The Award For Best Award

By our count, there are currently somewhat in excess of 50 different awards given out regularly every year

What makes people pay attention to
the Hugo Awards? History, process,
& focus. (Photo by Olav Rokne)

for science fiction and fantasy fiction, and another 60 or so defunct awards that were at some point handed out annually. These range from broad-based awards intended to showcase popular works, to regional and national awards, to awards for narrow niches in the genre, to those dedicated to advancing a specific ideology within genre fiction.

There are in fact enough award systems to warrant the effort of analysis to help decide which awards are worth paying attention to. Of course, dichotomous and divisive “success or failure” judgments are less useful than comparing how they’re organized and speculating about what might contribute to a robust and respected award. Examining the growing pains of recently created awards and thinking about why several smaller awards have managed to establish long-term relevance can also be helpful.

In our opinion, there are several major factors that can contribute to an awards system being perceived as having legitimacy: a track record of recognizing works that are broadly accepted as having enduring value; a consistent democratic and transparent process with accountability checks; and having a differentiated mandate that serves some segment of fandom.

The Weight of History

While subjecting awards to a ranking is, well, subjective, Hugo-winning fan writer Mike Glyer made a valiant effort to crowdsource a ranking of the top genre awards last year (though two of the awards listed have since changed their names). This gave fans a way to weigh in on which awards they felt were the most prestigious.

With slight variations, Glyer’s list falls roughly into chronological order by the date of these awards being established. The Hugos are at the top of the list, and that's probably in part because they are old, and have had the time to build a community and recognize more works that people love. In contrast, the Arthur C. Clarke Award jury never had an opportunity to hand out a trophy to the novel Dune.

Over time repetition becomes tradition, and tradition accrues the patina of respectability. However, reading fanzines and Worldcon publications from when the Hugos began in the mid-1950s, one gets a sense that the award did not engender much respect until later — many convention reports of the day limit coverage of the awards to statements such as “Some people won some awards.” In 1955, fan Wallace Weber describes the awards as the “low point of the convention.”

The Power of Process

The lack of respect shown to the Hugos during their early years may have to do with the inconsistent and ad hoc process by which the award was organized. Although always based on a public vote, the rules by which that vote took place varied from year to year, the categories on the ballot seemed to change randomly, and even the eligibility dates were wildly inconsistent.

Although it would be unfair to hold Hugo Awards of the 1950s to the same standards of process as modern awards, examining their stumbles, and how the process has evolved can be instructive.

The much-lamented presentation of the 1955 Hugo for best novel to Mark Clifton and Frank Reily’s

They'd Rather Be Right (AKA
The Forever Machine) would be
unlikely to win under modern
Hugo Awards balloting.
(Image via Wikipedia) 

They’d Rather Be Right actually points to the problems posed by a poorly engineered awards process. At that time, Hugo votes were cast via a write-in ballot and one-stage system. Thus, it was relatively easy for the award to go to a book that was loved by a small-but-enthusiastic group of fans, and to ignore the mainstream opinion. 

The creation of the WSFS constitution in 1963, and the subsequent gradual refinement of a relatively transparent awards voting system that balances participatory engagement with accountability has led to the Hugo process becoming one of the most robust. Although there have been a handful of attempts to subvert the award (such as the 1989 ballot-stuffing incident), these have been largely unsuccessful, which speaks to the quality of the process, and the dedication of WSFS business meeting participants.

Similarly, other recognizable awards have well-defined and robust procedures for selecting winners. The Nebulas, the Locus Award, the Clarke Award, the BSFA Award, are all open and consistent in their process; which engenders trust in the system among those paying attention.

There is a long tradition of inconsistent and ad-hoc processes in awards that have since faded from memory. It will be interesting to see if current attempts to launch new major awards will learn from or be plagued by these same errors of process. In particular, strong communication and clear focus are critical to establishing a long-running award.

Specific Focus

One of the reasons for the Hugo Awards’ survival through several years in which the process was irregular, and the award-winners were inconsistent, may have been that they had a specific mandate that was un-served by other contemporaneous literary awards: they were at the time the only game in town when it came to science fiction awards. Newer awards do not have that luxury; unless they are in some

It seems unlikely that a work 
like The Unincorporated Man
would gain much attention 
from mainstream awards. 
But the Prometheus Award
appeals to a specific niche. 
(Image via Amazon)

way different from the Hugos and Nebulas, they will likely continue to be compared unfavorably to the more established awards.

Perhaps proving the point, several awards have succeeded in part by finding their niche. For more than four decades, the Libertarian Futurist Society has recognized achievement in science fiction (and occasionally fantasy) that conforms to their worldview with the Prometheus Award. Similarly, the Otherwise Award (formerly known as the Tiptree) has an almost three-decade history of recognizing works of science fiction that explore an understanding of gender.

These may be narrow, and socio-political, categories, but the fact that the organizers and juries are up-front about their purpose helps them build a community willing to ensure sustainability.

The Carhullan Army by Sarah Hall is an excellent book, but appealed to too niche an audience to get Hugo or Nebula consideration. By recognizing The Carhullan Army, the Otherwise Award fulfilled a purpose by helping the book find new audiences.

When starting a new award for science fiction or fantasy, members of the general fannish public will always wonder “why should I pay attention to this award, rather than to the more established awards?” Having a clear mandate helps answer this existential question.

Doing it well

An example of a new award that seems to have been set up for long-term success can be found in the IGNYTE Award. The award was founded in 2020 by editors of FIYAH Magazine to “celebrate the vibrancy and diversity of the current and future landscapes of science fiction, fantasy.” Between this statement and FIYAH Magazine’s mission to promote works by BIPOC creators, the award has a relatively clear mandate (and one that has historically been underserved by existing awards).

Additionally, the award founders provided a clear description of the selection process: a 15-person jury to create a short-list, followed by public voting. Given that this award has been around for less than a year, it’s impossible to say whether that process will be robust and consistent, but they have clearly put thought into the process, and how it will fulfill the award’s mandate.

Conclusion

All awards systems have their structural biases, and the collective biases of the people making the selections. This is unavoidable and obvious in all areas of creative output.

Awards systems are by their very nature political; it is an expression of power dynamics to elevate one work over another, even when those deciding what gets elevated are doing so in good faith. It is therefore important to recognize the difference between suggesting that an award “got it wrong” with a selection, and suggesting that the entire awards system is invalid.

