Hugo Recs: Best Related Work
Feb. 19th, 2015 09:06 amHere are my recommendations for nomination for the Best Related Work Hugo. This category is a bit of catch all for non-fiction related to SFF. As such a lot of different types of things are eligible. My first year voting I found the category overwhelming and didn’t vote. But last year I quite enjoyed reading my way through the category. Anyways I have few things to suggest people consider for this category.
Invisible: Personal Essays on Representation in SF/F ed. Jim C. Hines
This is collection of essays by people form underrepresented groups writing about their experiences not seeing people like themselves in fiction. I found this really moving – some of the essays made me cry. I think it really important work and I want everyone in the SFF community to read this.
Lightspeed Magazine, June 2014: Women Destroy Science Fiction! Special Issue ed. Christie Yant
This was an awesome project to make women in Science Fiction more visible. And I really enjoyed all the stories and essays. There is some debate over the eligibility of this work since collections of fiction are eligible only if “noteworthy primarily for aspects other than the fictional text.” I feel this qualifies because it a noteworthy feminist project that is creating dialog about women SFF writers. However it is possible that the Hugo administrators will disagree with me. If I had a lot of things I wanted to nominate I might skip this because of the eligibility issues, but since I don’t I’m going to nominate and let someone else decide.
What Makes This Book So Great by Jo Walton
So I own a signed copy of this book, but I have not technically read it. However I have read all of the blog post collected here on tor.com were they originally appeared. In these essays Walton re-reads books and talks about them. After reading her thoughts on a book I generally have good idea if I want to read it or not. And if I’ve read the book before reading her review it generally gives me new things to think about. I’ve read a bunch of books I don’t think I would have otherwise found with her recommendation. The book also contains some more meta essays like thoughts on different types of series and the meaning of “mainstream.” What Makes This Book So Great is lovely way to learn more about speculative fiction—either by finding new books to read or encouraging interesting thoughts about books already read.
Invisible: Personal Essays on Representation in SF/F ed. Jim C. Hines
This is collection of essays by people form underrepresented groups writing about their experiences not seeing people like themselves in fiction. I found this really moving – some of the essays made me cry. I think it really important work and I want everyone in the SFF community to read this.
Lightspeed Magazine, June 2014: Women Destroy Science Fiction! Special Issue ed. Christie Yant
This was an awesome project to make women in Science Fiction more visible. And I really enjoyed all the stories and essays. There is some debate over the eligibility of this work since collections of fiction are eligible only if “noteworthy primarily for aspects other than the fictional text.” I feel this qualifies because it a noteworthy feminist project that is creating dialog about women SFF writers. However it is possible that the Hugo administrators will disagree with me. If I had a lot of things I wanted to nominate I might skip this because of the eligibility issues, but since I don’t I’m going to nominate and let someone else decide.
What Makes This Book So Great by Jo Walton
So I own a signed copy of this book, but I have not technically read it. However I have read all of the blog post collected here on tor.com were they originally appeared. In these essays Walton re-reads books and talks about them. After reading her thoughts on a book I generally have good idea if I want to read it or not. And if I’ve read the book before reading her review it generally gives me new things to think about. I’ve read a bunch of books I don’t think I would have otherwise found with her recommendation. The book also contains some more meta essays like thoughts on different types of series and the meaning of “mainstream.” What Makes This Book So Great is lovely way to learn more about speculative fiction—either by finding new books to read or encouraging interesting thoughts about books already read.
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