Author: Rebecca Demarest

Hugo Awards 2014 (Part 1)

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As many of you know, I’ve started reading for the Hugo Award this year, and I wanted to keep you all apprised of the work that’s up for consideration and what I think of it, mainly so that when voting comes up in a few weeks, I can remember why I liked, or didn’t like, certain stories…

That being said, I’ve made it through a few categories already, so here they are, in the order in which I liked them, favorite, to least favorite:

Short Story

“The Water That Falls on You from Nowhere” – John Chu
Chu has created a new world where, if you lie, water falls on you from nowhere. Literally, if you tell a whopper, you’re absolutely drenched in cold water. He takes this unusual setting and juxtaposes it with a problem that many people are actually facing today: the struggle of coming out to your family. It is a beautifully written piece, the struggle with the main character’s cultural and personal identities is well balanced and the whole thing makes your heart ache. Definitely voting for this one to be best in category.

“Ink Readers” – Thomas Olde Heuvelt
This fantasy involves a town who is responsible for making sure the wishes wished during a certain festival are fulfilled by their rituals. There is a lot of twists in this one, so I don’t want to say too much more, but it is a passably fun story. The only reason this one falls to second place for me is I felt like it was trying a little too hard to be foreign in the way the prose is presented and its ends up just being a bit convoluted.

“Selkie Stories” – Sofia Samatar
“Selkie Stories” was a total ‘meh’ for me. Its well written, but, as it even says at the beinning, “I’m tired of selkie stories.” This one really didn’t feel like it touched any new ground in the genre, and, in fact, it summarized a lot of older selkie stories within it. If someone was less familiar with that genre than I am, it may have been more enjoyable, but to me it just felt like the same old, same old.

“If You Were a Dinosaur My Love” – Rachel Swirsky
If I could downvote for the Hugo, I would for this one. It is overwrought drivel of the kind I would expect a middle schooler who was pining over the popular boy to write. Just don’t even go there…

Novelette

“The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling” – by Ted Chiang
I have long been a fan of Ted Chiang, particularly of Lifecycles of Software Objects. I think that novella is absolutely stunning, in both story and design, and so when I saw he had another short story up for consideration, I was stoked. Happily, he does not disappoint with this Novelette. “…Truth…” is a wonderful piece exploring what it means to tell the truth and how we deal with language and memory and how that affects said truth. It juxtaposes a futuristic society debating the pros and cons of a new technology that allows for perfect recall and search-ability of memories to an older story during colonization of a missionary teaching a tribesman how to write and keep records. Definitely try and find a copy of this, if you can, because it is amazing, particularly if you like your speculative fiction to have a bit of meaning behind it.

“The Lady Astronaut of Mars” – Mary Robinette Kowal
This is a heartbreaking story about the first woman who went to Mars and the latter days of her life on said planet with her husband. It is powerful, and moving, but I felt like the end didn’t quite deliver on its potential, hence it drops to my number two spot for this category. It deals a lot with the question of failing health in old age, responsibilities of the generations to each other, and similar topics.

“The Waiting Stars” – Aliette de Bodard
An interesting read, with a fascinating premise, about genetically/cybernetically enhanced humans as the core AI/computer system for ships. The precise details are left purposefully vague, but it sets up a tidy little conflict with a race that believes that this sort of thing is utterly immoral. Again, this dropped in my esteem because I felt like the end didn’t quite deliver, plus the beginning was a little hard to get into and understand what, exactly, was going on.

“Opera Vita Aeterna” – Vox Day
“Opera…” is an interesting fantasy story, featuring an elf studying human religion as though it were a separate magic system from what the elves know of. I rather enjoyed that part of it, the theological and cultural discussion of what religion is and can be, but then the author throws in what I felt was utterly unnecessary carnage, leaving me feeling ‘meh’ about the whole story. There was a lot of potential to create a powerful message about belief, but in the end it just ended up another story about revenge.

“The Exchange Officers” – Brad R. Torgersen
I actually got bored and stopped reading this one. Its space-opera-y but didn’t feel like it was covering any new ground. I skimmed the latter half of the story and, even knowing how the story came out in the end, had absolutely no desire to go back and finish it, so we’ll just leave it at that.

