the deaths struck. In this last volume he finally catches up with her after years of wandering and has to decide what he really wants. Simultaniously his enemies are catching up with him for one last confrontation. That storyline is incredibly effective as Vaughn and Guerra capture the growth that all the characters have undergone. The final issue is a bit more controversial since it jumps forward several decades and is filled with a lot of clumsy dialog telling the readers what happened to everyone. On the other hand the conclusion of that final issue is absolutely perfect. Still this is a very good story that only suffers because the reader needs to have read the rest of the series to appreciate it.
Fables: War and Pieces; written by Bill Willingham; pencilled by Mark Buckingham; art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy; color by Lee Loughridge; letters by Todd Klein - I'm a bit confused on this nominee: there's a three issue storyline titled "War and Pieces" that's part of the Fables series and there's a six issue trade paperback War and Pieces. Given the context of the nominees I believe that they mean the trade paperback but I can't be certain. The series itself is about all stories being true (especially fairy tales) on other planes of existence. Before the series began one of the characters, known only as the Adversary now, has conquored all of the other worlds forcing the characters in those fairy tales to flee to the real world. In this volume those refugees take the lessons of the real world back to make war on the Adversary. So there is a spy story as one gathers vital information which is followed by the story of the very brief and very brutal war. This volume does have the advantage of standing well on its own though again as the climax of a seventy-five issue long storyline it's more effective if the reader doesn't start at the end. Willingham clearly planned out the war carefully which makes the plan something simple and direct that the reader can both understand and believe. Buckingham always does a great job and for the final issue in the storyline does everything in spectacular verticle layouts.
Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones; written by Kaja and Phil Foglio; art by Phil Foglio; colors by Cheyenne Wright - The premise of this webcomic is a psuedo-Victorian world where some people possess the ability to create steampunk inventions that break the laws of physics. Agatha Heterodyne is the heir to the greatest family of mad scientists and has been in hiding her whole life from the forces that tore her family apart. In this section of the story she has returned to her ancestral home, an intelligent castle that has gone insane in her absense. People who want to seize that power for themselves or destroy it before it can be used have also arrived and Agatha must attempt to gain control over the castle before their plans can be activated. I've enjoyed the Foglio's work since I saw it in Dragon magazine and the webcomic is up to their standards. Unfortunately this particular storyline feels more like a bridge between larger events than a contained story of its own. We have a lot of characters moving to get into position to react but very little of them actually taking action.
Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic; by Howard Tayler - In contrast this storyline is almost completely self-contained. The mercenary crew that stars in this strip sold one of their enemies to some revolutionaries in a desperate situation as a "military aide". That enemy managed to win the revolution and install himself as king of the planet though his reign is measured in hours. Now the mercenaries find themselves in a classic dilema: they have two people who hire them to steal the body and the government of the planet hires them to guard the body. The dilema, of course, is how can they get paid three times for the same work. Tayler's art isn't up to the quality of the other nominees (he's grown from a doodler in his first few strips to a decent cartoonist over the ten years he's been working on the strip); still the actual story is among the best thanks to it's snappy pacing as a daily comic strip. Tayler keeps things moving from gag to gag and also recognizing that any given strip could be someone's first and that makes it very accessable.
My ballot for Best Graphic Story would be:
The Dresden Files
Schlock Mercenary
Fables
Y: The Last Man
Girl Genius
No Award
Serenity
The nominees for the new best graphic story category are interesting since they can be easily broken into three blocks of two books. We have two licensed comics based on already popular SF properties, two climaxes to long running Vertigo series, and two webcomics. I don't usually read licensed comics since they usually disappoint so those were the two I had not read before. The two webcomic nominees are one third of all the webcomics I follow and of the remaining webcomics there's only one that might even be considdered for the award. So I'm going to break it down by those blocks.
