Cautiously Optimistic About The Best Series Category

We had our doubts about the creation of the Hugo Award for Best Series.

Does the category fill a need? Would the vote just be about name-recognition given how difficult it is to read all the shortlisted works? Might we just see the same set of series showing up on the ballot on alternating years?

But some of these doubts have been allayed by Becky Chambers’ series Wayfarers receiving the

Becky Chambers' win
shows that Best Series
serves a segment of SF
ignored by other Hugos.
(Image via Goodreads)

award in Dublin at Worldcon 77. It’s not just because we enjoyed the Wayfarers novels. This win gives us hope because it demonstrates that the Best Series Hugo can recognize works that weren’t well-served by the pre-existing four fiction categories (novel, novella, short story and novelette).

There are at least two reasons why we consider this to be a monumental win: none of the novels in the series had already been awarded a Hugo; and it recognizes a relatively new talent, as Becky Chambers is both the youngest person to have been shortlisted for Best Series and the youngest to win it by three decades.

These facts may seem like minor distinctions, given that the category has only been around for three years. But to us they are positive indicators that the category might be working as intended.

For the first two years of its existence, the Best Series Hugo Award was presented to a towering icon of science fiction — Lois McMaster Bujold. She has won the Best Novel Hugo more often than any other living author, and each of Bujold’s wins for Best Series involved a series that had previously won her a Hugo or two.

It would be hard to argue that Bujold’s work is not meritorious. But if the Best Series Hugo only ever went to series that include a Hugo-winning novel, it might call into question the need for a series award at all. Giving a Best Series Hugo to Best Novel winners seems a bit redundant.

Did the Vorkoskigan
saga need another
Hugo Award?
(Image via Amazon)

Although two of Becky Chambers’ Wayfarers novels appeared on the shortlist for Best Novel, the majority of the series on the ballot in each of the years the award has existed were composed of previously non-Hugo-shortlisted works (series such as The Centenal Cycle, Rivers Of London, and The Memoirs of Lady Trent.) This indicates strongly that the award is serving a segment of genre fiction that was not served by the existing categories.

It is interesting to note that to date only Seanan McGuire’s October Daye books have made a repeat appearance on the best series shortlist. With six finalists listed in each of three years, one repetitious nominee out of 18 gives us hope that we might continue to see a diverse range of series getting shortlisted. A lack of repeat appearances could indicate that the category is serving a diverse and engaged readership.

It is too early for anyone to pass judgment on whether or not the Best Series Hugo is a useful addition as a category.

But in the long term, we would be happy to be shown that we were wrong in our initial opposition to the creation of this category.

Many Princes; One Crown

Which version of The Little Prince won the Hugo Award?

"A new translation of the
beloved classic."
(Image via Amazon.com)

Was it Katherine Woods’ classic 1943 translation? Was it the 1995 Irene Testot-Ferry translation? Or perhaps it was Richard Howard’s 2000 translation?

Since the initial publication of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's story in 1943, the book has been translated into English on at least seven different occasions, often with markedly different results.

If you’re an anglophone who is over the age of 30, or bought the book used, there’s every chance that you remember Woods’ relatively poetic and lyrical translation. A few might be most familiar with the direct and less florid Testot-Ferry version. Younger readers are likely to be more familiar with the plainspoken and colloquial Howard version of the text.

We argue here that the classic Woods version should be the one that is recognized as being worthy of the award, rather than one of the modern revisions. In particular, this is a Retro Hugo for 1944, and it is based on the work as it appeared in 1944 that votes should have been cast. The Hugo Awards page does specify the publisher, which would lead us to believe that it is indeed the Woods translation that is honoured.

That said, it is the 2000 version that is most readily available today, so a counter-argument could be made that a significant number of Hugo voters at Worldcon 77 were likely to have based their decision on the later version.

The differences between the translations are not insignificant.

Katherine Woods also
translated works such
as Emile Zola's The
Masterpiece, and was
the head of literature
with UNESCO.
(Image via Amazon.com)

As an example, the original Woods translation offers us the following: “It was from words dropped by chance that, little by little, everything was revealed to me.”

The 1995 Testot-Ferry translation flattens that same sentence to “It was thanks to the odd word, here and there, that everything was revealed to me.”