Graphic Novel

The Girl Who Loved Doctor Who – Paul Cornell & Jimmy Broxton
I felt like this was a fun twist on the ‘character visits our world where he is just a character’ trope. Good art, fun story, all around enjoyable.

Girl Genius – Kaja & Phil Foglio
I felt like this one was just trying too hard, with everything. I liked the art the best out of all three, but the writing itself felt stilted and awkward.

Meathouse Man – George R.R. Martin adapted by Raya Golden
I opened this, and closed it again. I have the same problem with this as I have with Game of Thrones: utter gratuity. There is no point to all the nakedness and blood other than to be nakedness and blood and I just don’t feel it adds to the story. I’m all for a good sex scene, or a rousing massacre, but they really need to serve a definite purpose to the plot, and I just don’t feel this does. Sorry Martin fans…

Next up, Novellas! I’ll eventually make it to the novels, I promise…

Finding Hidden Gems

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We had stopped by our local used book store a couple weeks ago while we were out and about and I happened to see a book by Diane Duane that I hadn’t previously known existed. I was very familiar with her Young Wizards Series, and loved them dearly, and here I was, presented with a science fiction novel, Starrise at Corrivale. I got quite excited and bought it immediately, and sat down to read it post-haste.

I wasn’t sure what I was expecting, but what I ended up getting was…very different from what I was used to reading from Diane Duane. The Young Wizards books are very straightforward, with pared down language and a no-nonsense, everyday sort of manner which works well in contrast with the high fantasy she is injecting into the modern world. The opening pages of Starrise, however, were flowery and overly descriptive, setting a lovely scene, but not in the slightest what I’d come to expect from Duane’s writing style. I even went to my bookshelf and grabbed the first of the Young Wizards books to make sure I wasn’t imagining the difference.

Once I got over the initial shock of such a different tone, I started to enjoy Starrise. It is very much a space opera, with blazing guns, marines, aliens, and evil corporate plots. it manages to avoid being cliche for the most part, which was refreshing, and the characters are all engaging and surprising. One interesting note: these sci-fi novels are actually set in the world of a game, Star*Drive, which I had no notion of before picking up this book. They manage to avoid the trap that most licensed books fall into, as they do not require any familiarity with the game to follow and enjoy, and Starrise is a full and complex story of its own. I find many licensed books to fall short on those aspects, so this was a nice change.

If you are in the mood for a somewhat pulpy space opera (which, admit it, we all want now and again) I’d go track down a copy of Starrise at Corrivale. Its well worth the hunt.

Problems with eBook Vendor

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Hello all, please forgive me, but if you’ve tried to purchase an ebook in the last few days, you’ve probably found it impossible. BookBaby and I had a difference of opinion on several matters and have parted ways and I am currently trying to find a new distributor. Bear with me for a little while, but if you want a digital copy now, just drop me a line and I’ll make sure you get one asap. Also, if you purchased a kindle copy anytime in the last three months, please let me know so that I can send you the pretty version of the book instead of the mangled piece of crap that has been up for sale on Amazon.

By the Skin of his Teeth…

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I was given the opportunity to interview Jim Butcher for The Speculative Craft last week, and he was kind enough to share a pre-press copy of Skin Game with me to read before the launch date today. Which means that now I can tell you what I think, before most of you probably even pick it up.

For all the rabid fans out there, like me, I can assure you, Skin Game does not disappoint. I don’t want to let any spoilers slip, cause I’m just not that kind of girl, but there are a good handful of twists that you don’t see coming, some for the book plot, some for the arc plot, and I really can’t wait until the next book, since Butcher has set up some phenomenally fun plot points to play with down the line. But the writing is solid as ever and the story keeps you turning the page.

I hadn’t realized until I started doing my pre-interview research that Butcher had actually planned out the full character arc for each character for the full 20-odd book series before he sat down to write the first one, which makes me even more excited to see where these characters are going. They’ve already changed so much and we’re already on book fifteen. I find myself day dreaming about where they might end up. I mean, by this time, Dresden has already played with Hellfire, Soulfire, and is now the Winter Knight, how much more powerful can he get? Will he end up running the council? Cause that would be hilarious. Who knows? And now I have a year to wait until I can read the next book. But to help with the withdrawal pains, look for the interview with Butcher next week on The Speculative Craft!