The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle; written by Jim Butcher; art by Ardian Syaf - Though I'm aware of Butcher's novel series about a hard boiled wizard detective in modern Chicago I haven't read any of them. The books have been recommended to me a few times but I'm always hesitant to pick up any book that's described as part of a "series". After reading this comic series I think I will try one of the novels. This comic had the advantage of being written by Butcher and unlike some writers from other mediums Butcher used the comic format well; his dialog is tight and complements the images. In this story the wizard/detective is called in to consult on a murder at a zoo that is being blamed on a gorrilla. Naturally there's evil magic involved and the detective gets in over his head. I don't want to discount Syaf's contribution to this work; most memorably he drew the title character in an overshadowed hard-boiled rough style while his unwilling sidekick is much lighter. The whole thing made for a charming book that made me smile.
Serenity: Better Days; written by Joss Whedon and Brett Matthews; art by Will Conrad; color by Michelle Madsen; cover by Jo Chen - In contrast with the previous book this is exactly why I don't read licensed comic books. While all of the common beats from the Firefly television series are here this comic is like a faded photocopy. The scruffy rogue characters are there but they're a bit off. It's a plot that you might see in the show (the crew makes a large pile of money while they're being hunted by someone looking for veterans of the war) but it doesn't come across well. There are moments that are effective and they are fleeting. The main storyline is disjointed and jumps from big moment to big moment. Given how the dialog just falls flat I strongly suspect that Whedon's involvement with this comic was just to say "Hey, let's make a Firefly comic!" and putting his name on it to increase sales. Conrad's art isn't bad but is nowhere near smooth enough to make up for that story.
Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores; written by Brian K. Vaughan; pencilled by Pia Guerra; inked by Jose Marzan, Jr. - I never thought I would enjoy a series about all the male mammels on earth dying except one man and his monkey. Instead of taking the obvious route Vaughan turned it into a journey into a post-apocalyptic world as the last man wandered the face of the earth looking for the girlfriend he was about to propose to over the phone when the deaths struck. In this last volume he finally catches up with her after years of wandering and has to decide what he really wants. Simultaniously his enemies are catching up with him for one last confrontation. That storyline is incredibly effective as Vaughn and Guerra capture the growth that all the characters have undergone. The final issue is a bit more controversial since it jumps forward several decades and is filled with a lot of clumsy dialog telling the readers what happened to everyone. On the other hand the conclusion of that final issue is absolutely perfect. Still this is a very good story that only suffers because the reader needs to have read the rest of the series to appreciate it.
Fables: War and Pieces; written by Bill Willingham; pencilled by Mark Buckingham; art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy; color by Lee Loughridge; letters by Todd Klein - I'm a bit confused on this nominee: there's a three issue storyline titled "War and Pieces" that's part of the Fables series and there's a six issue trade paperback War and Pieces. Given the context of the nominees I believe that they mean the trade paperback but I can't be certain. The series itself is about all stories being true (especially fairy tales) on other planes of existence. Before the series began one of the characters, known only as the Adversary now, has conquored all of the other worlds forcing the characters in those fairy tales to flee to the real world. In this volume those refugees take the lessons of the real world back to make war on the Adversary. So there is a spy story as one gathers vital information which is followed by the story of the very brief and very brutal war. This volume does have the advantage of standing well on its own though again as the climax of a seventy-five issue long storyline it's more effective if the reader doesn't start at the end. Willingham clearly planned out the war carefully which makes the plan something simple and direct that the reader can both understand and believe. Buckingham always does a great job and for the final issue in the storyline does everything in spectacular verticle layouts.
Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones; written by Kaja and Phil Foglio; art by Phil Foglio; colors by Cheyenne Wright - The premise of this webcomic is a psuedo-Victorian world where some people possess the ability to create steampunk inventions that break the laws of physics. Agatha Heterodyne is the heir to the greatest family of mad scientists and has been in hiding her whole life from the forces that tore her family apart. In this section of the story she has returned to her ancestral home, an intelligent castle that has gone insane in her absense. People who want to seize that power for themselves or destroy it before it can be used have also arrived and Agatha must attempt to gain control over the castle before their plans can be activated. I've enjoyed the Foglio's work since I saw it in Dragon magazine and the webcomic is up to their standards. Unfortunately this particular storyline feels more like a bridge between larger events than a contained story of its own. We have a lot of characters moving to get into position to react but very little of them actually taking action.
Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic; by Howard Tayler - In contrast this storyline is almost completely self-contained. The mercenary crew that stars in this strip sold one of their enemies to some revolutionaries in a desperate situation as a "military aide". That enemy managed to win the revolution and install himself as king of the planet though his reign is measured in hours. Now the mercenaries find themselves in a classic dilema: they have two people who hire them to steal the body and the government of the planet hires them to guard the body. The dilema, of course, is how can they get paid three times for the same work. Tayler's art isn't up to the quality of the other nominees (he's grown from a doodler in his first few strips to a decent cartoonist over the ten years he's been working on the strip); still the actual story is among the best thanks to it's snappy pacing as a daily comic strip. Tayler keeps things moving from gag to gag and also recognizing that any given strip could be someone's first and that makes it very accessable.My ballot for Best Graphic Story would be:
The Dresden Files
Schlock Mercenary
Fables
Y: The Last Man
Girl Genius
No Award
Serenity
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
2009 Hugo Nominees - The Novelettes
Before going on to the novelettes I wanted to include the Hugo nominated professional artists in my look at the nominees. As I did when I went through the past winners I won't review the art; I don't have an eye for it. All of the pictures were created in 2008 since that is the period that they're nominated for. Finally all of the images are taken from the artists' own websites so you'll notice their watermarks on most of the images. Since I'm behind by one nominee there's two paintings today. First, from Dan Dos Santos:
And from Bob Eggleton:
If the theme of the short story category was "monkeys" the theme here is "old horror pastiche". As before the links will take you to the text of the story. This is also the first time in looking at nominees where I didn't actively dislike any of the nominees in the category. A couple of the stories approach the borderline and none cross it.
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel - I've already reviewed this story as the 2008 Nebula winner. For those who d0n't want to look back: I enjoyed it as a cute mash-up of Frankenstein and Pride and Prejudice. I can't call it brilliant work though if you like that kind of literary game then you'll enjoy it.
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner - The first thing that any reader is going to notice about this novelette is the quirky voice. It's all short, declaritive sentences with almost no description. Once you get into the story about a boy who finds a ray-gun and learns about love and responsibility from that voice helps keep things from being too personal. Gardner takes the story in a few directions I didn't expect right up to the ending which has its own strange twist. One thing I appreciated was just how naturally the story progresses; it might have a ray-gun as the driving factor but all of the reactions are reasonable. Gardner does a wonderful job in capturing the changing attitudes of the boy as he matures and that carries the story well.
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi - In the newsroom of the near future a Laotian reporter concentrates on important stories that don't attract interest. He is threatened with being fired if he cannot get more readers and one of his coworkers helps him hook up with a starlet that can raise his profile. The newsroom of tomorrow is an interesting theme to work with and I felt that Bacigalupi just didn't quite get the concepts down. Reading the story it felt like he knew the buzzwords and problems facing media organizations but not how everything connects together. Consequently he has a news cycle and reactions that are measured in seconds; the media is certainly going to be cycling faster in the future but there is a limit of human response. Getting beyond that it becomes just another story of a crusading journalist versus the people who just want fluff. Personally I would have rather read the story about the people working to fill those incredibly fast news cycles.
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear - I was expecting more of a Lovecraft pastiche from this story than what it is. Instead Bear's story feels more like a response to Lovecraft's attitudes regarding race (those attitudes were solidly planted in the mid-nineteenth century despite the fact that Lovecraft wrote in the early-twentieth). In "Shoggoths in Bloom" the threat of a second world war is in the air as an African-American college professor attempts the first significant examination of the shoggoths in the wild. The giant, acidic, tentacle-sprouting monstrocities ooze onto shore in the late autumn where they flower for a brief time before returning to the ocean depths. While examining them the professor deals with the casual racism of New England, his own automatic responses to innocent remarks, and concerns for what is happening in Nazi Germany. The first two thirds of the story are interesting but the last portion where all of the answers are handed over on a deus ex machina left a bitter taste in my mouth. The ethical delema that replaced the questions wasn't interesting enough to make up for the shift.
