{"id":18399,"date":"2024-04-05T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-04-05T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/?p=18399"},"modified":"2024-03-27T19:59:27","modified_gmt":"2024-03-28T01:59:27","slug":"how-i-would-vote-now-2021-hugo-award-best-novel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/how-i-would-vote-now-2021-hugo-award-best-novel\/","title":{"rendered":"How I would vote now: 2021 Hugo Award (Best Novel)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Nominees<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Piranesi<\/em> by Susanna Clarke<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The City We Became<\/em> by N.K. Jemisin<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Relentless Moon<\/em> by Mary Robinette Kowal<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Harrow the Ninth<\/em> by Tamsyn Muir<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Black Sun<\/em> by Rebecca Roanhorse<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Network Effect<\/em> by Martha Wells<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Actual Results<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
    \n
  1. The Network Effect<\/em> by Martha Wells<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. The City We Became<\/em> by N.K. Jemisin<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Piranesi<\/em> by Susanna Clarke<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Black Sun<\/em> by Rebecca Roanhorse<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  5. The Relentless Moon<\/em> by Mary Robinette Kowal<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  6. Harrow the Ninth<\/em> by Tamsyn Muir<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    How I Would Have Voted<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
      \n
    1. Network Effect<\/em> by Martha Wells<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    2. No Award<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    3. Piranesi<\/em> by Susanna Clarke<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

      Explanation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

      Network Effect<\/em> was pretty good. In fact, it’s my favorite Murderbot book. There was a little bit of wokery, mostly in the form of the polyamorous relationships of the humans, but that didn’t bother me as much because part of the point of the Murderbot books is that the humans are (for the most part) aggravatingly dumb and slow, so the polyamory kind of blended into the rest of the nonsense that muderbot constantly has to deal with. But I can see how it would bother some readers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      I DNFed all the other books, but I didn’t want to lump Piranesi<\/em> in with all the others because it just wasn’t my kind of book. All the other ones had woke themes or tropes or other issues that turned me off immensely. I DNFed the first Lady Astronauts book when it turned into a story about the brave little woman that could and her band of misfit minorities fighting back against Captain Patriarchy. The City We Became<\/em> dropped half a dozen f-bombs in the first chapter, and I think it had a gay rape scene too. Also, I have no love whatsoever for New York City. As for Black Sun<\/em> and Harrow the Ninth,<\/em> they both suffer from the trope that I call “death is chic.” At best, it’s an aesthetic that turns me off, and at worst it’s just a cover for outright nihilism and a pro-death, anti-life worldview that undergirds everything that I hate about our current culture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      As a side note, I just want to say that when it comes to book blurbs, Neil Gaiman is one of the best contrarian indicators for my own personal tastes that I’ve found. He may have blurbed a book or two that I actually enjoyed, but for every book or author that I can remember, if he gave them praise, I not only didn’t like it, but actively hated it. He may actually be a better indicator for me than the Hugo Award itself, since I actually enjoyed the book that won this year\u2014but I cannot think of a single book that Neil Gaiman blurbed that I didn’t despise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      The Nominees Piranesi by Susanna Clarke The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin The Relentless Moon by Mary Robinette Kowal Harrow the Ninth by Tamsyn Muir Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse Network Effect by Martha Wells The Actual Results How I Would Have Voted Explanation Network Effect was pretty good. In fact, it’s my favorite… Continue reading How I would vote now: 2021 Hugo Award (Best Novel)<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[724,567,1512,339,1709,1298,645,1724,1561,1723],"class_list":["post-18399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-blurbs","tag-hugo-awards","tag-martha-wells","tag-mary-robinette-kowal","tag-murderbot","tag-n-k-jemisin","tag-neil-gaiman","tag-rebecca-roanhorse","tag-susanna-clarke","tag-tamsyn-muir","entry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iXK-4ML","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18399"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18683,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18399\/revisions\/18683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onelowerlight.com\/writing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}