It is easy to find several examples through the years of reactionary awards systems that were created in protest of the decision made by more prominent awards. When they’re created with integrity and honesty about the political motivations, more new awards can add a lot of value to the evolving conversation about genre works.

But when the creators of an award offer little more than a vague declaration that the mainstream awards “are broken,” one has to question the motivation.

Even Charles Stross' worst book is pretty good

If we select nominations for Best Series based on a representative title being released in 2020, The

Laundry Files may not make the grade. But if we are choosing nominations based on the strength of the entire series, then Charles Stross’s decades-long Laundry Files series is nearly a lock for our ballots.

This is not to say that Dead Lies Dreaming is a let-down. Rather, it’s an uneven book that doesn’t always showcase the strengths of the series, or Stross’ rich imagination.

Taking place in a London transformed by the rise of the dark and eldritch forces unleashed during the events of the previous few Laundry Files novels, Dead Lies Dreaming follows the exploits of a group of marginalized youths who support themselves through magic-based crime. Through various circumstances — and family connections — they become embroiled in a plot to travel back in time and secure a rare and dangerous tome of magic.

As always with Stross, there’s a fair degree of on-point criticism of capitalism’s excesses, much of which lands well. The sections in which he uses the point of view of the marginalized youths to examine the completely bizarre housing market in the United Kingdom, are perspicacious, witty, and sad.

One of the strongest scenes — and perhaps the most difficult to read because it hits so close to home — involves a visit to a long-term care facility. Stross writes the section with a keen eye for the real-world horrors of old age, dementia, and under-resourced nursing staff.

Those who have spent time at privatized seniors
care facilities will find Stross' insightful writing
about such places to be harrowing.
(Image via Chilliwack Progress) 

Where Dead Lies Dreaming falls down as a book is that it’s hard to get a handle on any of the characters as people. Several of them seem interesting at first — particularly police officer / thief taker Wendy Deere, and corporate power-broker Eve. Stross has introduced a large and diverse cast, but doesn’t develop many of them beyond sketch work.

Stross has made a clean break here from all the previous books in the series. The story barely even mentions any of the existing characters, does not tie into the overall story arc, and doesn’t even touch on the spycraft that had been the unifying theme for the series. This makes one wonder whether this book might have been better-served by being pared down, streamlined, and released as something wholly separate.

It has been almost a decade since Charles Stross penned a novel that was not a sequel to one of his previous books. Dead Lies Dreaming is still a sequel, but in some ways it is a welcome change in that it stands alone far more than most of his recent novels. Some might even find it a better entry point to the world of the Laundry Files than several of the previous books. But is this a world that is worth devoting many more books to? Only Stross can pull that off, and we think he could, but is he ready to move on? Dead Lies Dreaming leaves us hoping he might be.

The Vanished Birds soars

Rich with anthropological detail and criticism of market-driven ideologies, Simon Jimenez’ debut novel is a puzzle that rewards those with the patience to figure out how all the pieces fit together.

(image via Goodreads)

The novel’s sections appear at first to be distinct from each other. Readers begin by learning about a child growing up in an early agrarian society visited by space ships about every dozen years. Next they’re swept into the story of a merchant vessel from an advanced mercantile civilization reliant on exploiting planets like the one in the first chapter. Finally, the novel becomes an adventure about the rescue of a lost crew member.

Throughout the novel, flashbacks to a near contemporaneous earth are used to convey backstory through the eyes of Fumiko, an early architect of interstellar civilization who skips forward through time by going in and out of suspended animation.

Although various parts of the novel appealed to various book club members differently, there was a consensus that Jimenez’ writing is excellent. Some of us were drawn in by the first chapter while others were worried it was setting up a more wunderkind YA narrative. Using a subsistence farmer’s point of view in the first chapter served to create context for the subsequent stories.

There was even sharper disagreement about the flashbacks. Some club members felt it was essential exposition about the failure of modern capitalism and the colonization of space, while others described the flashbacks as extraneous.

The final section of the novel, in which the plot hits a fairly frenetic pace, left some readers scratching their heads. The change in tone from a contemplative — almost meditative — novel, to an action-adventure is somewhat jarring. 

(Image via Backpage)

Space opera is a subgenre that has all-too-often fallen into the trap of focusing on technology, rather than imagining alternative ways that humans can organize themselves. One of the most appealing aspects of The Vanished Birds is that Jimenez weaves social commentary and structural critiques into the cultural setting. He’s skillful enough not to slap readers in the face with this, but rather offers enough detail that those who scratch beneath the surface will be rewarded.

Jimenez seems deeply versed in the history of the genre; at times paying homage to Ursula K. le Guin, and at others referencing Alfred Bester. In fact, the book could be read as a direct response to Bester’s The Stars My Destination, as one of the main characters in The Vanished Birds can jaunt like the earlier novel’s protagonist Gully Foyle — and at a whim can travel across vast distances almost instantaneously. Jimenez’ seems to be suggesting that a citizen’s ability to leave would be the ultimate subversion of corporate power. 

The Vanished Birds is a puzzling novel, and one whose pieces occasionally fit together oddly. But it is also  a smart and thoughtful book that will deeply appeal to readers looking for cultural criticism in their outer-space adventures. 

Hugo Cinema Club: The "No Award" of 1959

This blog post is the second in a series examining past winners of the Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo Award. An introductory blog post is here.  

At the 1959 Hugo Awards, three movies that are still well-remembered today vied for the title of “Best

(Image via IMDB)

Hollywood Movie.” There was The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, in which Ray Harryhausen crafted the first of his mythology-inspired adventure movies; the influential off-kilter science fiction horror in The Fly (directed by Kurt Neumann); and Christopher Lee redefined the modern vampire in the Hammer Studios version of Dracula. It was an excellent shortlist.

In a decision that looks more and more curious in retrospect, none of these films were honoured, as Hugo voters chose to present no award.

At the time, this was not a controversial choice. In the fanzine Science Fiction Times, Belle C. Dietz describes that the vote to do so was overwhelming. Writing in Fanac, Dick Eney describes people cheering as they learned that no movie would be honoured that year. The long-standing beef that many fans had with how filmmakers outside of fandom had adapted their genre to the screen seems to have been in full force that year.

