March 3, 2015

SF/F Commentary

My Complete 2015 Hugo Awards Nominations Ballot (Finished on 3/10/15)

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It’s that time again.  Hugo Awards time.  Since the nomination period closes on March 10th, 2015, I figure it’s time to start sharing my ballot with the world. Note:  this list is extremely incomplete and will be periodically updated as I find things to add to unfilled categories.  Categories are also subject to change.  If you have suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments (seriously; I’m very scatterbrained at the moment, so I’m missing all kinds of things). Here goes: Best Novel (Just Let Me Nominate 12 Novels…) City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie Memory of Water by Emmi Itaranta Breach Zone by Myke Cole The Mirror Empire by Kameron Hurley Best Novella Scale Bright by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (Immersion Press) Grand Jeté (The Great Leap) by Rachel Swirsky (Subterranean Press) Where the Trains Turn by Pasi Ilmari Jääskeläinen (Tor.com) The Mothers of Voorhisville by Mary Rickert (Tor.com) Hath No Fury by Kat Howard (Subterranean Press) Best Novelette “From the Nothing, With Love” by Project Itoh (Phantasm Japan) “The End of the End of Everything” by Dale Bailey (Tor.com) “Among the Thorns” by Veronica Schanoes (Tor.com) “Reborn” by Ken Liu (Tor.com) “The Bonedrake’s Penance” by Yoon Ha Lee (Beneath Ceaseless Skies) Under consideration: “Three Partitions” by Bogi Takács (Giganotosaurus) Best Short Story “A Whisper in the Weld” by Alix E. Harrow (Shimmerzine) “Autodidact” by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (Clarkesworld) “A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide” by Sarah Pinsker (F&SF) “The Vaporization Enthalpy of a Peculiar Pakistani Family” by Usman T. Malik (Qualia Nous) “Makeisha in Time” by Rachael K. Jones (Crossed Genres) Under consideration:   “Never the Same” by Polenth Blake (Strange Horizons) “Resurrection Points” by Usman T. Malik (Strange Horizons) Best Related Work Jodorovsky’s Dune (dir. Frank Pavich) Special Needs in Strange Worlds (SF Signal; ed. Sarah Chorn) Speculative Fiction 2013 (Ana Grilo and Thea James) Rocket Talk (Justin Landon; Tor.com) Best Graphic Story Ms. Marvel Vol. 1: No Normal (G. Willow Wilson and Adrian Alphona) The Wake (Scott Snyder and Sean Murphy) Saga Vol. 3 (Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples) Saga Vol. 4 (Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples) Uncanny X-Men: The Good, the Bad, the Inhuman (Brian Michael Bendis, Chris Bachalo, and Kristafer Anka) Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form) Interstellar (dir. Christopher Nolan) Snowpiercer (dir. Bong Joon-ho) Edge of Tomorrow (dir. Doug Liman) Big Hero 6 (dirs. Don Hall and Chris Williams) Guardians of the Galaxy (dir. James Gunn) Reconsidering:  Captain America:  The Winter Soldier (dirs. Anthony and Joe Russo) Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form) “Tempest Fugit” from Sleepy Hollow (Season One)(written by Mark Goffman; dir. Paul Edwards) “Turn, Turn, Turn” from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (Season One)(written by Jed Whedon and Maurissa Tancharoen; dir. Vincent Misiano) “The Watchers on the Wall” from Game of Thrones (Season Four)(written by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss; dir. Neil Marshall) “The Children” from Game of Thrones (Season Four)(written by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss; dir. Alex Graves) “The Last Stand” from Legend of Korra (Season Four)(written by Michael Dante Dimartino; dir. Melchior Zwyer) Best Editor (Long Form) Anne Perry (Hodder & Stoughton) Jenni Hill (Orbit UK) Lee Harris (Angry Robot Books) Amanda Rutter (Strange Chemistry and Angry Robot Books) Julian Pavia (Crown/Broadway) Best Editor (Short Form) Neil Clarke (Clarkesworld) Andy Cox (Interzone) Julia Rios (Strange Horizons and Kaleidoscope) Alisa Krasnostein (Kaleidoscope) Ellen Datlow (Tor.com) Best Professional Artist Victo Ngai Stephen Martiniere Abigail Larson Kekai Kotaki Kentaro Kanamoto Under consideration:  Sam Burley, Richard Anderson, Galen Dara, and Noah Bradley. Best Semiprozine The Book Smugglers (Ana Grilo and Thea James) Interzone (ed. Andy Cox) Strange Horizons (ed. by a legion) Giganotosaurus (ed. Rashida J. Smith) Crossed Genres (eds. Bart R. Leib, Kay T. Holt, and Kelly Jennings) Best Fanzine A Dribble of Ink (Aidan Moher) Nerds of a Feather, Flock Together (TheG and Vance Kotlra) Bookworm Blues (Sarah Chorn) Ecdysis (Jonathan Crowe) Lady Business (Renay, Ana, and Jodie) Under Consideration:  SFF Mistressworks (Ian Sales) Best Fancast Doorway to the Hidden World (Jeffrey Pelton, who is totally not Kevin Lux) The Incomparable (Jason Snell) The Book Was Better (???) The Writer and the Critic (Kirstyn McDermott and Ian Mond) Best Fan Writer Sarah Chorn Paul Weimer Foz Meadows Abigail Nussbaum Natalie Luhrs Best Fan Artist Alice X. Zhang (OMG YES) Finnian MacManus (OMG YES) euclase (some of the best still lifes ever) Evankart (loving the Winter Soldier work) Sandara (more beautiful art; should be making book covers) The John W. Campbell (YES IT IS A FUCKING HUGO SHUT UP) Award S.L. Huang (author of Zero Sum Game) Benjanun Sriduangkaew (author of Scale Bright) Usman Malik (author of “Resurrection Points”) Brian McClellan (author of the Powder Mage Trilogy) Michael J. Martinez (author of The Enceladus Crisis) ——————————— Disclaimer (because we need these now, given the current Hugo Awards climate):   This list reflects what I think are worthy works.  It is not intended for any sort of logrolling.  It is not my effort to tell anyone “this is what you should vote for.”  Vote for whatever the hell you want.  My only hope with this list is that it introduces some folks to things they might otherwise have missed (or that it will reveal gaps in my reading/viewing that need filling).

