Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels discussion

you guys are all doing great!

Way to go, Antti!

Joining in really late! It looks like I'm only missing a few letters on the year.

A: Ancillary Justice
B: The Big Time
C: The City in the Middle of the Night
D: Doomsday Book
E: Embassytown
F: Fugitive Telemetry
G: Gideon the Ninth
H: How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe
I: Inspector Hobbes and the Curse
J:
K: Klara and the Sun
L: The Light Brigade
M: The Mercy Journals
N: Network Effect
O: Out of the Silent Planet
P: Piranesi
Q:
R: Redshirts
S: Saturn's Children
T: To Say Nothing of the Dog
U:
V: Valiant
W: Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
X: X-Men: Days of Future Past
Y: The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Z:

For the open letters, I've got a plan for two out of four as I have physical copies of:

J: Janissaries
U: Up the Walls of the World

But, I've apparently never read a book starting with Z! Q will also be a challenge.

A nice list, Chris! Regarding your U read - the group read it, so you may jump in to a discussion there as well

Chris wrote: "Q will also be a challenge."

May I suggest Queen of Angels? I'm about to finish it myself to close out the challenge. Looking at your list above, it would seem to fit your taste. Hard SF, a sprinkle of cyberpunk, very dense, interesting story.

Finally finished! The last two went very slowly (note to self: don't save the hard SF for last). Here's a recap (*** is H/N listed):

A - Amberlough ***
B - Brown Girl in the Ring
C - The Changeling
D - Downward to the Earth
E - Emergence ***
F - The Final Programme
G - Glory Road ***
H - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire ***
I - Isle of the Dead ***
J - Jem: The Making of a Utopia ***
K - Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI
L - The Legion of Time ***
M - Mockingbird ***
N - Neptune's Brood ***
O - On the Beach
P - Piranesi ***
Q - Queen of Angels ***
R - Road Out of Winter
S - Shades of Milk and Honey ***
T - There Will Be Time ***
U - Use of Weapons
V - Voices - LeGuin trilogy
W - Witchmark ***
X - Marvel Masterworks: The Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 2
Y - The Year of the Quiet Sun ***
Z - Zodiac - not sff, true crime

Allan--Zodiac! I loved the movie, so much I got a copy of the book, but I have never read it. Is it great?

Kateblue wrote: "Allan--Zodiac! I loved the movie, so much I got a copy of the book, but I have never read it. Is it great?"

Alas, I didn't think it was that great, maybe 3 stars. It goes through the history of it, and describes the evidence and suspects they did investigate over the years, but since the crimes weren't solved, it really didn't go anywhere. I don't know, you might like it more.

well, I have many other books to read, so Zodiac is going further down the list for now. Thanks!

As I sit killing time at my computer with a lightning-frightened dog on my feet, hiding under my desk, I wonder how close I am to completing the Alphabet Challenge a second time, given all the books I've read starting with the same letters. About what I expected, 9 of 26 left, with all the hard letters......

A - A Desolation Called Peace
B - Blackout ***
C - China Mountain Zhang ***
D - Deathworld 1 ***
E - The Echo Wife
F - The Foundation Trilogy
G - Gifts
H - Homeland
I - Iron Council ***
J -
K -
L - Life During Wartime - in progress
M - Mission of Gravity ***
N - Network Effect ***
O - Orphans of the Sky
P - Project Hail Mary
Q -
R -
S - The Scar ***
T -
U - Ubik
V - Version Zero
W - We Were Soldiers Once... and Young: Ia Drang - The Battle that Changed the War in Vietnam
X -
Y -
Z -

I suggest Jane Doe. Not SF, but one of the most unique and interesting books I have read all year

Haha amazing Allan! Hope your pup is doing well now 🐶

Allan wrote:
May I suggest Queen of Angels?"

Fantastic suggestion Allan! I just picked up a copy from the local library and will probably start on it later this week.

And awesome to see the progress on a second run!

A - Annihilation A very interesting read, worth experiencing once. Not sure if I'll be reading the sequels, because I'm afraid they will take away from the mystery.
B - Binti A bit let down for me. It should've been a shorter story, with the scenes more to the point and snappy pacing. It may be a good foundation for a series, the imagination is there.
C - The Currents of Space - An unmemorable specimen of a distant cousin of the Foundation series. Shame, because the beginning is very intriguing.
D - Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom - very disappointing, poorly executed modern one trick pony of a book.
E - The Eye of the World - First book in the Wheel of Time series.
F - Factoring Humanity
G - Glory Road: very weak and unprofessional.
H - The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate – Discoveries from a Secret World - a must read for anyone interested in the natural world. Trees are far more complicated than what is widely believed.
I - I Am Legend: a rare occasion where the book is worse of the movie.
J - Joy at Work
K - Killing Commendatore: Haruki Murakami keeps growing on me, every book appears deceptively simple but you just can't get enough of his style of writing. Also I think he is getting the hang of actual endings!
L - The Lost World: a classic but unfortunately not of the timeless kind. It definitely reads as pulp of the time.
M - Mindbridge Reads like a discovered draft for a novel, released by an overly ambitious publishing agent. #chasingbucks
N - Neptune's Brood: Vorkosigan Saga meets publishing house pressure and poor world building.
O - One Summer: America, 1927. A very interesting book which explores numerous subjects and origins of many of modern concepts.
P - Pale Blue Dot
Q - Quiet Power
R - Robots and Empire - One of the best Robots in my opinion.
S - Saturn's Children: Ew, steer clear. A book where two gimmick ideas do not hold water and added pervy parts are there only for the shock value.
T - Thinking, Fast and Slow. A nice book overall, but here and there it felt dated and at times narrow-minded
U - UR
V -
W - World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War - still in the process of reading.
X - Xenocide
Y -
Z - Zen Mind