And in 2000, Howard renders this same sentence as “It was things he said quite at random that, bit by bit, explained everything.”

It is clear that the newer translation does not capture the gentleness of the original French phrase: “Ce sont des mots prononcés par hasard qui, peu à peu, m'ont tout révélé.”

The structural changes are mirrored by a narrowing of the vocabulary in the work: ‘a primordial forest’ becomes ‘a jungle.’ A ‘tippler’ becomes a ‘drunkard.’ A ‘spring of fresh water’ becomes a ‘fountain.’

By-and-large, the publishing industry is more sensitive to the work of translators today; today they often they get cover credit that they might not have in the past. For example, in 2014, Ken Liu was recognized on the cover of The Three-Body Problem and was consequently also recognized at the Hugo Awards for his translation work. 

But the case of The Little Prince is more comparable to that of the first translated work to appear on a Hugo Ballot: the 1963 novel Sylva, which was written by French war hero Vercors (A.K.A. Jean Bruller). No translator is mentioned on the dust jacket of the book. And until this summer, when the record was updated at our request, the official Hugo Awards site did not list the name of the translator, Rita Barisse. The Wikipedia entry for the Hugo Awards, and several other publications continue to neglect Barisse’s contribution to the work.

It is important when giving an award to a translated work to recognize the person — or people

The Little Prince has been translated into
more than 250 languages, and is the most
translated non-religious text on Earth.
(Image via Nortsider) 

— who worked on bridging the linguistic divide, and who interpreted and attempted to capture the tone and rhythm of the original. The translation of foreign works into English is a subtle and often misunderstood art. It is also one that all-too-often has gone unacknowledged.

Both Sylva and The Little Prince were published without translation credit on the cover, so when they were discussed, nominated, and voted on, there was little information provided to voters about whose work went into turning French prose into English.

While Sylva’s translator is easy to identify, and to retroactively credit, The Little Prince is a little less clear. But recognition, and attribution, must be offered.

It is Katherine Woods’ version that helped make the work so successful in North American English markets, it is her work that was available in 1944, and it should be recognized that she is the translator who contributed to the award-winning version of the work.

The WSFS should adopt a consistent practice of acknowledging translators in all instances, both for contemporaneous Hugos and for Retro Hugos. 

The Privilege Of Magic

The most frightening villain ever to stalk the halls of a school for magic isn’t Voldemort, it’s

Designed by Will Staehle,
the cover of Magic For
Liars is memorably great.
(Image via Amazon)

privilege: the subtle, corrosive force at the heart of Magic For Liars.

At its core, Sarah Gailey’s debut novel is about how the powerful impose their will without consent, and without a second thought. These power dynamics might be portrayed within Magic For Liars as the relationship between the magical and non-magical, but they are grounded in well-observed real-world dynamics between those who have privilege and those who don’t. 

Setting the story at the Osthorne Academy for Young Mages, Gailey uses the standard tropes of the magical academy to explore notions of privilege by telling the story from the perspective of someone who lacks magical ability. The protagonist, private investigator Ivy Gamble, is the non-magical twin sister of a teacher at the school. Ivy is lead by circumstance to investigate a murder within the magical community. 

Through this set-up, Gailey interrogates themes of power, consent, toxic relationships, sibling resentment, and identity. Memorable scenes, such as when a magical healer subjects Ivy to an invasive procedure without asking, or a flashback to a practical joke her sister played on her, effectively reinforce these themes. This is a lot of heavy subtext for a novel with a sprightly cadence and breezy prose, but for the most part it works. 

Some of the things we enjoyed the most about Magic For Liars were what Gailey chose to omit. Rather than deluging the reader with endless explanations of magic or magical society, Gailey focuses on characters and motivations. Rather than treating the sexuality of characters as big revelations, the inclusion of LGBTQ characters is refreshingly natural and casual. 

The magic of privilege enables many
people to become their worst selves.
(Image via Twitter.) 

Because of the massive cultural hegemony of Harry Potter, it’s difficult not to compare any novel about a school for magicians to the one in J.K. Rowling’s best-sellers. But we’d argue that the school in Magic For Liars might more aptly be compared to Eton College, the famous privilege factory that has churned out generations of upper class twits such as David Cameron and Boris Johnson. 