SF/F Commentary

Helsinki in 2017: Why I Support the Bid & the Supreme Awesomeness of Finnish Care Packages

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If you didn’t already know, I’m a huge supporter of Helsinki’s 2017 Worldcon bid.  A huge supporter.  I did the whole pre-support thing when I was in London last year, and I intend to go through the whole process of voting for Helsinki at this year’s Worldcon — well, not at the actual con, mind, but you get the idea. I’ve never done anything like this before.  But in the last year-ish, I’ve met and talked to numerous folks from Finland or involved in the Helsinki bid (Crystal, I’m talking about you!), I’ve held and taken many pictures with Moomins, and I’ve learned about Helsinki itself.  Plus, I love Nightwish: And more Nightwish: Sing it, Tarja Turunen! Anyway.  Where was I?  Oh, right, so Helsinki in 2017.  Big supporter. So there are all kinds of reasons I want the bid to go to Helsinki: First, the idea of a Worldcon in Helsinki just sounds amazing.  Finland is a gorgeous country.  Don’t believe me?  Look for yourself.  It’s gorgeous all the time.  Summer, spring, winter, whenever.  It’s just gorgeous.  GORGEOUS.  And what about Helsinki?  Gorgeous.  Plus, I’m told it has great food, good public transport, cool markets, and lots of old stuff for weird old stuff lovers like me to enjoy.  If London gets to have a Worldcon because it’s an awesome city, then there’s no good reason Helsinki shouldn’t get one, too.  Plus, they have reindeer.  And tea.  Seriously.  Why hasn’t Worldcon been in Helsinki already? Second, Helsinki is, well, different.  I’ve never been to Finland, let alone anywhere farther east than England.  But the idea of traveling to a new place to meet new folks who love the things that I love is nothing short of amazing.  I loved meeting non-US folks at LonCon3.  In fact, this is probably my favorite thing about conventions:  meeting new people.  And I want to meet more Finnish fans.  And I want to see what they’ll bring to the Worldcon table if they win their bid.  Guaranteed, it will be awesome. Lastly, I think of “Worldcon” in quite literal terms:  a WORLD convention.  Whether that was its purpose in the beginning is irrelevant.  I would much rather have Worldcon hit a country on all 6 of the other continents before it came back to North America — let alone the United States.  Don’t get me wrong.  I love the U.S., too, but I think the “WORLD” part of sf/f deserves more love than it gets.  These are global genres, and I think our two “world” conventions should do their best to move about the world, to bring new fandoms into the fold in a big and significant way.  Finnish fandom is important, after all, and it seems high time Finland rock the Worldcon train with some good old fashioned Finnish cool. There are, of course, other great reasons to support Helsinki.  If you’re a supporter, let me know why in the comments. Now for the last little bit of fun: If you were following me on Twitter, you’ll have learned that I received what I’m calling a Finnish Care Package from a Helsinki in 2017 crewninja (what is their official title anyway?).  That care package included everything in the picture below: The picture contains: A booklet on Finnish customs (super cool) Helsinki in 2017 Stickers Helsinki in 2017 Keychain Gizmos (I think that’s what they are) A Tourist Guide to Helsinki A Food Guide to Helsinki (ah, hell yeah!) A jar of cloudberry preserves (which are very interesting, by the way) A copy of Emmi Itäranta’s incredible novel, Memory of Water (we interviewed her on the Skiffy and Fanty Show, by the way) 3 Bags of Finnish Tea from Forsman Tea:  Lakrits Te (Svart te; Indian-Ceylon w/ licorice oil), Mustikka Superior (Musta Lehtitee; blueberry tea, though I’m not sure what the “base” is because I can’t read Finnish), and Citrus Seikkailu (Vihreä Gun Powder Tee; green gun powder tea w/ lemon and orange spices). I’ve already given the licorice tea a spin, and I pretty much loved it.  I’m going to review all of them over the next week, since I have a ton of Hugo Awards reading to do.  And to make things interesting, I’m going to start comparing teas to characters from Battlestar Galactica, since I drink so much damn tea and should probably be reviewing the stuff anyway. So, there you have it.  My reasons for voting Helsinki and the nifty stuff I got in the mail.  My week totally got better 🙂

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