Thinking, Fast ans Slow is definitely dated: it was written before the replication crisis really hit, and it shows. Kahneman and Tversky trust the then-new priming studies way too much, and nowadays those are universally considered false. You can read more at Replication Index: https://replicationindex.com/2020/12/...

Antti wrote: "Thinking, Fast ans Slow is definitely dated: it was written before the replication crisis really hit, and it shows. ."

Interesting, thanks for the info

One to go! Of course its X 🤦🏻‍♀️

A - Axiom's End
B - Beneath the Twisted Trees
C - The Curse of Chalion
D - A Desolation Called Peace
E - The Empire of Gold
F - Foundryside
G - Golden Son
H - House of Earth and Blood
I - The Invasion of the Tearling
J - Jade City
K - The Kingdoms
L - Legendborn
M - Mistborn: The Final Empire
N - Nevernight
O - The Original
P - Piranesi
Q - Queens of the Wyrd
R - Red Rising
S - Shorefall
T - To Sleep in a Sea of Stars
U - Uprooted
V - A Veil of Spears
W - Winter's Orbit
X
Y - Year Zero
Z - Zsezzyn, Who is Not a God from Metaphorosis Magazine

Nice list! X is a tough one.

Nicely done Rebecca!

As for X.... there's this list Titles That Begin With X but I haven't heard of most things on it!

It might help Allan trying to complete his second alphabet too ;)

A sneaky way to have x-titled - read Dawn, it is of Xenogenesis series and is nice

Thanks for the suggestions all! I think I'm going to count The Poet X as my X read. I just got the audio from my library and I'm not quite ready to dive into the X-men universe (which was my original plan for X) quite yet.

'Xenocide' (Ender's Saga) is not bad

Xenocide was good but it helps to have read Speaker for the Dead first. But sorry, I haven’t been much help as I have family visiting and reading completely disrupted. I haven’t gotten through 20 pages this week vs 100 a day normally.

Yep, and Ender's Game. I think Orson Scott Card can cover a fair few letters of the alphabet just in the Ender's Saga series.

Khira wrote: "Yep, and Ender's Game. I think Orson Scott Card can cover a fair few letters of the alphabet just in the Ender's Saga series."

Problem with reading him now is whether one can separate a creation from a creator. For his (at least early) works are very talented, but his later political position can discourage potential readers

That's very true

(I read a few of his earlier books many years ago and didn't know about his later commentary)

Ignorance is bliss.
I don't think that NOT reading something is an effective form of protest. Even in the worst case.
To me it's like not watching the news about atrocities that are happening on another continent. "Yeah... Let me switch back to my Disney channel, this whole Rwanda thing is killing my vibe."

I guess it is an offtopic and if members wish, I can start a topic on 'problematic authors' or something similar. I think not reading is fine and potentially effective - it means not buying - either directly or indirectly via a library loan, meaning less income of a person, whose views are problematic for you.

I think not reading is a better and more effective way of protest than screaming about things on the internet, for sure.

Mostly, my opinion is, I may read it, but I won't buy it.

I have no opinion about starting the thread you suggest. It's fine, but I hope it won't get taken over by people criticizing authors who were actually pretty progressive for their time, but it's just long past and now sounds not so good. I've seen that happen in other groups. But I think we are a pretty intelligent bunch here.

Art wrote: "I don't think that NOT reading something is an effective form of protest."
There are many different ways to endorse things. Whether it's buying the book, borrowing it from a library, writing a review on goodreads, talking about it with a friend, letting someone see you reading it on the train, etc.

I loved Card's books that I have read, but I would never recommend them someone now without a disclaimer about the author. I know better and I can do better.

Kateblue wrote: "It's fine, but I hope it won't get taken over by people criticizing authors who were actually pretty progressive for their time, but it's just long past and now sounds not so good."
It's a perennial problem, and I think there is always space for criticism.

The reality is there are so many great books out there, you never have to read a problematic author if you don't want to.

This whole thing is definitely off-topic for this thread though... unless we're really that stuck for X books ;)

Finished! With slight cheats on X (not the first letter) and Z (short story). Whew. Thanks for the fun challenge Art.