Some have suggested that the book is more comparable to Lev Grossman’s The Magicians than to the Harry Potter series. This is in part due to the age of the students and the mature tone of the books. Most notably, the ability — the privilege —of doing magic enables characters to be their own worst possible selves. Interestingly, Ivy Gamble is a far more likeable protagonist than Quentin Coldwater.

When dealing with characters and their relationships, when dealing with magic as a metaphor for social stratification and when dealing with implied politics, Magic For Liars succeeds, but as a mystery novel, it is somewhat unsatisfying. The investigative threads are occasionally obvious, and the lack of observational acuity among the school faculty beggars belief. Most troubling is the convenient trail of notes left for the protagonist — most of our book club found it too simple to be considered a puzzle.

Gailey’s prose oscillated at times between light and engaging fantasy and noir detective pastiche. Some readers found this tone switching distracting, especially in early chapters where the overuse of similes was especially annoying. One reader almost didn’t finish the book because of lines like “The drought-impossible velvety green lawn that surrounded the school looked like frosting that was waiting to have a finger through it.” It was suggested that this tone might have been intentionally over-the-top to evoke hard-boiled detective prose. 

But despite these quibbles and qualms, it is a book that we recommend. We suspect that it will appeal to many Hugo voters, especially given how the protagonist reminded at least a few of us of Elma York, the hero of Mary Robinette Kowal’s Hugo-winning The Calculating Stars. Much like York, Ivy Gamble is a flawed narrator who deals with anxiety and impostor syndrome, and much like York, she challenges systems of privilege and power.

We look forward to reading Gailey’s subsequent works.

Not On The Shortlist 2019

Every year there are more worthy works than could fit on any Hugo Awards ballot. There will therefore always be works that are not included, no matter how great they may be. As our book club has done in previous years, some of us have selected the works they wish could have made this year's ballot.

(AW) Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster -- Lodestar
It’s rare to have a YA or a fantasy title on my (non-Hugo Book Club) reading list, so it feels a bit odd

Is it a surprise that someone
in this book club was drawn
to a book with strong labour
themes?
(Image via Goodreads) 

to be highlighting a work of YA fantasy as this year’s “should have been nominated novel.” Jonathan Auxier’s Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster is an award-winning work that provides a wonderfully engaging story with smartly-written characters. It also helped me think about what’s often missing from other novels (from all genres and for all reading levels).

Set in 1875 London, the chronologically young but situationally mature Nan Sparrow carries the reader through the dangerous, exploited lives of chimney sweeps. In the Victorian era, those who worked as sweeps were normally between the ages of 4-9; Nan is late career by this measure. Charlie is Nan’s golem (protector), serving as a metaphor for the painful plight of parents who found themselves on the wrong side of the labour and wealth redistribution of the industrial revolution. Sweep is the product of an experienced writer, with skillful narrative construction and delineated sections that (1) build characters and motivation and (2) bring tensions to a coming of age resolution for both Nan and the UK’s social contract.

With entertaining and careful writing about historical stakeholders (e.g. masters and servants, Friendly Societies, a nascent entrepreneurial and middle class), contemporary authors (William Blake, etc.), social conditions, and social progress, this is a work I’d love to see on elementary school curricula.

The afterword explains how Auxier crafted Sweep over many years, marinating ideas about golems and social norms and labour rights until his story elements were seasoned enough to bake into a narrative worth sharing. To be clear, it’s not the length of gestation but the care of crafting that has left an impression — and sets other novels in contrast. A strong novel bears the imprint of a patient and disciplined author; one that is willing to wait until disparate parts are ready to come together in a form worthy of a copy-editor’s effort, a publisher’s support, and a reader’s time.

For the record, I did read to at least a quarter-depth of all the novels included in the 2019 WorldCon voter’s package. If Sweep had been included in the YA list and voters actually read all the nominated works then Auxier would have been the favourite for a Lodestar Award in Dublin.

(BG) Senlin Ascends by Josiah Bancroft
Though only marginally eligible for the Hugo this year, my choice is a 2018 gem: Josiah Bancroft's Senlin Ascends. Senlin Ascends was originally self-published in 2013, but after getting a lot of positive attention out of the 2016 SFBO (Self-Published Fantasy Blog-Off) competition was published by Orbit in 2018.