“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick - Resnick has done it to me again; he wrote a story where I'm not sure what to make of the ending. If the man wrote endings that were any more ambiguous they'd trail off into random text. This time around two very old men reminisce about a a magic shop where they first met as children nearly eighty years before. On a lark the two of them look for the shop and find it with the same proprietor who introduced them still running it. The proprietor now agrees to show them some new things. Unfortunately for this story the ending comes down to a confrontation between some weak homilies and vaguely sinister supernatural forces. That made it much less involving for me than some of Resnick's other stories. Still it's a solid piece of work despite the fact that strange shops of wonders and reclaimed youth have been overused.
My ballot for the novelette category would look like:
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel
“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi
No Award
And from Bob Eggleton:
If the theme of the short story category was "monkeys" the theme here is "old horror pastiche". As before the links will take you to the text of the story. This is also the first time in looking at nominees where I didn't actively dislike any of the nominees in the category. A couple of the stories approach the borderline and none cross it.
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel - I've already reviewed this story as the 2008 Nebula winner. For those who d0n't want to look back: I enjoyed it as a cute mash-up of Frankenstein and Pride and Prejudice. I can't call it brilliant work though if you like that kind of literary game then you'll enjoy it.
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner - The first thing that any reader is going to notice about this novelette is the quirky voice. It's all short, declaritive sentences with almost no description. Once you get into the story about a boy who finds a ray-gun and learns about love and responsibility from that voice helps keep things from being too personal. Gardner takes the story in a few directions I didn't expect right up to the ending which has its own strange twist. One thing I appreciated was just how naturally the story progresses; it might have a ray-gun as the driving factor but all of the reactions are reasonable. Gardner does a wonderful job in capturing the changing attitudes of the boy as he matures and that carries the story well.
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi - In the newsroom of the near future a Laotian reporter concentrates on important stories that don't attract interest. He is threatened with being fired if he cannot get more readers and one of his coworkers helps him hook up with a starlet that can raise his profile. The newsroom of tomorrow is an interesting theme to work with and I felt that Bacigalupi just didn't quite get the concepts down. Reading the story it felt like he knew the buzzwords and problems facing media organizations but not how everything connects together. Consequently he has a news cycle and reactions that are measured in seconds; the media is certainly going to be cycling faster in the future but there is a limit of human response. Getting beyond that it becomes just another story of a crusading journalist versus the people who just want fluff. Personally I would have rather read the story about the people working to fill those incredibly fast news cycles.
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear - I was expecting more of a Lovecraft pastiche from this story than what it is. Instead Bear's story feels more like a response to Lovecraft's attitudes regarding race (those attitudes were solidly planted in the mid-nineteenth century despite the fact that Lovecraft wrote in the early-twentieth). In "Shoggoths in Bloom" the threat of a second world war is in the air as an African-American college professor attempts the first significant examination of the shoggoths in the wild. The giant, acidic, tentacle-sprouting monstrocities ooze onto shore in the late autumn where they flower for a brief time before returning to the ocean depths. While examining them the professor deals with the casual racism of New England, his own automatic responses to innocent remarks, and concerns for what is happening in Nazi Germany. The first two thirds of the story are interesting but the last portion where all of the answers are handed over on a deus ex machina left a bitter taste in my mouth. The ethical delema that replaced the questions wasn't interesting enough to make up for the shift.
“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick - Resnick has done it to me again; he wrote a story where I'm not sure what to make of the ending. If the man wrote endings that were any more ambiguous they'd trail off into random text. This time around two very old men reminisce about a a magic shop where they first met as children nearly eighty years before. On a lark the two of them look for the shop and find it with the same proprietor who introduced them still running it. The proprietor now agrees to show them some new things. Unfortunately for this story the ending comes down to a confrontation between some weak homilies and vaguely sinister supernatural forces. That made it much less involving for me than some of Resnick's other stories. Still it's a solid piece of work despite the fact that strange shops of wonders and reclaimed youth have been overused.