It’s a shame because each of these movies has a lot of strengths, and each show differing ways in which science fiction and fantasy cinema continued to evolve.

Of the three, The 7th Voyage of Sinbad is the most visually compelling, but it’s also clearly the weakest in terms of storytelling and acting. The movie follows Sinbad (Kerwin Mathews) as he goes to Colossa Island, fights monsters, and gets involved in a magician’s subterfuge. The plot seems to exist mostly to take the viewer from one special effects sequence to the next, but those sequences are compelling enough to warrant a viewing.

In many ways, it is not a movie that has aged well: There are significant issues of cultural appropriation, of casting lilly-white actors to play Middle-Eastern protagonists, and the reinforcement of unfortunate

As visually impressive as any
movie made in the 1950s,
7th Voyage of Sinbad is
basically still just a kids movie.
 (Image via Classic Film)

cultural stereotypes. But the creature effects and the skeleton fight scene are epic. It pushed special effects forward so much that it was selected for preservation by the United States National Film Registry.

Modern viewers are probably more familiar with David Cronenberg’s 1986 remake, but the original The Fly also holds up remarkably well. Much like the remake, the 1958 original is a body horror about a man who becomes merged with a fly during an experiment in teleportation.

The narrative framing of having the story told as an extended flashback as police interrogate Hélène does a disservice to the plot. Because of this framing, viewers go into the horror knowing how the story will end, who will survive, and who will not. This unfortunately leeches some of the tension out of an otherwise first-rate science fiction horror.

The pacing of The Fly is terrific, the acting and directing are more naturalistic than was common for films of the era, and the horror of a man slowly losing himself is extremely effective. This would have been a worthy Hugo winner, and was the top pick for at least one of our viewers.

He may not have a clue and he may not have style
But everything he lacks, well, he makes up in denial.
(Image via Avalon Theatre)

But for most of our viewing group, the clear stand-out on the ballot was Dracula. From top-to-bottom, the 1958 version of Dracula has an extraordinary cast: Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Michael Gough, and Melissa Stribling are all note perfect.

Despite making significant changes to the novel, it was still clearly made with care and respect for the original source material. The story may be more confined to a smaller stage, but the broad strokes are all there. And unlike previous almost-chaste adaptations of the novel, the Hammer Horror version oozes with a dark lust. This is the definitive movie version of Dracula, and should have not only won the Hugo Award, but deserved recognition from the Oscars.

All three of these movies received significant praise and commercial success outside of fandom. The 7th

Christopher Lee is the all-time
 definitive movie Dracula.
(Image via Filmschoolrejects.com)

Voyage of Sinbad earned $6 million at the box office — more than ten times its budget. A contemporaneous review in the London Spectator praised The Fly as ‘serious,’ ‘respectable,’ and ‘ingenious.’ While Motion Picture Daily listed Dracula as one of the all-time best horror films.

Interestingly and likely relevant, 1959 was the first Hugo Awards in which “No Award” was an option, and voters chose to snub all the movies in this category. In explaining why they offered voters that choice, Worldcon publications editor George Young wrote “It was very apparent from the nominations ballots that in some categories there was no particularly outstanding selection. Because of this we have included a choice called “No award in this category.” The option was offered in three categories: Short Story, Best New Author, and Best Movie.

It is an intense shame that voters felt the need to insult these films by declaring that none of them deserved recognition. It is sometimes easier to assess the enduring merit of works with the benefit of hindsight. It seems likely that if there were Retro Hugos for 1959, modern audiences would not select “No Award.”

Interview with Gautam Bhatia, author of The Wall

Lawyer, academic, and author Gautam Bhatia has been editing non-fiction articles at Strange

Gautam Bhatia’s debut novel
The Wall is the sort of book that
you keep pondering weeks after
you finish reading it. 
(Image via Amazon) 

Horizons magazine for more than five years. The Rhodes Scholar has written two non-fiction books about constitutional law, and in August saw his fiction debut The Wall released by HarperColins. The book, which is set in a city that has been trapped within an impenetrable wall for 2,000 years mixes insights into sociology, law, and the nature of rebellion. Bhatia, who is completing his PhD at Oxford, spoke via Skype with blog contributor Olav Rokne in September.   

The Wall is a powerful metaphor. Never more so than in the current political context, in which world leaders have used walls as a totemic symbol of their own xenophobia. Was this book in any way shaped by that political environment?

The idea of the wall was part of the story from the beginning. It was there when I started writing the book in 2008, long before walls … you know … really became such an unwanted part of our daily imagination. 

 But many people have always lived with walls.

I mean, the India-Bangladesh border has always inspired rhetoric about infiltration, so-called illegal migration, fences and walls. So there have been people who always suffered because of walls.

It strikes me that The Wall is actually an almost exact mirror image of what Iain M. Banks did; The Culture was entirely post-scarcity and the world of The Wall is one in which scarcity is turned up to the Nth degree.

There’s one little line where someone says that “you can vote for many things, but you can’t really vote against the wall.”

That line actually is a little sly tip of the hat to a statement made by one of the European Union commissioners when there was a popular protest movement in Italy against austerity, and he said that “look you can’t vote against the treaties.” There’s a sense that for the European Union, when a country wants to rebel against austerity, it’s treated as if they’re rebelling against the natural law of the world. How can you possibly vote against a natural law? 

 

And so I thought about what would happen if something like neoliberalism took a physical form in the shape of a wall; you literally can’t vote against The Wall.

In the world in which we live, scarcity is a rhetorical device that is used to suppress popular aspiration. What would happen if scarcity wasn’t just rhetorical, but actually physically there in front of you? 

Author Gautam Bhatia's
keen legal mind informs
his rich and nuanced 
worldbuilding. 
(Image via The Times of India)

What other writers influenced your writing?

[Ursula K.] Le Guin was a massive influence.

When I was seven or eight years old, my parents got for me a copy of the Wizard of Earthsea. There were three books I read when I was very young. One was the Hobbit, the second was the first Harry Potter (a Canadian colleague of my dad’s actually brought it from Canada when he came visiting and it hadn’t become a cult phenomenon yet), and the third was Earthsea.

At that time, I really loved Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter both. I kind of passed by them after a point, but Le Guin has been a continuing and formative influence.

