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posted by janrinok on Thursday August 23 2018, @11:45PM   Printer-friendly
from the best-page-turners dept.

In Science Fiction, some awards have become almost meaningless as they came to be dominated by interests other than the pure enjoyment of a truly good story. The Hugo Awards, for example, have descended into a left/right catfight. They have become as meaningless as a Nobel Peace Prize.

Some, like yours truly, have entirely stopped reading about awards after getting burned once too many times and rely almost entirely on word of mouth or serendipity to find new authors and worthwhile books.

Our recent discussion of "The winners of the 2018 Hugo Awards" brought the idea (from bzipitidoo) that perhaps Soylent News could do a better job of pointing out new works of Science Fiction that could be of interest to soylentils and janrinok supported the idea, going so far as offering a kidney to the best author. (I think he's British, so he might have meant a kidney pie. [Not true, but funny])

Mind you, we would need to separate Science Fiction from Sci-Fi, Fantasy and other genres that have been mishmashed into one by most publishers and awards organizations.

So what do you think? What is the best new author/book in Science Fiction?


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @04:53AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @04:53AM (#725625)

    It's strange to see muslims randomly walking through sci fi scenes.
    Can anyone explain the black elf [wikia.com] in the Shannara Chronicles. Is this supposed to be a Dark Elf or something?

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @05:20AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 24 2018, @05:20AM (#725644)

    No, it is simply another salvo in the war against racism. Why are there no black elves? Why are all the dark skinned creatures in LOTR the baddies?

    I love LOTR, but you can't deny the rather significant racism even if it was unintentional.

    • (Score: 2) by jmorris on Friday August 24 2018, @06:17AM

      by jmorris (4844) on Friday August 24 2018, @06:17AM (#725663)

      Because elves are part of the myths invented by Europeans. And Tolkien was explicitly creating a myth cycle for his people, the English.

      If one is reading a African myth it would be a bit silly if there were random people from other areas unrelated to the setting for the story. Don't remember protests over the lack of Asians in Wakanda for that matter. It isn't racism to realize everybody is not interchangeable units of production.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Friday August 24 2018, @11:36AM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Friday August 24 2018, @11:36AM (#725748) Journal

      Why are there no black elves?

      Because Morgoth had a lock on black while the other deities all were light-side. So bad things were dark and good things were light.

      I love LOTR, but you can't deny the rather significant racism even if it was unintentional.

      Unintentional? Elves lived indefinitely, were the fairest, and generally smarter than the humans. And the only consolation prize the humans got were that they got to go to ghetto heaven when they died, far away from sullying the final places of the elves. Orcs/goblins/etc were just tools of the bad guys. They didn't get to go anywhere when they died. The Ents were the only ones with a lock on photosynthesis. Dwarves got to grub in the dirt and be the wealth collectors for the dragons (as well as the second-hand greed stereotype in the books).

      But sure, let's make a big deal out of Tolkien not having dark-skinned elves in his books. Real significant racism there.