Newlyweds Senlin and Marya are visiting the awe-inspiring Tower of Babel when they are separated. The mysterious Tower is so massive that each floor is its own ringdom (round kingdom) and no one is exactly sure how many floors there even are. So (of course) Senlin must start climbing up through the strange levels of the Tower in search of Marya. Senlin is semi-unlikeable at the start of the novel, but I found myself thoroughly won over and eager for a sequel by the end. Overall Senlin Ascends is a delightful debut, with wonderful prose, compelling characters and a promising world.

(OR) Kiksuya (Westworld Season 2, Episode 8) by Written by Carly Wray & Dan Dietz
If more people had been able to slog through the first seven boring episodes of Westworld’s second

Zahn McClarnon's performance as
Akecheta had pathos and humanity
that helped create the most compelling
hour of television in 2018.
(Image via Forbes) 

season, we’d wager that the eighth would have made the ballot for Best Dramatic Presentation Short Form.

Set in a western-themed park populated with androids who exist for the entertainment of wealthy visitors, Westworld’s second season depicted a variety of the now self-aware androids attempting to escape their servitude. While the overall season was mediocre at best, "Kiksuya" stood out as a near-perfect episode, shifting the perspective away from the mostly uninteresting set of protagonists that viewers were familiar with, and bringing a set of Indigenous android background characters into sharp focus.

The episode is primarily the story of Akecheta (Zahn McClarnon), leader of the Ghost Nation, and one of the first androids to achieve consciousness. Over the course of the tightly-scripted hour of television, we learn about how the memory of androids in the Ghost Nation have been re-written time and time again. Akecheta’s first life as a peaceful family man gets taken away and replaced with a violent one.

It was difficult not to see the repeated erasure and reprogramming of these Indigenous-presenting androids as a metaphor for historical attempts to erase Indigenous culture in North America. Akecheta’s narrative journey is a continuous attempt to remember who he was, and to reclaim his identity.

Having modeled the Ghost Nation on the real-world Lakota Nations (who live in what is now Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas), the writers and producers of this episode hired Indigenous scholars such as Emmy-winner Larry Poirier and Cordelia White Elk to ensure that the episode accurately depicted Indigenous traditions and cultures whenever possible. The episode’s dialogue is almost entirely in the Lakota language with English subtitles. The episode’s title that translates to ‘Remember.’

If every episode of Westworld had been as good as "Kiksuya," it would have been the best series on the air in 2018.

(KB) Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice
Moon of the Crusted Snow was one of the best science-fiction books of 2018, and I wish it had been on the ballot for Best Novel.

Written by Waubgeshig Rice, an Anishinaabe journalist and author, the book asks a question best asked by an Indigenous author: “What happens when a society that already survived their apocalypse faces the crescendo of the climate crisis?” Rice explores this premise in the setting on an Anishinaabe reserve in Northern Ontario. Many “apocalypse-in-action” books are set in the urban environment, so

For many Indigenous
communities, the
apocalypse arrived in
1492. Waubgeshig Rice
explores what happens
to these communities when
the apocalypse hits the rest
of the planet.
(Image via Goodreads)

the realities of a rural, remote life enable a unique perspective not often heard in science fiction.

Another strength of this novel are the characters. The narrative’s main guiding voice is Evan Whitesky, a young father who is trying to relearn his traditional culture. Evan’s role in his community takes readers into the lives of a variety of other characters and their realities. This approach makes the reserve a fully-realized setting, an entire world apart from what most readers know from their day-to-day lives.

Readers learn about the Anishinaabe culture and language alongside Whitesky and his young family, and readers see the traditional knowledge leveraged for survival at the end of the Anthropocene as we know it. This is especially poignant considering the incredible harm Indigenous peoples survived in Canada both in the past (ie. Residential Schools, genocide, land theft) and in the present (ie. Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, Millennium Scoop). Colonization is a monster in the book, but Rice focuses on celebrating the survivance and thrivance of his people –– a love-letter to his culture.

