Friday, June 21, 2019

Hugo Roundup: Best Novelette

Novelettes are weird. There aren't as many markets for them, they don't do well as standalones, and a lot of writers avoid the length.

Despite that, there were some good offerings.

1. If at First You Don't Succeed, Try, Try Again, by Zen Cho. Not in the packet, and was apparently released on a blog. I elected not to go searching for it. At least the URL, people.
2. The Last Banquet of Temporal Confections, by Tina Connolly. Dystopian fantasy with a food theme. May well make you hungry. Very well written.
3. Nine Last Days on Planet Earth by Daryl Gregory. Enjoyable, but doesn't really quite integrate the speculative elements with the human elements.
4. The Thing About Ghost Stories by Naomi Kritzer. Very cute. That's really the best word for it.
5. The Only Harmless Great Thing by Brooke Bolander. I'm sorry, but I couldn't get past the base concept of training elephants to paint watch dials.
6. When We Were Starless by Simone Heller. Brilliant far future...something. Beautifully written even if I never did work out what the protagonist's species is. It didn't matter.

My pick: When We Were Starless
My prediction: Either that or The Last Banquet. Depends on how hungry people are.

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