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The Nebula Awards annually recognize the best works of science fiction or fantasy published in the United States. The awards are organized and awarded by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), a nonprofit association of professional science fiction and fantasy writers.[1]
(Some might argue the Hugo Awards are the more prestigious awards in science fiction, as they are international awards. But, voting for a Hugo only requires membership in the World Science Fiction Society, which anyone can join. The 2017 Hugos will be presented at the 75th Worldcon, Worldcon 75, in Helsinki, Finland, on August 12, 2017.)
The SFWA just announced this year's Nebula awards, honoring works published in 2016. This year's winners are:
Best Novel: All the Birds in the Sky, by Charlie Jane Anders
Best Novella: Every Heart a Doorway, by Seanan McGuire
Best Novelette: "The Long Fall Up", by William Ledbetter
Best Short Story: "Seasons of Glass and Iron", by Amal El-Mohtar
Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation: Arrival, Directed by Denis Villeneuve, Screenplay by Eric Heisserer
Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy: Arabella of Mars, by David D. Levine
The nominees for these awards are listed at the above SFWA link.
[1] Wikipedia.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Friday May 26 2017, @06:26AM (9 children)
If only someone would have to courage to, you know, comment on the FA, in an insightful and interesting way, without any racist alt-right crap, perhaps SoylentNews could be saved. But I grow pessimistic. The inability to censor the truly bad posters, the deplorable expendables, has doomed a bastion of free speech. Oh, what SoylentNews could have been! It was a bare idea, (fuck beta), a whisper, and now it is gone.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Friday May 26 2017, @07:39AM (5 children)
Will a cynical comment do?
I've heard the Hugo has been compromised by ballot box stuffing, and has lost a lot of credibility. They couldn't queer the Nebula Award with the same tactics, but recall hearing that it is suspect too, possibly been swung by pressuring and/or bribing committee members.
Oh well, I've been out of the SF/Fantasy scene long enough that I no longer know what's current there. Most of the authors I used to read are dead or retired.
Plus, I wonder if storytelling needs a makeover. Writing is such a stodgy way of telling a story. Am glad to hear that the graphic novel has gained respectability. Movies have their points, but in those cases where a story is available in both book and movie forms, in most cases the book is better. They tried "choose your own adventure" books, and they were kind of neat but just too limited. Role playing is more flexible. Most MMORPGs missed, badly. Too easy to go the power gamer route in those, grind away trying to gain levels and loot. Seems the computer ought to be able to tell stories in ways more compelling than any printed book can, if only we can figure out how.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Friday May 26 2017, @07:52AM (1 child)
> Oh well, I've been out of the SF/Fantasy scene long enough that I no longer know what's current there. Most of the authors I used to read are dead or retired.
Last year I picked up 5 or 6 novels just because they were shortlisted for some SF/Fantasy award (cant remember if it was Nebula or Hugo or something else). It was a pretty good way to find interesting books. I only regretted reading one of them. A couple I really liked.
> Seems the computer ought to be able to tell stories in ways more compelling than any printed book can, if only we can figure out how.
They were getting there with games like Deus Ex. I have tried one or two more recent ones like Witcher but it tends to be a bit of a slog. I wonder if they can do a truly "non-linear" RPG. Not "non-linear" as in you can do the quests/missions/whatever in any order (which is not really a big step up from linear); more like - you have to accumulate sufficient evidence to convict a suspect, and there are lots of bits of evidence around, probably implicating multiple suspects.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday May 28 2017, @04:52PM
The Humble Book Bundle: Super Nebula Author Showcase [sfwa.org]
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 26 2017, @08:30AM
It is entirely because funding requires a massive ROI to be considered successful, which means catering to the lowest common denominator. That is why pretty much every successful game has turned into a neverending grind where just as you get ahead there is something new to attain.