My ballot for the novelette category would look like:
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel
“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi
No Award
Thursday, May 21, 2009
2009 Hugo Nominees - The Short Stories
Last year I only discussed the three short fiction categories for the Hugo nominations. I'm going to expand things a little bit more this time around. I'm not going for all of the nominated novels or related non-fiction. I'm also not planning on the short form dramatic presentation category since I'm intentionally behind on two of the shows nominated (maybe as the summer progresses and I catch myself up on Lost and Battlestar Galactica). I have however read four of the six nominees in the graphic story category and have easy access to the remaining two. So I'm going to cover all of the short fiction nominees, the long form dramatic presentation, and graphic story categories.
First up are the short stories which demonstrate to us that if your story starts with any letter greater than "F" people just won't reach it when they're reading for nominees. All of the links will take you to a copy of the story. Here they are in the order which I read them:
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” by Kij Johnson - This story is from that school of urban fantasy where something strange happens to give someone's life meaning. In this case it's a set of strange monkeys who perform an impossible disappearing trick. Their owner purchased the act for one dollar from the previous owner when her life was at its lowest point. There are two things that make this story more effective than most along these lines. First the style that it's written in is a disjointed set of notes that carries quite a bit of information. Also the reader gets some answers that add a touch of charm to its conclusion. I enjoyed the story quite a bit.
“Exhalation” by Ted Chiang - This might be my least favorite Chiang story which puts it on the level of good but not spectacular. In it there is a strange world filled with compressed gas driven automatons. One of them recognizes that something is changing within themselves or the world and undertakes extreme measures to understand. Once he does he finds that the nature of the universe is far more cruel than he could imagine. There's some direct global warming parallels in the story but this is not a story about environmentalism beyond the biggest of the big picture. Instead Chiang focuses on how understanding a small thing can change the fundamental understanding of the universe. The problem with this is that it means that the reader gets a lot of exposition. And when I say a lot I mean metric tonnes of it. The concepts raised are intriguing and the narrator's voice carries it well enough but this is not a very tight story and that's due to the quantity of data that has be thrown at the reader.
“Evil Robot Monkey” by Mary Robinette Kowal - This is an astoundingly short story; I haven't done a word count on it but I'd be surprised if it exceded a thousand. Still it's not imposssible for a good story to be told in that space; unfortunately "Evil Robot Monkey" isn't a very good story. There's a smart monkey who scults clay and swears at children who make fun him. That's almost the entire story right there. It comes across as one-tenth of a story rather than something complete. Characters exist only as the broadest outlines and plot is non-existant. There's not even an interesting prose style to give it some strength.
“Article of Faith” by Mike Resnick - For this short story a cleaning robot at a church is inadvertantly converted to Christianity by the reverand. For the first half of the story I thought that Resnick was going someplace interesting with the difference between faith and knowledge. I suppose I should say that I was surprised by the second half but the surprise was that anyone would write a story where robots were standing in as objects of human prejudices today. Those stories were stale in the 1950's when they were socially relevant; today it's just clumsy. Despite being a decent storyteller Resnick can't do much with such a worn out story. I found the initial philisophical questions raised much more interesting than the flat characters and when they vanished for a quick lesson that "Prejudice is bad" they couldn't carry it.
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled” by Michael Swanwick - Swanwick's story also uses an ancient SF theme: two seperate aliens that cannot trust each other are forced together by circumstances to join together in order to cross dangerous territory. In this case it's a human from a libertarian distopia joining with an alien from a society that holds trust as the highest virtue. Together they're on the run from the destruction of the alien's city which was betrayed and they carry with them a library containing information beyond calculable value. What makes this story work is the ambiguousness of it; while both character's hold their society's values in great esteem they also recognize the limitations of it even before the story begins. So while it plays with the "learning about other cultures" theme there is an undercurrent that both already know those lessons. It also helps that the story has a unique viewpoint: a ghost AI that runs one a spacesuit. It's a subtle story that has some interesting layers and I appreciated it for that.