Dispossessed, as you can see is a huge framing influence on this book in many ways, not just in the shape of the political conflict, but also what Le Guin kept telling us all: that we should imagine alternatives to capitalism, and that it was possible to imagine those alternatives even in constrained spaces.

There’s a scene early in your book that reminded me of The Dispossessed, how our words constrain our language, and how our languages can constrain our worlds. It’s the scene with Methila learning about the word “horizon.” I wondered if you were deliberately setting this up as a metaphor for the ways that our imagination can be constrained by a hegemonic set of ideas.

You’re right that it is a metaphor, but also I wanted to explore in literal terms what impact that kind of constrained life would have upon your language and what impact the inability to frame certain words would have upon how you could visualize certain things.

One thing that's fascinated me has been the interplay between language and the way we perceive the world. Samuel Delaney’s work was in that sense very interesting for me and more recently China Miéville’s Embassytown.

Can you tell me a little bit about the legal system, and what ideas were you trying to explore with it?

The exploration of the legal system in The Wall obviously stems from my other life as a lawyer — as a constitutional lawyer specifically.  

I realized over the years that legal structures — in a certain sense — form the hidden plumbing of the world. Many of the things that you don’t think have anything to do with the law are still very much undergirded by what the legal system allows or doesn’t allow.

[For example], the so-called free market itself is entirely a construction of a series of legal rules involving property contracts. So law is kind of the unarticulated basis of many things we do in our daily lives. It’s relatively unexplored in speculative fiction.

Law is so connected to the material realities of any society. If you were to change something as basic as having a wall that ensured a literal scarcity of resources, and created actual restraints on mobility, then the way the laws would be framed to express that material reality would also be very different. I thought it would be very interesting to explore.

Are you working on any books after these two?

Right now mentally and emotionally completely consumed by Book Two and finishing the story. I have some vague vague ideas for another series that continues to play with Ursula LeGuin’s whole idea that the task of speculative fiction writers is to imagine alternatives to capitalism. That’s just something that I’m obsessed with. I’m just thinking about how to work with that within a space opera framework.

It’s something a bit like what Iain M. Banks did, but he didn’t really explore how The Culture worked. He often focused more on the conflicts The Culture had with other non-Culture societies, and I’m more interested in how a post-capitalist space-faring society would work — how the mechanics of it might work from the inside. I just have some very very vague ideas which are completely unformed right now.

But for the moment, I’m investing my energy on Book Two and finishing that now.

A Strong Sense Of Justice

An active and ebullient presence on Twitter, Adri Joy has been blogging about science fiction for more

Adri Joy is one of the 
editors at Nerds Of A Feather.
(Image via Twitter) 

than five years.

Having joined Nerds of a Feather as one of their editors in 2019, she has written first-rate reviews and provided needed criticism. Her work deserves to be recognized and we will be putting her name on our Hugo nominating ballots in the fan writer category.

Given the fact that she is both a millennial and British, it should come as no surprise that her writing style is quippy and nuanced. Her reviews are often well-constructed, stylistically solid, and provide a strong through-line of argumentation about what makes a work compelling.

By any measure, Joy has written some of her best work in 2020. In her review of Incomplete Solutions, she provides a culturally sensitive approach to the work while not not turning a blind eye to issues surrounding gender. Her discussions with other bloggers about awards shortlists often provide both wry humour and accurate criticisms. In her blog post “Tor.com Publishing, First Become Ashes, and the pretty pastel packaging of abuse,” Joy offers an even-handed, insightful and compelling analysis of the marketing surrounding K.M. Szpara’s novels. It is this last post that is particularly illustrative of what makes Joy such an important voice in the SFF community: she is unafraid to engage with the political and social questions influencing the genre.

And on these political and social questions, Adri Joy seems motivated by a strong sense of justice. She is fierce in her defense of trans rights, gay rights, the rights of neurodiverse people, the rights of persons with disabilities, and the rights of all marginalized people. In doing so, she does not shy away from controversy, and seems more interested in integrity than popularity.

Just as important as her blogging, Joy’s presence on Twitter contributes to her standing as a first-rate fan writer. She is quick-witted, funny, and fast to find the joy in the SFF community.

There are times that some people in this book club don’t entirely agree with Joy. What is undeniable however, is that she argues with insight, passion, and tenacity. Even when we disagree with her, the debate is better for what she has to say.

There is grandeur in this view of life

“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.” 

— Charles Darwin

An alternate history that delves into unfollowed evolutionary paths, Adrian Tchaikovsky’s latest novel The Doors Of Eden is a complex and perplexing book that is ultimately more than the sum of its parts.

The book follows four disconnected people in London: young Fortean cryptid hunter Lee whose girlfriend Mal mysteriously vanishes; a mathematician Dr. Kay Amal Khan who is targeted by terrorists; a ruthless criminal enforcer Lucas May whose employer seems to be involved in the paranormal; MI5 agent Julian and his colleague Alison.

Each of these characters spends the first half of the novel investigating disparate mysteries, all of which eventually are revealed to have a common cause: the impending collapse of the universe.

Between character-based chapters, non-diegetic inserts offer vignettes about how evolution progressed in different timelines. The relevance of these passages to the narrative unfolds as the beings in these worlds become part of a larger effort to preserve the multiverse.

It’s a lot to fit into one book, and sometimes it feels like Tchaikovsky is juggling too many narratives. But somehow, for the most part it all ends up fitting together nicely. And, as is often the case, it’s more satisfying to have an author resolve a story in one book instead of three. 

One of our favourite interludes
was "The Philosophers." 
(Art via author's Twitter)

A recurring theme in Adrian Tchaikovsky’s science fiction is an ever-expanding definition of who and what deserves to have rights. The Doors Of Eden might be the most definitive thesis statement he has offered on this point: myriad types of intelligence are introduced throughout the book, and their neurodiversity has value. The villains of the book are those who strive for a narrow-minded definition of a “pure” race, and those who believe there is one correct way to be, to think, or to perceive the world. Diversity of thought, diversity of experience, diversity of form, are all overtly shown to be strengths. 

One character’s attempt to create an England for English people drives this point home, as Tchaikovsky draws a direct line between intolerance for differing ways of being and thinking, and a rigid authoritarianism that is incapable of dealing with global challenges. 

