2021 Hugo ballot: Best Series
Less than a week to go for Hugo voting, later than usual this year for reasons we are all very familiar with. This will be my second last post on this year's finalists.
I'm not a fan of the Best Series category. I feel it's important that the Hugo Awards represent the best in the genre of the previous year. With the Best Series final ballot this year, we are being asked to judge between a series that started in 2009 (October Daye), four recent trilogies (one of which has some associated short fiction) and a series of novellas capped by a novel. I don't think it's really comparing like with like, and we're certainly not comparing 2020 with 2020.
In addition, as a conscientious Hugo voter I have tried to read every work on the final ballot every year I've had a vote. That's completely impossible with Best Series. I did read at least one more volume than I had already done in each of the series on the final ballot, and actually finished the one I liked best, but did not complete any of the other five. I don't find this satisfactory, but I don't think any other approach is realistic if we have a Best Series award.
The four winners of Best Series so far have been worthy victors - Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan and Five Gods, Becky Chambers' Wayfarers (where I was honoured to present the award to Becky Chambers in person in 2019) and The Expanse; and whatever else one may think about Lovecraft, the plain fact is that Cthulhu was clearly the most significant entry on last year's Retro Hugo ballot, and given that we were having the category at all (a decision that I unsuccessfully opposed) it was the right winner. But I can't see that level of quality being continued indefinitely. As I wrote in 2018 (the only year of the most recent five where I was not myself involved with the administration of the Hugos, when three series got enough votes for the final ballot but were disqualified on grounds of length, and a fourth declined nomination):I do query how long the Best Series category will be sustainable. No winner can be eligible again; no finalist can be eligible again until another two volumes with 250,000 words have been produced. My feeling is that the well of plausible nominees may run dry rather quickly.
I think we are seeing that this year already.
One other point worth making - there were some complaints that some of this year's Best Series finalists also included works that appeared on the ballot in other categories, and that the rules should preclude this. That wasn't our reading of the constitution, this year or in 2019 - some people clearly thought that was what they were voting for when the category was created, but it isn't what we got. It's worth noting, in line with my previous comment, that if we had excluded those series (or asked authors to choose which nomination should stand) it would have been a weaker ballot overall.
Anyway, to this year's finalists. I found this a really easy ranking, though I'm equally certain that voters will take a very different view.
6) October Daye, by Seanan McGuire - I read volumes 1 (Rosemary and Rue), 2 ( A Local Habitation) and 8 ( The Winter Long). I completely bounced off the core concept of a Gaelic otherworld conveniently located in the American West, with no visible representation from other less foreign supernatural traditions. The fact is that San Francisco has been a major European settlement for less than 200 years; how then does it mysteriously have a parallel world of ancient Celtic entities full of European chivalric traditions sitting alongside it? And what has happened to the supernatural beings of the more indigenous traditions? On top of that, the characters need to constantly infodump to us about the rules of their parallel society. I think this has a good chance of winning, because McGuire has an enthusiastic fanbase which she actively cultivates (and there is nothing wrong with that), but it won't be with my vote.
5) The Murderbot Diaries, by Martha Wells - I read three of the first four novellas ( All Systems Red, Artificial Condition and Exit Strategy) and the novel Network Effect. I'm one of the three people in fandom who rather bounced off the novellas, largely due to my antipathy to cute anthropomorphic robot stories (even if the robot is also a killer robot). The most recent volume was OK, as it turns out that Murderbot does actually have a space for friendships and possibly even growth, making it a bit more than a one-joke story. It's on the Best Novel ballot and won the Nebula and Locus (SF), and the whole sequence is now qualified in the Best Series category for the first time. Also has an enthusiastic fanbase which may get it the award, but again not with my vote.
4) The Lady Astronaut Universe, by Mary Robinette Kowal - I read the first and third of the trilogy, The Calculating Stars and The Relentless Moon, and the original novelette (two of them won the respective Hugo ballots of their years, the votes are not yet in for the last). Full marks for descriptions, but really not convinced by the scenario of a devastated mid-twentieth century USA turning towards liberalism and space flight; we should be so lucky... and the plot twists in the latest book really challenged my suspension of disbelief just a bit, as did the postscript after the main action of the book was over. Best of luck to Kowal personally as she has ended up chairing this year's Worldcon after the dramatic events of June, in which I myself had a hand.