So my ballot would be:
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss”
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled”
“Exhalation”
No award
“Article of Faith”
“Evil Robot Monkey”
First up are the short stories which demonstrate to us that if your story starts with any letter greater than "F" people just won't reach it when they're reading for nominees. All of the links will take you to a copy of the story. Here they are in the order which I read them:
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” by Kij Johnson - This story is from that school of urban fantasy where something strange happens to give someone's life meaning. In this case it's a set of strange monkeys who perform an impossible disappearing trick. Their owner purchased the act for one dollar from the previous owner when her life was at its lowest point. There are two things that make this story more effective than most along these lines. First the style that it's written in is a disjointed set of notes that carries quite a bit of information. Also the reader gets some answers that add a touch of charm to its conclusion. I enjoyed the story quite a bit.
“Exhalation” by Ted Chiang - This might be my least favorite Chiang story which puts it on the level of good but not spectacular. In it there is a strange world filled with compressed gas driven automatons. One of them recognizes that something is changing within themselves or the world and undertakes extreme measures to understand. Once he does he finds that the nature of the universe is far more cruel than he could imagine. There's some direct global warming parallels in the story but this is not a story about environmentalism beyond the biggest of the big picture. Instead Chiang focuses on how understanding a small thing can change the fundamental understanding of the universe. The problem with this is that it means that the reader gets a lot of exposition. And when I say a lot I mean metric tonnes of it. The concepts raised are intriguing and the narrator's voice carries it well enough but this is not a very tight story and that's due to the quantity of data that has be thrown at the reader.
“Evil Robot Monkey” by Mary Robinette Kowal - This is an astoundingly short story; I haven't done a word count on it but I'd be surprised if it exceded a thousand. Still it's not imposssible for a good story to be told in that space; unfortunately "Evil Robot Monkey" isn't a very good story. There's a smart monkey who scults clay and swears at children who make fun him. That's almost the entire story right there. It comes across as one-tenth of a story rather than something complete. Characters exist only as the broadest outlines and plot is non-existant. There's not even an interesting prose style to give it some strength.
“Article of Faith” by Mike Resnick - For this short story a cleaning robot at a church is inadvertantly converted to Christianity by the reverand. For the first half of the story I thought that Resnick was going someplace interesting with the difference between faith and knowledge. I suppose I should say that I was surprised by the second half but the surprise was that anyone would write a story where robots were standing in as objects of human prejudices today. Those stories were stale in the 1950's when they were socially relevant; today it's just clumsy. Despite being a decent storyteller Resnick can't do much with such a worn out story. I found the initial philisophical questions raised much more interesting than the flat characters and when they vanished for a quick lesson that "Prejudice is bad" they couldn't carry it.
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled” by Michael Swanwick - Swanwick's story also uses an ancient SF theme: two seperate aliens that cannot trust each other are forced together by circumstances to join together in order to cross dangerous territory. In this case it's a human from a libertarian distopia joining with an alien from a society that holds trust as the highest virtue. Together they're on the run from the destruction of the alien's city which was betrayed and they carry with them a library containing information beyond calculable value. What makes this story work is the ambiguousness of it; while both character's hold their society's values in great esteem they also recognize the limitations of it even before the story begins. So while it plays with the "learning about other cultures" theme there is an undercurrent that both already know those lessons. It also helps that the story has a unique viewpoint: a ghost AI that runs one a spacesuit. It's a subtle story that has some interesting layers and I appreciated it for that.
So my ballot would be:
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss”
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled”
“Exhalation”
No award
“Article of Faith”
“Evil Robot Monkey”
Saturday, March 21, 2009
The 2009 Hugo Nominees
I'm leaving for a four hour drive to MidSouthCon in a few minutes but I had to take a few moments to point out the 2009 Hugo nominees:
Best Novel
Anathem by Neal Stephenson
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross
Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi
Best Novella
“The Erdmann Nexus” by Nancy Kress
“The Political Prisoner” by Charles Coleman Finlay
“The Tear” by Ian McDonald
“True Names” by Benjamin Rosenbaum & Cory Doctorow
“Truth” by Robert Reed
Best Novelette
“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear
Best Short Story
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” by Kij Johnson
“Article of Faith” by Mike Resnick
“Evil Robot Monkey” by Mary Robinette Kowal
“Exhalation” by Ted Chiang
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled” by Michael Swanwick
Best Related Book
Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn
Spectrum 15: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art by Cathy & Arnie Fenner, eds.