We appreciated the fact that the book’s celebration of diversity included representation of non-cis-gendered people (though we would be interested to hear the thoughts of someone from the trans community about what they thought of this depiction). There were moments in the novel in which an alt-right villain deliberately misgenders a protagonist who is trans, and this made some of us uncomfortable. 

In previous novels, Tchaikovsky seems to have taken inspiration from his degree in zoology, and his knowledge of ethology and evolution are again on full display here.While reading The Doors Of Eden’s speculations on various evolutionary paths, we were repeatedly reminded of Richard Dawkins’ The Ancestor’s Tale, and that book’s detailed dive into the diversity and beauty of evolutionary biology. The Doors Of Eden is a joyful celebration of the natural world’s endless potential, and an appeal to our shared empathy.

Tchaikovsky’s latest is among his best novels, and among the top-tier of 2020.

The absolute, unquestionable, definitive and unalterable science fiction canon

Over the past few weeks, prompted by events at the recent Worldcon, the science fiction blogging

There are no politics
in this novel at all. 
(Image via Amazon)

community has been engaged in one of our regularly occurring debates about what is the literary canon of our genre.

There are, of course, interesting and compelling arguments being presented on both sides of this debate. While some people suggest that the genre is a vibrant, ever-evolving, smorgasbord of creativity in which it would be foolish to try and codify a list of great works, other (more reasonable) voices have been pledging their undying fealty to what are obviously the greatest works of science fiction that will ever be written.

Using a methodology that we will not explain — but which is nonetheless unquestionable and scientifically accurate — our panel of experts has meticulously compiled the definitive list of which works that every human being absolutely must read in order to be taken seriously in any discussion of science fiction.

It should be obvious to all that the fact that most of the great works were written by able-bodied straight white men who died decades ago is entirely a coincidence. The questionable political views of some of these authors is likewise immaterial, as all works are obviously separate from their author.

1. O-Zone by Paul Theroux

(Image via Goodreads)

Whitbread Prize-winner Paul Theroux delved into science fiction in 1986 with this apocalyptic tale of radiation and racism in a vast uninhabited area of the Midwest USA. Theroux uses his literary skills to find the redemptive nature of decay and abandonment. The New York Times praised it as a book that “tells us what we already know, but it does not tell us this well, or interestingly, or vividly.” 

2. Mission Earth Volume 2: Black Genesis by L. Ron Hubbard

One of the most famous science fiction authors of the Golden Age, L. Ron Hubbard’s final magnum opus is the 10-volume Mission Earth saga. This second novel is the most iconic of the series, as it sees anti-hero Soltan Gris allying himself with the mafia to undermine Jettero Heller, who is trying to save planet Earth from environmental destruction. Reading this novel really makes you understand why so many enthusiastic fans (apparently all living at the same address) bought Worldcon memberships for no other reason than to nominate L. Ron Hubbard for a Hugo award.

3. The Blindness by Philip Latham

Writing under the pen name Philip Latham, the American astronomer Robert S. Richardson published several iconic science fiction novels such as Five Against Venus and Missing Men of Saturn. But are any of them as well-remembered as The Blindness, his 1946 work in which he depicts the advent of Haley’s Comet’s return in 1987 as a parable for cultural collapse? 

There is no subtext
in this novel. 
(Image via Amazon)

4. Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card

This empowerment fantasy about a messianic young person who is the most special person in the history of specialness has absolutely no subtext. Our unmitigated love for Orson Scott Card’s novel should not be questioned. It is a classic that has shaped generations of science fiction fans.

5. Earth Final Conflict: The First Protector by James White

Northern Ireland’s James White is known for empathy-driven big space science fiction tales. In his final novel, he delivered this character study of an alien who lives among humanity for generations. To fully appreciate the richness of this text, readers may find it helpful to re-watch all five seasons of the 1990 syndicated television series Earth Final Conflict. 

6. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

Just when we thought that there were absolutely no new ideas to explore in science fiction, Ernest Cline wrote this entirely unique novel. In Ready Player One, readers are introduced to “the Oasis,” a virtual reality world in which people compete to see who can memorize The Goonies better. Better yet, Ready Player One encourages readers to completely ignore any political subtext in the pop culture spoon-fed to us by multimedia conglomerates. No wonder Stephen Spielberg adapted it into a blockbuster!

Hugo Cinema Club: The Best Of 1958

The Incredible Shrinking Man was the 
first movie honoured by the Hugo Awards.
(image via Empire Magazine)

This blog post is the first in a series examining past winners of the Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo Award. An introductory blog post is here.  

By the late 1950s, science fiction cinema had developed a reputation for being the domain of B-movies. Shot quickly, on a cheap budget, and featuring mostly unknown actors, these movies appear to have aimed low and were a disappointment to serious science fiction fans. It was possibly to counteract this reputation that the organizing committee of Solacon (the 16th Worldcon) decided to introduce a Hugo Award for “Outstanding Science Fiction Motion Picture,” and promote movies that took the genre more seriously.

Author Charles Beamont, quoted in the September 1955 Science Fiction News, expressed a common opinion at the time among fans: “The correction of a single mistake — Hollywood’s mad insistence upon hiring writers who know nothing about science fiction, and care for it less, to write science fiction — might do wonders toward bringing about a renaissance.” Similar complaints litter almost every discussion of science fiction movies in fanzines in the 1950s.

Having Richard Matheson closely involved with a major motion picture adaptation of one of his books was therefore something that was welcomed by fandom. As the guest of honour for Solacon, Matheson was well-known, and it should be no surprise that a movie he’d crafted was worthy of winning the first award for what would later be known as Best Dramatic Presentation.

The Incredible Shrinking Man is head and shoulders above almost all other genre films released in 1957. The story is well told, nicely paced, and emotionally rich. The movie features an ordinary middle-class American named Scott Carey who begins to slowly shrink after being exposed to radiation. Though the premise might seem pulpy, Matheson’s writing draws in the audience, first with a tale of psychological turmoil as the protagonist’s normative privilege is stripped away, then later with an adventure movie in which he faces more physical threats. 