A unique premise, an introspective philosophical theme, well-written characters –– seems like the sort of work Worldcon attendees would respond to.

(MB) The Quantum Magician by Derek Künsken
The Quantum Magician is Ocean’s Eleven in space and surely deserved a Hugo nod.

Ottawa resident, Derek Künsken, crafts a web of intrigue in which a homo quantus, a genetically engineered human able to read quantum states and make stunning predictions, brings together a team of genetic misfits to con one of the biggest empires in the galaxy. The story has enough twists and turns to keep any one off balance and all the loose ends are tied up in a dramatic finish.

It’s not only a delightful thriller, the story has excellent science fiction chops. There are multiple new branches of humanity, well developed starship propulsion systems, and a sprawling galactic community.

The book raises questions of what it means to be human, loyalty, and belonging. It’s a lot of fun to read gives a person something to think about long after the book is finished.

Game Over

Last month, Forbes magazine published an article titled “The Best Science Fiction Books of All Time.” Given the superlative and sweeping absolutism of the title, and the narrow scope of his selections, the article was subject to much (deserved) ridicule on Twitter.

We loved Leviathan Wakes,
but is it really better than
The Dispossessed, Foundation
 Gateway or Babel-17?
(Image via Amazon)

Paul Tassi, the article’s author, normally covers video games for Forbes. A quick scan of his work in this area indicates a wealth of knowledge … about video games and the gaming industry. The nuance he brings to reporting on video games is absent in his list of Best Science Fiction Books. 

What Tassi’s poorly-researched listicle shows is that knowledge of one geeky subject matter (video games) does not confer expertise in another (science fiction literature).

This brings us to our main point: Worldcon is not a media convention, it is not a comic book convention, and it is definitely not a gaming convention. Worldcon is a literature-focused science fiction and fantasy convention, and the voters who select each year’s Hugo Awards reflect that. 

The knowledge of one geeky subject matter (science fiction and fantasy literature) does not confer expertise in another (games). It is for this reason that we do not support proposals to add a category for “Best Game Or Interactive Experience.”

Since 1969, scope creep has doubled the number of Hugo Award categories from 10 to 20 (including the two “technically not a Hugo” categories that are voted on and awarded with the rest). Some additions have obviously strengthened the award slate, while we would argue that other more recently-created Hugos are of dubious merit.

Ira Alexandre, who has been the driving force in arguing for a Best Game Hugo, has done their research. They looked at the amount of gaming content at Worldcons, examined the burgeoning field of interactive works, and made some significant arguments in favour of the suggested award.

But none of their work addresses the fact that gaming has never been a primary focus of Worldcon. Alexandre’s number-crunching even showed that the amount of gaming-related programming has never exceeded nine per cent of the convention — and is usually much smaller. We would suggest that the majority of Hugo voters are unlikely to have played a wide-enough and diverse-enough range of games and interactive experiences to make adequate nominations in a category dedicated to gaming. 

It’s already difficult enough for Hugo voters to get through a voting package with six works on the shortlist in 15 categories. Games and Interactive Works individually take up to 150 hours to play through - with a short time between the announcement of the shortlist and the voting deadline, it would be difficult to play through, and be able to adequately assess, even one such game.

Independent game Return of the Obra
Dinn deserves recognition, but are
the Hugos the right place for games?
(Image via obradinn.com)

Science fiction is well-represented in games and interactive experiences — and while there are many awards in gaming, some excellent examples of science fiction get overlooked by the existing gaming awards. We do not believe, however, that such recognition should come from the Hugo Awards.

In their thorough and well-researched 100-page document arguing for the creation of a Hugo Award for Gaming, Alexandre correctly points out the vibrancy of science fiction within the modern independent game industry. However, given the tendency of the Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form) category to recognize only those works with the highest budgets, we are unconvinced by Alexandre’s suggestion that independent games would win out over high-profile works with big advertising budgets. If Hugo voters shortlisted a blockbuster like Avengers: Endgame ahead of an independent film like Prospect, why should we believe they would select an independent game like Return of the Obra Dinn ahead of of a blockbuster like God Of War?