A - Axiom's End
B - Beneath the Twisted Trees
C - The Curse of Chalion
D - A Desolation Called Peace
E - The Empire of Gold
F - Foundryside
G - Golden Son
H - House of Earth and Blood
I - The Invasion of the Tearling
J - Jade City
K - The Kingdoms
L - Legendborn
M - Mistborn: The Final Empire
N - Nevernight
O - The Original
P - Piranesi
Q - Queens of the Wyrd
R - Red Rising
S - Shorefall
T - To Sleep in a Sea of Stars
U - Uprooted
V - A Veil of Spears
W - Winter's Orbit
X - The Poet X
Y - Year Zero
Z - Zsezzyn, Who is Not a God from Metaphorosis Magazine

Whoop! Whoop! Congratulations!

Well done guys, I'm closing in on my missing letters. Should be able to finish it next month.

Congrats, Rebecca, great job!

Can anybody recommend a book that starts with a "J"?
I can only think of Juniper Time and I don't want to read it by myself, will wait for the group to vote for it.

I loved my J book, which was very randomly discovered. Jane Doe by Victoria Helen Stone

Not SF, but interesting because the main character is like no other.

Or there is always Jane Eyre

I loved my J book too Jade City there is also The Jasmine Throne.

Jem by Frederick Pohl, one of his better ones I thought

Thanks everyone.
I've read Jane Eyre and Jade City doesn't excite me as much because it is a part of a series.
Maybe Jem could be it. I'll keep looking for possible non fic options

Are you looking for any genre, or hoping to stay in the SFF realm? Jurassic Park & Journey to the Center of the Earth are both SFF.

Just looked at my own book list for other ideas. Jason and Medea & Joy at Work: Organizing Your Professional Life are both pretty short and easy to get hold of :P

Thanks Sarah!
2/4 are already on the list of books I want to read eventually and this Joy at Work book looks very interesting. I'll try looking for it.

Alright, I've got many of my remaining books lined up with only "V" and "Y" missing. Almost there!!

The goal is to find some non fic for those letters

Art wrote: "Can anybody recommend a book that starts with a "J"."

From best to least best:
Jagannath
Jack Glass
Jonathan Livingston Seagull
Jury Service by Cory Doctorow

Nonfiction:
A Journey to the Dark Heart of Nameless Unspeakable Evil: Charities, Hollywood, Joseph Kony, and Other Abominations (It is funnier than the title sounds.)

Not read, but maybe interesting
Jhereg
Jurgen

Oleksandr wrote: "I guess it is an offtopic and if members wish, I can start a topic on 'problematic authors' or something similar. ..."

There was a good bit of discussion of that topic in "*RESOLVED?* Ender's endgame."

Just for the hell of it, 2nd time through:

A - A Desolation Called Peace
B - Blackout ***
C - China Mountain Zhang ***
D - Deathworld 1 ***
E - The Echo Wife
F - The Foundation Trilogy
G - Gifts
H - Homeland
I - Iron Council ***
J - Jack of Shadows ***
K -
L - Life During Wartime - in progress
M - Mission of Gravity ***
N - Network Effect ***
O - Orphans of the Sky
P - Project Hail Mary
Q - The Queen's Gambit
R - Raven Strategem ***
S - The Scar ***
T -
U - Ubik
V - Version Zero
W - We Were Soldiers Once... and Young: Ia Drang - The Battle that Changed the War in Vietnam
X - Marvel Masterworks: Uncanny X-Men #3
Y -
Z - tbr: Zodiac by Neal Stephenson

Wow! second time through! I never thought of that. Maybe if I have some time to kill in December . . .

Almost made a second time through, but I'm going to fall short by two books, Y and Z. I found a book for each but just couldn't get to them with all my other goals.

A - A Desolation Called Peace
B - Blackout ***
C - China Mountain Zhang ***
D - Deathworld 1 ***
E - The Echo Wife
F - The Foundation Trilogy
G - Gifts
H - Homeland
I - Iron Council ***
J - Jack of Shadows ***
K - King Rat (China Mieville)
L - The Last Wish
M - Mission of Gravity ***
N - Network Effect ***
O - Orphans of the Sky
P - Project Hail Mary
Q - The Queen's Gambit
R - Raven Strategem ***
S - The Scar ***
T - The Tower at Stony Wood ***
U - Ubik
V - Version Zero
W - We Were Soldiers Once...and Young
X - Uncanny X-Men Vol. 3
Y - ???
Z - ???

I know it's a few days late, but I did actually finish on time on the 30th! I unfortunately didn't get to Queen of Angels this year (left it behind while traveling), so that'll be nice to start the new challenge with :)

A: Ancillary Justice
B: The Big Time
C: The City in the Middle of the Night
D: Doomsday Book
E: Embassytown
F: Fugitive Telemetry
G: Gideon the Ninth
H: How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe
I: Inspector Hobbes and the Curse
J: Janissaries
K: Klara and the Sun
L: The Light Brigade
M: The Mercy Journals
N: Network Effect
O: Out of the Silent Planet
P: Piranesi
Q: Quantum Rose
R: Redshirts
S: Saturn's Children
T: To Say Nothing of the Dog
U: Upright Women Wanted
V: Valiant
W: Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
X: X-Men: Days of Future Past
Y: The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Z: Zone One