The Vorkosigan Companion: The Universe of Lois McMaster Bujold by Lillian Stewart Carl & John Helfers, eds.
What It Is We Do When We Read Science Fiction by Paul Kincaid
Your Hate Mail Will be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi
Best Graphic Story
The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle Written by Jim Butcher, art by Ardian Syaf
Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright
Fables: War and Pieces Written by Bill Willingham, pencilled by Mark Buckingham, art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy, color by Lee Loughridge, letters by Todd Klein
Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic Story and art by Howard Tayler
Serenity: Better Days Written by Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews, art by Will Conrad, color by Michelle Madsen, cover by Jo Chen
Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores Written/created by Brian K. Vaughan, pencilled/created by Pia Guerra, inked by Jose Marzan, Jr.
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
The Dark Knight Christopher Nolan & David S. Goyer, story; Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan, screenplay; based on characters created by Bob Kane; Christopher Nolan, director
Hellboy II: The Golden Army Guillermo del Toro & Mike Mignola, story; Guillermo del Toro, screenplay; based on the comic by Mike Mignola; Guillermo del Toro, director
Iron Man Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby and Art Marcum & Matt Holloway, screenplay; based on characters created by Stan Lee & Don Heck & Larry Lieber & Jack Kirby; Jon Favreau, director
METAtropolis by John Scalzi, ed. Written by: Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder
WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form
Lost - “The Constant” Carlton Cuse & Damon Lindelof, writers; Jack Bender, director
Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon & Maurissa Tancharoen , writers; Joss Whedon, director
Battlestar Galactica - “Revelations” Bradley Thompson & David Weddle, writers; Michael Rymer, director
Doctor Who - “Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead” Steven Moffat, writer; Euros Lyn, director
Doctor Who - “Turn Left” Russell T. Davies, writer; Graeme Harper, director
Best Editor, Short Form
Ellen Datlow
Stanley Schmidt
Jonathan Strahan
Gordon Van Gelder
Sheila Williams
Best Editor, Long Form
Lou Anders
Ginjer Buchanan
David G. Hartwell
Beth Meacham
Patrick Nielsen Hayden
Best Professional Artist
Daniel Dos Santos
Bob Eggleton
Donato Giancola
John Picacio
Shaun Tan
Best Semiprozine
Clarkesworld Magazine edited by Neil Clarke, Nick Mamatas & Sean Wallace
Interzone edited by Andy Cox
Locus edited by Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong-Wong, & Liza Groen Trombi
The New York Review of Science Fiction edited by Kathryn Cramer, Kris Dikeman, David G. Hartwell, & Kevin J. Maroney
Weird Tales edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal
Best Fanzine
Argentus edited by Steven H Silver
Banana Wings edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
Challenger edited by Guy H. Lillian III
The Drink Tank edited by Chris Garcia
Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
File 770 edited by Mike Glyer
Best Fan Writer
Chris Garcia
John Hertz
Dave Langford
Cheryl Morgan
Steven H Silver
Best Fan Artist
Alan F. Beck
Brad W. Foster
Sue Mason
Taral Wayne
Frank Wu
I'll be going over some of the categories across the next few weeks.
I find the number of young adult books nominated in the novel category to be odd. While there is nothing preventing YA books from being good they are intentionally geared for an immature audience. I'm left wondering if the nominations were due to the popularity of the author or the realities of publishing these days where YA is the ascendant market.
I'm pleased that they introduced the graphic novel category a year early but the nominees do not thrill me. Two webcomics (and in fairness two of the very few webcomics that I follow) and two adaptations of an already popular work from another medium are not strong nominees while the remaining two are climaxes of long running Vertigo books. Ah well, there were many worse choices.