We must also ask what this Hugo Award would add to the overall cultural conversation about games and gaming. Again, Alexandre has done the legwork to look at other gaming-related awards: this is a field in which there are numerous high-profile awards that already recognize achievement in the field. From the perspective of those outside of the Worldcon bubble, a Hugo for Best Game or Interactive might appear to be a third-rate and irrelevant award: a Golden Satellite, rather than an Oscar.

The coveted Golden
Satellite award.
(image via
 pressacademy.com)

There are already an excessive number of categories at the Hugo Awards that receive little attention from those being honoured. Last year, only one of the shortlisted Graphic Story authors was in attendance and only one shortlisted Dramatic Presentation (short or long form) was represented by a director. The movie industry doesn’t seem to care about the Hugo Award — we are dubious that the gaming industry would either. 

The push to add a new category to the Hugo Awards in order to recognize games and gaming is one that we fundamentally respect. Proponents of the move are clearly working towards reasonable aims, and are providing some sound arguments in favour of their proposal. The proposal has been tabled for further study and will be discussed further at next year's WSFS business meeting. 

Fundamentally though, we do not believe that the addition of this category would produce the hoped for results, nor would it add to the legitimacy of the overall Hugo Awards process — instead it’s more likely that the Hugos would suffer the same ridicule as Paul Tassi.

To The Daring Belongs The Future

"To the daring belongs the future"

— Emma Goldman, 1916

Women are often removed from history.

In their new novel, Annalee Newitz brings this fact to life by imagining a reality in which misogynists are enacting the planned and premeditated erasure of the socially vulnerable through time travel and murder.

Exuberantly feminist and unabashedly political, The Future Of Another Timeline is an intellectual

The cover of Future Of
Another Timeline was
designed by the great
Will Staehle.
(Image via Amazon)

heir to both Margaret Atwood’s A Handmaid’s Tale and Connie Willis’ Oxford Time Travel novels.

Newitz offers readers a covert war between time travelling factions battling over women's rights in particular and human rights more broadly. On one side of the conflict is a small group of academics from the 2020s conducting small edits to the historical timeline in order to promote equity and equality. On the other side of the conflict (and mostly unseen) is a faction from the 2300s who are trying to engineer a future in which women are entirely subservient.

The book pivots between two main points of view: a teenager named Beth in 1990s Irvine California, where women don’t have the vote or access to adequate reproductive health services; and Tess, a time-travelling activist. Beth’s work includes greasing the wheels of history to enfranchise women, improving access to abortion and contraception, and working to encourage more progressive cultural attitudes.

Newitz doesn’t concern the reader too deeply with the mechanics of time travel. It simply exists and always has. That said, creating lasting edits to the historical timeline is no easy task.

The level of research (and background knowledge) Newitz brings to the table enriches this story. Obscure historical figures, cultural movements and legal battles make the conflict more tangibly real. Industrial Workers Of The World (IWW) founder Lucy Parsons makes a cameo, as does Emma Goldman.

It is also gratifying to see positive and thoughtful representation of labour unions — even tangentially — in a story. Prior to the existence of an organized feminist movement, several women worked through the labour union movement to advance gender equality. This implicit recognition of the power of collective action and of organizing is often neglected in genre fiction.

In fact, time travel novels in particular have often subtly endorsed the Great Man theory of history, as opposed to collective action as a historical force. Newitz provides a reasonably believable introduction to these ideas through the philosophical musing of a main character, providing arguments in both directions. Of course, in the end, it’s through collective action that women make gains.

References to historical feminist movements makes for a convincing exploration of the ways in

Author Annalee Newitz in 2014.
Photo Gregor Fischer
Who released the photo under a
CC-BY-SA 2.0 license. 

which history — and thus our present — might have been different. What would America be like if the puritanical right wing had built more influence in the 1890s? What might have happened if women received universal suffrage in the 1870s? These are questions that Alternate History (AH) rarely grapples with, and Newitz’ answers will be satisfying to AH fans. This is a book that we hope will be seriously considered by Sidewise Award judges.

One of the aspects of The Future Of Another Timeline that shows Newitz’ progress as a writer is the emotionally engaging and well-realized character moments of their two main protagonists. In particular, Tess’s turbulent family life. There are moments of her story that have stayed with us.