Brian Donlevy is the only actor to have
played Professor Quatermass twice. 
And he's excellent. 
(Image via hammerfilms.com)

One of the narrative arcs that highlights the strength of Matheson’s writing is Scott Carey’s relationship with his wife Louise. Before he starts shrinking, Scott and Louise seem to have a very positive, happy relationship — though she is to some degree depicted as subservient to him. Once he starts to decrease in size, he becomes increasingly controlling towards her and lashes out as his privilege metaphorically shrinks. This connection between diminishing privilege and reactionary anger is well observed, and still seems timely.

The Incredible Shrinking Man could be described as two stories stitched together; the first half of the movie is a story about Carey’s fraying relationships, while the second half is a pulp adventure story about survival. While this does create some pacing issues, both halves of the movie work on their own, and the result holds up well today.

The special effects in the second half of The Incredible Shrinking Man are particularly effective, and show attention to detail. Unlike several contemporaneous movies, these effects are used to tell a story, rather than the story being a vehicle on which to sell a visual spectacle. The ending is also remarkably grim — a fact that reportedly left 1950s audiences unsatisfied, but one that in our eyes helps make the movie relevant today.

With no shortlist to rely on, it’s difficult to know what other movies Hugo voters might have considered for the award in 1958. With the benefit of hindsight, we’d suggest Ray Harryhausen’s black-and-white movie 20 Million Miles To Earth might have warranted a nod. Only his second movie in charge of all special effects, 20 Million Miles To Earth was the first movie that was made entirely as a showcase for his work. Though the plot is thin — standard monster-movie fare — and the acting is uninspiring, the level of care put into the monster elevates the movie above many of its contemporaries.

Another film that may have been suitable for a Hugo shortlist that year would have been Quatermass 2,
the Hammer Films remake of the BBC serial from the previous year. One member of our viewing club did pick it as his favourite science fiction movie of 1957, and said he would vote for it ahead of Shrinking Man. Quatermass 2 is one of the better films to follow the Invasion Of The Bodysnatchers trope. It oozes tension as the protagonist Bernard Quatermass investigates the infiltration of the British government by alien forces. There’s a lot to love in this movie — particularly the acting and dialogue, but its inconsistent special effects and an incongruent slapstick ending are disappointing.

In some ways, the Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo Award could not have been introduced at a better time than 1958: the movies that stood out from the pack that year show the medium moving forward, and helped introduce popular audiences to a new generation of science fiction writers, directors and special effects artists. 

The Hugo For Best Dramatic Presentation starts out on a high note. Not only does the winning movie stand the test of time, the award moves science fiction cinema forward.

Re-Watching The Hugos (Intro)

Best Dramatic Presentation is a Hugo category with a long history: Of the 17 current awards categories, only Novel, Novella, Short Story, Fanzine and Pro Artist awards have been handed out in more calendar years. Since Dramatic Presentations were first recognized by the WSFS, silver chrome rocket ships have been handed out to movies and TV shows at 57 different awards ceremonies.

However, the category does not seem to warrant the same cache as most of the other categories; often the recipients skip the awards ceremony, there are no podcasts dedicated to revisiting past winners, and Jo Walton repeatedly disparages the category in her Informal History of the Hugos. It is also the category in which Hugo voters have chosen to present no award on the most occasions, voting for “no award” in 1959, 1963, 1971 and 1977, and neglecting to even nominate a shortlist for the category in 1964 and 1966.

It might also be noted that movies are rarely (if ever) marketed using the Hugo Award as a credential. Did

Galaxy Quest director Dean Parsiot (front row,
second from right) showed up to accept his 
Hugo Award. (Image via Locus)

you know that Hugo-winning director Dean Parsiot has a big-budget movie hitting cinemas on August 28? The lack of using Parsiot’s Hugo trophy in the marketing of Bill & Ted Face The Music is telling, especially considering that Parsiot’s Hugo-winning movie Galaxy Quest is often held up by fans as the exemplar of why the Best Dramatic Presentation category exists.

In the past, this blog has questioned whether the Dramatic Presentation category continues to serve any purpose. In order to answer this question, contributors to this blog including Olav Rokne, Tim Klassen, Paul Senior, Daniel Calder, Christy Foley and Earl Prusak have begun re-watching works from Hugo shortlists from previous years to see how well they hold up, to consider whether other works should have been considered, and to ask whether the Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo has made any impact on how well these works are remembered.

Posts:
Blog Post 1 - The dawn of the Best Dramatic Presentation (1958)

Blog Post 2 - The "No Award" of 1959
Blog Post 3 - 1960 Gets In The Zone

Blog Post 4 - A Return To The Zone In '61

Blog Post 5 - Zoning Out in 1962
Blog Post 6 - The Day No Award Caught Fire (1963)

Blog Post 7 - Ignoring Foreign Films in 1964

Blog Post 8 - How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bombastic Ego (1965)

Blog Post 9 - Once More Into The Breech (1966)

Blog Post 10 - Best Dramatic Presentation Boldly Goes Forward (1967)

Blog Post 11 - The Hugo For Best Star Trek (1968)

Blog Post 12 - Monolithic (1969)

Supplemental - All My Apes ... Gone!

Blog Post 13 - One Giant Leap Backwards for Science Fiction on Screen (1970)

Blog Post 14 - Possibly The Worst Year In Sci-Fi Cinema (1971) 

Blog Post 15 - Clash of the Cinema Titans (1972)

Blog Post 16 - Battle of the Vonneguts (1973) 

Blog Post 17 - God Never Talks. But the Devil Keeps Advertising. (1974) 

Blog Post 18 - IT'S ALIVE (1975)
Supplemental - The Evil of Choosing Among Lessers
Blog Post 19 - Edgelord Cinema Maximalism (1976)

Blog Post 20 - I've Got A Bad Feeling About This (1977)

Blog Post 21 - TO COME (1978)

Blog Post 22 - Death From Above (1979)

Blog Post 23 - The Ascendancy of Science Fiction Cinema (1980)

A Future Well Remembered

Hardly a year went by between 1996-2006 in which the name Michael A. Burstein failed to appear on

(image via Goodreads)

the Hugo Awards ballot.

For an author to rack up 10 Hugo nods in the prose fiction categories is a rare accomplishment (for comparison, that’s the same number as Heinlein). Even more impressive is that Burstein did this before his 37th birthday, making him the third youngest author to reach 10 Hugo nominations. Published in 2008, the book I Remember The Future collects his award-nominated stories and makes a strong case for the continued relevance of his work.

