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I did my Hugo nominations! I didn't read half as many things or half as well as I ought, and I liked less than half of them half as well as they deserved. And I didn't nominate as much as I was planning to, either, because I came home yesterday and crashed out on the hammock chair instead of finishing my noms. But I got in everything I really wanted to get in, and it's done one way or another! And now I get to read WHATEVER I WANT without the pile of Hugo-eligible stuff staring at me balefully from across the room. I can get to finally read the new Vorkosigan book! And the new Young Wizards book! And most importantly, the last-ever Dragonbreath book!

(I was good and only nominated Ursula Vernon twice. <_<)

...not that the Hugos stopped me from reading the first 14 volumes of Naruto and nine volumes of Dragonball and two large tomes about sea monsters but you know sometimes you just have to read old manga and books about sea monsters.

Being a Hugo voter is really hard work, guys. I think I am now morally opposed to fan-nominated awards, not for any fairness-of-awards reason, but because if I put in that much work I wanna be getting paid for it. I will probably not be doing that again, whew.

Let's see. I've signed up for Camp NaNo again, which is good because I've been slacking on that. I'm also signed up for MCU Rolling Remix, which sounded fun, and I really liked the last remixy thing I did, although I suppose I should actually watch Age of Ultron before I write mine. I planted some peas in the garden last week but I don't know if they're coming up yet (something is coming up, but is it peas?) and I should really do some more garden stuff this weekend. And I signed up for the get-in-shape challenge at work, because they give you prizes, and I've already been trying to do jump rope to build my cardio (reading about ninja training is good motivation for this). I started where I'd feel like death after 25 jumps; after six weeks I feel only a little bit like death after 4 sets of 50, which I guess is progress, but it's progress from a pretty low floor.

ANYWAY. I was thinking about reviewing some of the short-fiction stuff I read for Hugos, but there are several of them where my review would be "I would have nominated it but it has boy cooties" and that just wouldn't have advanced the dialogue at all really. Anyway, if you want to ask me my thoughts on any of the things rated on my list of stuff to read ask and I will ramble. (If you want to know why I didn't read one that's not rated, there is no answer, except that I didn't get to it in the list.)

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Hah, I'm glad to see someone else who couldn't finish The Traitor Baru Cormorant.

I mean, I knew it was going to be depressing, and I started reading it when I was on a mood downturn already, but the more I think about even the little bit I did get through, the more I think it was a book that was just way too interested in being manipulative at the expense of what I think makes good storytelling for me to have ever nominated it anyway.

(also I then read somebody's review of it on DW that said it didn't even get the accounting right, and the main reason I was interested in it was ACCOUNTANCY HERO, so, ehhh.

...surprising number of stuff on that list got ruled out for failing to get the basic principles of the facts on which it what trying to build its story incorrect.)

Thoughts on Uprooted and Sorceror to the Crown?

I read them both over a year ago (back when they were actually still new), so my thoughts are not terribly fresh, but: I really enjoyed them both! They were good books and fun to read and I really like that they exist and got published!

Sorceror to the Crown was basically a fantasy Regency romance. It was a very good fantasy Regency romance! Probably one of the top three or so I've read! And it did a much better job engaging with wider world of Regency England than they usually do. Recommended.

But... it was basically not much but a fantasy Regency romance. The magical worldbuilding gave the impression it was thin enough to blow over in a strong wind, the plot was intricate but didn't have a lot of depth, the romance was just kind of... there, filling the requirement for a romance in a Regency romance, and the resolution was really really too good to be believable.

Uprooted is a YA fantasy novel set in fairy-tale Poland. It is a very good YA fantasy novel and it does really interesting things with the setting! I really liked all the characters and I loved the various resolutions they got and how twisty the interpersonal stuff ended up, and big battle scene and the climax were amazingly well done, and, just, a lot happened in that book and it was all fun to read (other than the weird bit in the city which was really ham-handed compared to the rest of it.)

it was definitely drawing hard on the current YA fantasy standard, though it did rise above the standard pretty far. I had.... mixed feelings on the ending, though, which did the (vague spoiler?) "elder race must nobly and graciously and nonviolently fade away to make room for the white settlers" trope in a way that was pretty uncritical of it, and I'd kinda thought sff as a genre had gotten to the point of being willing to be critical of that trope.

Thank you for the reviews!

On that list of stuff to read, what does the star system mean? Is it just four stars you liked, five stars you loved, etc?

Anyway yes, I did not read or nominate nearly as many things as I'm sure should have been read or nominated, but I did read way more things from 2015 than I other wise would've (which might very well have been zero), so overall I am satisfied. And I too nominated Ursula Vernon twice. :)

I was considering going up to four or five times for Ursula but really she has a Hugo already. :P

They're more or less based on the ones I put on my goodreads account, although I was being more generous than I am on Goodreads, because I was mostly taking notes for myself for nominating, but basically: five is would nominate for a Hugo probably; four is either good but not great, or great but with a few issues that bother me; three is workmanlike and acceptable or good but with some major issues; two is would happily read if backpacking and found it in the rafters of a trail shelter on a rainy day; one is threw the book at the wall.

Probably some of my ratings on there should drop by a star under that standard but I tend to feel more generous when the person is only getting magazine rates and therefore definitely doing it mostly for love.

(I ended up nominating a mix of fives and fours because I didn't have enough fives.)

Edited 2016-04-02 02:01 (UTC)

Yeah, I think I came up with three things I really really loved, and then the rest of what I nominated was just very good. :)