Although our book club enjoyed Newitz’ debut novel Autonomous, it was at times overly convoluted. In that novel, it felt like Newitz wanted to fit many of their clever thoughts into the text, leaving some

The odious Anthony Comstock is one
of the many historical figures who populate
the pages of this time travel novel.
Newitz’ research brings these
characters to life.
(Image via Wikipedia.) 

 ideas without enough room to breathe. We found Future Of Another Timeline to be more disciplined and focused in both writing and plotting, though even here there are digressions and other inclusions that seem unnecessary (such as the chapter featuring an extended communal masturbation scene). In addition, readers looking for effortless escapism will likely be disappointed. It takes effort to follow multiple intersecting points of view while jumping back and forth between at least four different time periods.

Despite the final twenty per cent of the book being somewhat less coherent and more difficult to follow, the strength of the overarching metaphor about historical revisionism is enough to carry one through.

Through the use of time travel, this novel makes it easy to see the real-world connections between crusading anti-women activists of the 1890s and today’s Incel movement. Time and again, we were reminded that the villains of The Future Of Another Timeline exist in our world, and we don't need time travel to draw a straight line between Anthony Comstock and Jordan Peterson.

This is a novel that will almost certainly appear on our Hugo nominating ballots for 2020.

The value of Speculative Opinion

This spring, an exciting new series of short science fiction was launched in an improbable publication: The New York Times.

John Karborn has illustrated most
of the articles in the series with
evocative conceptual art.
(Image via New York Times)

Op-Eds From The Future is a feature in America’s paper of record that appears every second week, in which an academic or science fiction author tackles a political issue from the perspective of an editorialist writing in the not-too-distant future.

Given that the series has so far included submissions written by luminaries such as Cory Doctorow, Malka Older, Ted Chiang, and Brooke Bolander, it is unsurprising that the results of this experiment have been compelling.

Masterminded by the paper’s op-ed technology editor Susan Fowler, this project shows the integral connection between science fiction and politics, demonstrating the relevance of the genre to a wider (mundane) audience. Speculative opinion is not standard fare for the New York Times, but it is a very welcome addition.

“Science fiction is so powerful and effective because it takes the problems and issues we face today and puts them into new situations and contexts, allowing us to see them more clearly,” Fowler explained on Twitter. Put another way, the series provides a type of public service.

Every second Monday, the Times publishes a new piece, tackling issues as varied as the intersection of income inequality and genetic engineering, the possible effects of anti-hate speech legislation on internet discourse, and the rights of persons displaced by climate change.

Using the traditional structure of an op-ed to explore a science fictional idea lays bare the political nature of the genre. The futurist nature of these works connects the changing role of technology with the practicalities of policies elected officials might enact as a result.

The format and venue also forces authors to hew closely to constraints of hard science fiction; there is a level of solemnity to the Grey Lady that inspires seriousness in its authors. We suspect that this lean towards hard science is also the product of Fowler’s editorial vision, which we appreciate.

Though several luminaries of science fiction have been featured thus far, those invited to submit articles to the series are not limited to genre professionals — University of Connecticut professor Susan Schneider penned one on the nature of consciousness. 

One of the joys of this series is quickly becoming the Monday-morning anticipation of discovering who has penned the latest installment. Although we have a long list of thinkers we would love to see play in this particular sandbox (i.e. Vernor Vinge, Madeline Ashby, Karl Schroeder …), we suspect that we will be surprised and delighted by the people Fowler has lined up for the coming weeks.

Susan Fowler masterminded the new
series appearing in the New York Times.
(Image via BizJournals)

We would love to see this series included in next year's Hugo shortlist. But there isn’t an obvious category at the Hugo Awards to recognize the importance of this contribution. Susan Fowler is not eligible for Best Editor, nor would it be fair to compare her work to that of editors working on publications dedicated to the genre. The individual Op-Eds might technically fit into the Short Story category, but to us, the value of the overall project is greater than the sum of its parts. We are likely to suggest including the overall Op-Eds From The Future project in the Best Related Work category (though even that is a slightly odd fit that Hugo administrators might find reason to reject).

This is a series that we look forward to reading every week, and hope that the New York Times continues it over the long-term. Even better, we hope to see competitor pieces in other established dailies make this a staple of tomorrow’s newspapers.