Stories of the near future often age poorly, which is why tales like Burstein’s debut “TeleAbscence,” and its sequel are so notable in their prescience. It could even be suggested that these works are more relevant now than when they were when published more than two decades ago.

For those of us working in public education policy during the current Covid-19 pandemic, the story’s depiction of the pitfalls and potential of elementary classrooms run via teleconferencing technology is particularly insightful. Burstein uses this as a backdrop to comment on racial disparities, on wealth and privilege, and on the opportunity gap.

Prescience can be painful. Burstein’s “Kaddish For The Last Survivor,” is a story about social relapse as the Holocaust passes out of living memory. His protagonist’s sacrifice to ensure that the flame of memory is kept alive could be a rallying cry for those of us concerned about the global rise of authoritarianism and nationalism.

Burstein’s writing style is unpretentious and direct, the plotting and structure is well thought out and clean. These are not stories told for the sake of rococo prose, but for the sake of telling a story. For those of us in the book club who appreciate such substance, the clarity and comprehensibility of Burstein’s writing was refreshing. Others suggested that there may have been slightly too much exposition, especially in the earlier stories in the collection.

But the content of I Remember the Future is consistently top-tier. Burstein is relentlessly inventive, from mundane SF tackling excessive secrecy in government documents (“Seventy-Five Years”) to big ideas-based whimsical SF (the title story “I Remember The Future.”)

Michael A. Burstein is a fan of 
science fiction as a genre, and this
shows through in every page of
I Remember The Future.
(Image via author's Facebook)

In recent decades, the craft of short story writing has come to be seen in some quarters as a stepping stone to writing novels. For whatever reason, Burstein never followed that path. He has unfortunately written only a couple of stories since this collection came out in 2008, but his writing career is an example of how short fiction can equal the emotional and narrative impact of novels. It takes a lot of work to fit so much into so few words. 

The explanatory essays in which Burstein talks about his inspirations and how the stories were developed add an additional layer of value to this collection of stories. 

We are very glad that Michael A. Burstein received so many Hugo nominations and won what is now known as the Astounding Award for Best New Writer: these awards are helping new generations of readers connect to his work. 

In our opinion, this is one of the best short story collections of the past decade.

Gateway to Adventure

“It is at the moments when the doors open, when things flow between the worlds, that stories happen.” 

— Alix E. Harrow

Coming of age stories and portals to other worlds are featured in many fantastic tales. Wardrobes to

Cover art by Lisa
Marie Pompilio. 
(Image via Amazon.ca)

Narnia, rabbit holes to Wonderland, or — as is the case in Alix E. Harrow’s debut novel — Doors to a myriad of places and cultures. And, naturally, exploration beyond these portals provides opportunities for change and growth.

The Ten Thousand Doors of January is a love letter to the portal fantasy, which itself comes on the heels Harrow’s Hugo-winning short-story A Witch's Guide to Escape: A Practical Compendium of Portal Fantasies (2018). The novel follows the story of January Scaller — a lonely, nearly-orphan girl growing up in New England affluence at the turn of the 20th Century. Her adventures and salvation revolve around an absentee father, a mysterious book, and a series of Doors connecting her world to innumerable others.

Although our book club met and discussed The Ten Thousand Doors of January prior to the Hugo voting deadline, we struggled to find a consensus opinion on the novel. Certainly, the fact that it has prompted weeks worth of discussion and analysis for our book club points to the fact that it is a rich text.

Despite the ubiquitous use of portals in fantasy, Harrow’s interpretation of the door/portal as a crucible for change does offer readers something novel. It is clear throughout the novel that Harrow’s Doors and the worlds they divide are a metaphor for relations of power and the points of tension within their inversions. Unsurprisingly, then, Ten Thousand Doors features an innocent, strong, and worthy protagonist in January. Through the privilege of her captive upbringing she is able to peer inside the power structures that keep her from the love of her family and her own self-actualization. Where January’s captors (those in power) seek to preserve and build control, Doors are closed and lives are lost. Put another way, the powerful are able to make decisions that impact the vulnerable… until our hero finds a way to break this pattern. January’s inherited and emergent weapon is both satisfying and novel: the written word shaped into narrative, imbued with desperate confidence.

For a debut novel, Ten Thousand Doors
is remarkably accomplished. We look 
forward to reading further works by 
Alix E. Harrow. 
(Image via OrbitBook.net)

Ten Thousand Doors is an excellent debut novel but not without its issues. Some members of the book club found it to be a mixed reading experience, while others loved it. The reflective and descriptive writing is consistently strong and most were amused by the occasional nod to academic writing. Some readers who don’t normally gravitate to fantasy novels found it surprisingly enjoyable. January’s story also features one of the best canine protagonists in recent memory. Sinbad is a ‘bad’ dog that provides the protagonist with much-needed loyalty and readers with a character that’s easy to love.

Some book club members didn’t enjoy the structure of the novel, finding the ‘book-within-a-book’ conceit frustrating. This structure also left January without much to do until the second half of the novel — at which point the action ramps up. Some readers felt this pacing choice to be jarring. Others felt the chapters dedicated to parental backstories were strong enough to stand alone, perhaps as a novella.

Despite some misgivings about her debut novel, we all agreed that Harrow is an exciting emerging writer. We look forward to her next novel The Once and Future Witches, expected later in 2020.

Moving Forward on Looking Backwards

Among the controversies to emerge from this year’s Worldcon was the honouring of two disgraced

Say what you will about the
honourees, these are some of
the nicest-looking Hugo bases
ever designed. 
(Image via TheHugoAwards.org)

former titans of the genre, as both John W. Campbell Jr. and H.P. Lovecraft were selected to receive a Retro Hugo for the year 1945.

Their malignant racism is well documented, and does not need to be re-litigated here. Instead, we would like to take the regrettable outcome of these two awards as a case example of structural biases inherent in the Retro Hugo Awards.

The Retros Hugos sometimes stumble. It is worth asking whether they should continue, and if so what form they should take.

Retro History

The original proposal for the Retro Hugos came from long-time SFF fan Bruce Pelz during the lead-up to the 1996 Worldcon in Los Angeles. The Retros were initially intended to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 1946 Worldcon which had also been held in Los Angeles. Pelz initially proposed that Retro Hugos would only be presented if a Worldcon was happening in the exact same place on a 50th or 100th anniversary.