Best Novel
Anathem by Neal Stephenson
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross
Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi
Best Novella
“The Erdmann Nexus” by Nancy Kress
“The Political Prisoner” by Charles Coleman Finlay
“The Tear” by Ian McDonald
“True Names” by Benjamin Rosenbaum & Cory Doctorow
“Truth” by Robert Reed
Best Novelette
“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear
Best Short Story
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” by Kij Johnson
“Article of Faith” by Mike Resnick
“Evil Robot Monkey” by Mary Robinette Kowal
“Exhalation” by Ted Chiang
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled” by Michael Swanwick
Best Related Book
Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn
Spectrum 15: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art by Cathy & Arnie Fenner, eds.
The Vorkosigan Companion: The Universe of Lois McMaster Bujold by Lillian Stewart Carl & John Helfers, eds.
What It Is We Do When We Read Science Fiction by Paul Kincaid
Your Hate Mail Will be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi
Best Graphic Story
The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle Written by Jim Butcher, art by Ardian Syaf
Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright
Fables: War and Pieces Written by Bill Willingham, pencilled by Mark Buckingham, art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy, color by Lee Loughridge, letters by Todd Klein
Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic Story and art by Howard Tayler
Serenity: Better Days Written by Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews, art by Will Conrad, color by Michelle Madsen, cover by Jo Chen
Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores Written/created by Brian K. Vaughan, pencilled/created by Pia Guerra, inked by Jose Marzan, Jr.
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form
The Dark Knight Christopher Nolan & David S. Goyer, story; Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan, screenplay; based on characters created by Bob Kane; Christopher Nolan, director
Hellboy II: The Golden Army Guillermo del Toro & Mike Mignola, story; Guillermo del Toro, screenplay; based on the comic by Mike Mignola; Guillermo del Toro, director
Iron Man Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby and Art Marcum & Matt Holloway, screenplay; based on characters created by Stan Lee & Don Heck & Larry Lieber & Jack Kirby; Jon Favreau, director
METAtropolis by John Scalzi, ed. Written by: Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder
WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form
Lost - “The Constant” Carlton Cuse & Damon Lindelof, writers; Jack Bender, director
Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon & Maurissa Tancharoen , writers; Joss Whedon, director
Battlestar Galactica - “Revelations” Bradley Thompson & David Weddle, writers; Michael Rymer, director
Doctor Who - “Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead” Steven Moffat, writer; Euros Lyn, director
Doctor Who - “Turn Left” Russell T. Davies, writer; Graeme Harper, director
Best Editor, Short Form
Ellen Datlow
Stanley Schmidt
Jonathan Strahan
Gordon Van Gelder
Sheila Williams
Best Editor, Long Form
Lou Anders
Ginjer Buchanan
David G. Hartwell
Beth Meacham
Patrick Nielsen Hayden
Best Professional Artist
Daniel Dos Santos
Bob Eggleton
Donato Giancola
John Picacio
Shaun Tan
Best Semiprozine
Clarkesworld Magazine edited by Neil Clarke, Nick Mamatas & Sean Wallace
Interzone edited by Andy Cox
Locus edited by Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong-Wong, & Liza Groen Trombi
The New York Review of Science Fiction edited by Kathryn Cramer, Kris Dikeman, David G. Hartwell, & Kevin J. Maroney
Weird Tales edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal
Best Fanzine
Argentus edited by Steven H Silver
Banana Wings edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
Challenger edited by Guy H. Lillian III
The Drink Tank edited by Chris Garcia
Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
File 770 edited by Mike Glyer
Best Fan Writer
Chris Garcia
John Hertz
Dave Langford
Cheryl Morgan
Steven H Silver
Best Fan Artist
Alan F. Beck
Brad W. Foster
Sue Mason
Taral Wayne
Frank Wu
I'll be going over some of the categories across the next few weeks.
I find the number of young adult books nominated in the novel category to be odd. While there is nothing preventing YA books from being good they are intentionally geared for an immature audience. I'm left wondering if the nominations were due to the popularity of the author or the realities of publishing these days where YA is the ascendant market.
I'm pleased that they introduced the graphic novel category a year early but the nominees do not thrill me. Two webcomics (and in fairness two of the very few webcomics that I follow) and two adaptations of an already popular work from another medium are not strong nominees while the remaining two are climaxes of long running Vertigo books. Ah well, there were many worse choices.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)