I say this in contrast to 'somewhere new to explore', because quite a few games could have (and some smaller ones do!) get by not on the new skill/experience levels you can obtain from a new release (often with a mediocre storyline) but by opening up new paths through the world, placing story elements that tie together into them, then leaving it for the players to work out the rest. This is similiar to how the best novels leave the important bits to the mind of the reader rather than spelling it out in no uncertain terms. Also why some authors are so hated if people actually know their politics/religious/sexual leanings, in comparison to people's mistaken assumptions based on the inferences they themselves made off the well crafted fiction of the author. (Earlier Scott Card Works, C.S. Lewis, Heinlen, etc.)
The problem is, as is often the case, when financial considerations outweigh creativity, doing something new, or exploring a hotly contested topic that normal people have been emotionally rather than objectively exploring.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday May 28 2017, @04:49PM (1 child)
I've heard the Hugo has been compromised by ballot box stuffing
Yes, and it's easy to do, albeit expensive. You can buy as many memberships as you want, and each one gets a vote. Not the Nebulas.
Plus, I wonder if storytelling needs a makeover. Writing is such a stodgy way of telling a story.
Your youth is showing. The magic of the written word is that a movie or comic book (calling them "graphic novels" doesn't change their childishness; I gave them up when I was seven after Batman taught me to read) is when you watch a movie, everyone in the theater hears the same voices and sees exactly the same thing; everyone sees the same story. With a book, no two people read the same story!
in those cases where a story is available in both book and movie forms, in most cases the book is better
That's been my observation, although the books We Were Soldiers, and Young and True Grit were terrible. The first was a dry scholarly tome, dryer than a government report, and the latter was just poorly written, but the movies were excellent.
Of course, if you have dyslexia or some other reading disability the movie is always better.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Monday May 29 2017, @08:13AM
> Your youth is showing.
Better than my age showing? Batman, yeah. Superhero stories are in many ways childish fantasies. They require a whole lot of suspension of disbelief, often too much. But why should that ruin the format? I thought Art Spiegelman's Maus was excellent. I also enjoyed Knights of the Dinner Table.
I feel Hollywood underemphasizes the storytelling, and could do so much better at that part, if they wanted to. They are awesome at the visuals. Able to recreate the look and feel of just about any era in history, make up completely fantastic science fiction or fantasy settings, spend gobs of money on explosions and amazing stunts, and so forth. They didn't used to be so fussily thorough about it. Like many of the 1960s Star Trek sets and scenes look cheap and fake compared to later series, and the 60's Batman TV series, with fight scenes covered over with comic art words such as "pow", is really weak. But they're a lot better now. If only they'd devote as much effort to the stories. Terminator 2, for instance, is a terrible story, with a lot of just plain stupid plot elements. Seems the audience was supposed to be so jazzed by the special effects they wouldn't notice. By today's standards, the special effects are nothing special, which makes the crap story inescapably obvious.
Anyway, it's not the fault of the format that so many of the stories are butchered, that's Hollywood's fault. But movie making is becoming more and more possible for anyone to do, and I believe that is a good thing. Competition will push them to improve.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by SixGunMojo on Friday May 26 2017, @11:51AM (2 children)
The inability to censor the truly bad posters, the deplorable expendables, has doomed a bastion of free speech.
Oh, the fucking irony.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 27 2017, @03:14PM (1 child)
There is no irony. There is just an obvious lesson that you've failed to learn.
Shittiness begets more shittiness.
Take a shit in a cistern and pretty soon the entire container is teeming with bacteria.
Tarchus is a creature grown in the uncontrolled pollution fed by those posters.
Clean up the shit and guys like tarchus go away too.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Thursday June 01 2017, @09:48PM
Stupid, hateful, ignorant, uneducated, Republican, racist, denying, and sexually twisted posts drive out good posts. No one wants to read that. It is like finding a place where there is shit all over the sidewalks. Better to just avoid the neighborhood.
Some of the best of us no longer post. It is just not worth all the stupidity and ignorance, and of course, fear and loathing. Soon, there will be no need of censorship, because all the people who are worth listening to will be dead on a train at the hands of a shit poster advocating "free speech" for vile stupid ideas.