The location requirement was dropped during debate because it was felt to be too restrictive. But it was still not anticipated that the Retro Hugos would become something that was done on a regular basis.

Here's what Pelz said in 1993 while introducing the idea of Retro Hugos: "I expect the idea to be pretty much a Funny-Once, and that other Worldcons will not want to try this. But with a 1946-1996 Opportunity, I would like to be able to try it at least once."

To date, Retro Hugos have been awarded on eight occasions. According to the WSFS constitution, they can only be awarded on the 50th, 75th or 100th anniversary of a year in which the Hugo Awards themselves did not occur.

Of the eight Retros, three were on the 50th anniversaries, and five have been on the 75th anniversaries.

Bruce Pelz speaking at Noreascon One. 
(Photo by Jay Klein via Calisphere.org) 

Looking at the lists of finalists, it seems evident that there is a difference between the awards at the 50-year mark (1946, 1951, 1954) and the awards presented at the 75-year mark. That additional 25 years of distance in the cultural memory is significant; it is not particularly unusual for a fan to attend two Worldcons 50 years apart, but it is almost unheard of for someone to attend conventions 75 years apart. The prospect of awards given out to works a full century after they were published — as might occur in 2040 — gives us trepidation.

Structural Biases

Because they are voted on primarily by people who were born decades after the original publication dates, the Retro Hugos are less likely to recognize work that has not been reprinted. This means that the average Retro Hugo voter inevitably experiences the works they’re voting on through a filter created by the intervening generations. 

Additionally, it is impossible for Retro Hugo voters to be unaware of what various writers might

Even if you can travel in time like the folk
from Journey Galactic, it's difficult to 
experience the stories in their original context.
(Image via Hugo Book Club Blog)

accomplish later in their careers. When Robert A. Heinlein’s debut novel Beyond This Horizon was on the Retro Hugo ballot, could any of us consider it without being aware of his long career and relevance to the field?

The effects of these systemic biases will naturally be most pronounced in the categories in which it is most challenging for the average Hugo voter to make an informed decision: the editing category, and the best series award.

The Invisible Editor

The value of talented editors can not be overstated. One only needs to look at the “Un-Edited” editions of Stranger In A Strange Land and The Stand to see that the professional editors who worked with Robert A. Heinlein and Stephen King made significant changes to these iconic novels. But other than these few examples where we can compare the texts, the value added by the editor is usually invisible to the reader. This presents a significant challenge to Hugo Award voters who take the task seriously.

With contemporaneous Hugos, we often rely on word of mouth and on reputation to make informed decisions, as well as a general awareness of what works those editors have had a hand in. But given the nature of the Retro Hugo Awards, the people who have worked with the editors nominated for the award aren’t around to inform the discussion. Thus, votes are cast based on little more than historical reputation.

The invisibility of editors’ work is a significant exacerbating factor to the reputational biases of the Retro Hugos. No matter how flawed a historical nominee may be, when voters don’t have the tools to judge the nominees work, name recognition becomes paramount.

Unintended Consequences

When the Retro Hugos were first conceived in the early 1990s, the Hugo for Best Series was not a consideration because that category did not exist. More recently, in all the WSFS business meeting debates surrounding the creation of a Hugo for Best Series, we cannot find one reference to how the new category would be handled in the Retro Hugos.

The Retro Hugo for Best Series therefore seems like an unintended consequence of multiple rule changes.

The amount of reading that Hugo voters need to do to make informed votes in the best series category is an issue that has been brought up repeatedly in discussions of this category. This reading burden is exacerbated when trying to make informed votes about long-out-of-print series.

If there’s a series on the Retro Hugo ballot that is still inspiring works in the new millennium, that series will have an obvious advantage, even if the works written 75 years ago were racist, misogynist, and mediocre.

A Silver Lining

The selection of H.P. Lovecraft and John W. Campbell Jr. as Retro Hugo recipients in 2020 has

On its original publication, Leigh Brackett's
Shadow Over Mars was in Starling Stories.
The fact that editor Oscar J. Friend
commissioned Virgil Finlay to illustrate the
story is an indication of the high regard
readers had for Leigh Brackett's writing.
(Image via claytonianjp.tumblr.com)

unfortunately overshadowed several ways in which the 1945 Retro Hugo awards have been successful.

The recognition of Leigh Brackett as a foundational figure in science fiction by awarding her the Best Novel award and Best Related Work award for 1945 will help ensure her work continues to be read. Recognizing the work of Margaret Brundage in the Best Professional Artist category is an excellent move by Hugo voters, and overdue. Significant credit for these successes should be paid to fan writer Cora Buhlert for her efforts over the past year to elevate the level of debate and dialogue surrounding the Retro Hugos.

Moving Forward on Looking Backward

There will be no Retro Hugos in 2021, given that the 1946 Retros were handed out at L.A. Con III in 1996. This is good because it gives the Worldcon community a chance to pause and reassess the value of continuing these retrospective awards.

The distorted perspective of voters who are living 75 years removed from the context of the matter being voted on means that some Hugo categories don’t work very well for the Retro Hugos. Is it time to abandon some categories in the Retro Hugos?

Additionally, when applied to works from a time before living memory, the Hugo nomination process seems to draw in works that have no business being celebrated: one can point to last year’s Retro Hugo-shortlisted movie Batman (1944). It’s a racist dumpster fire that deserves to be forgotten. Perhaps due to the nature of the award, different nomination rules for Retro Hugos should be considered?

Or perhaps the Retros can be salvaged through the work of bloggers like Buhlert, and by engaging a broader swath of Hugo voters in discussions about the less-savory aspects of fannish history.

For the Retro Hugos to be relevant and worthwhile awards, we as members of the World Science Fiction Society need to wrestle with why the awards need to exist. Is their intent to reproduce the racist tastes of the past or can they help focus a critical lens on the history of the genre and help us discover works that might have been overlooked?

There is a way to re-envision the Retro Hugos as progressive and constructive. We must look forward on looking backward, but that will take effort and commitment. If we aren’t willing to put in that effort, perhaps 2020 should be the last time Retro Hugos are presented.