3) The Interdependency, by John Scalzi - I read the first two of the trilogy, The Collapsing Empire and The Consuming Fire. The first volume had grand sweeps of interstellar space, the second concentrates very much more on court politics in the capital of a galactic empire which is being undermined by the collapse of the wormhole network on which it depends. The political and sexual intrigue is well done, but I keep running into the same problem with Scalzi's books, which is that all the characters sound the same
2) The Daevabad Trilogy, by S.A. Chakraborty - I read the first two of the trilogy, The City of Brass and The Kingdom of Copper, and got 100 pages into the third, The Empire of Gold. This is a tremendously assured tale set partly in eighteenth century Cairo but with links to the world of djinns. Lots of court politics, well sketched characters and intricate plotting. A really good bit of secondary world-building. I admit that I put down the third volume because voting deadline was looming and I knew from the first hundred pages that it probably wouldn't change my ranking, but I may come back to it.
1) The Poppy War, by R.F. Kuang - this was the only Best Series finalist where I read the entire set of volumes, The Poppy War, The Dragon Republic and The Burning God. As with Chakraborty, it's a big fantasy trilogy, with politics, military strategy, young woman protagonist and dark magical forces which are difficult to control and threaten to destroy the world and our protagonist, whose successes and flaws are very well portrayed. I thought it a tremendous series; ticked a lot of my boxes and it emphatically gets my vote. As noted above, I'm not sure that mine will be a majority view. I suppose that the fact that I would probably not have read this if it had not been a finalist is a point in favour of the Best Series category. From the adminsitrator's or conscientous reader's point of view, it's still a lot more work.
2021 Hugos: Best Novel | Best Novella | Best Novelette | Best Short Story | Best Series | Best Related Work | Best Graphic Story or Comic | Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form | Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form | Best Professional Artist and Best Fan Artist | Lodestar | Astounding
I'm not a fan of the Best Series category. I feel it's important that the Hugo Awards represent the best in the genre of the previous year. With the Best Series final ballot this year, we are being asked to judge between a series that started in 2009 (October Daye), four recent trilogies (one of which has some associated short fiction) and a series of novellas capped by a novel. I don't think it's really comparing like with like, and we're certainly not comparing 2020 with 2020.
In addition, as a conscientious Hugo voter I have tried to read every work on the final ballot every year I've had a vote. That's completely impossible with Best Series. I did read at least one more volume than I had already done in each of the series on the final ballot, and actually finished the one I liked best, but did not complete any of the other five. I don't find this satisfactory, but I don't think any other approach is realistic if we have a Best Series award.
The four winners of Best Series so far have been worthy victors - Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan and Five Gods, Becky Chambers' Wayfarers (where I was honoured to present the award to Becky Chambers in person in 2019) and The Expanse; and whatever else one may think about Lovecraft, the plain fact is that Cthulhu was clearly the most significant entry on last year's Retro Hugo ballot, and given that we were having the category at all (a decision that I unsuccessfully opposed) it was the right winner. But I can't see that level of quality being continued indefinitely. As I wrote in 2018 (the only year of the most recent five where I was not myself involved with the administration of the Hugos, when three series got enough votes for the final ballot but were disqualified on grounds of length, and a fourth declined nomination):I do query how long the Best Series category will be sustainable. No winner can be eligible again; no finalist can be eligible again until another two volumes with 250,000 words have been produced. My feeling is that the well of plausible nominees may run dry rather quickly.
I think we are seeing that this year already.
One other point worth making - there were some complaints that some of this year's Best Series finalists also included works that appeared on the ballot in other categories, and that the rules should preclude this. That wasn't our reading of the constitution, this year or in 2019 - some people clearly thought that was what they were voting for when the category was created, but it isn't what we got. It's worth noting, in line with my previous comment, that if we had excluded those series (or asked authors to choose which nomination should stand) it would have been a weaker ballot overall.
Anyway, to this year's finalists. I found this a really easy ranking, though I'm equally certain that voters will take a very different view.
6) October Daye, by Seanan McGuire - I read volumes 1 (Rosemary and Rue), 2 ( A Local Habitation) and 8 ( The Winter Long). I completely bounced off the core concept of a Gaelic otherworld conveniently located in the American West, with no visible representation from other less foreign supernatural traditions. The fact is that San Francisco has been a major European settlement for less than 200 years; how then does it mysteriously have a parallel world of ancient Celtic entities full of European chivalric traditions sitting alongside it? And what has happened to the supernatural beings of the more indigenous traditions? On top of that, the characters need to constantly infodump to us about the rules of their parallel society. I think this has a good chance of winning, because McGuire has an enthusiastic fanbase which she actively cultivates (and there is nothing wrong with that), but it won't be with my vote.
5) The Murderbot Diaries, by Martha Wells - I read three of the first four novellas ( All Systems Red, Artificial Condition and Exit Strategy) and the novel Network Effect. I'm one of the three people in fandom who rather bounced off the novellas, largely due to my antipathy to cute anthropomorphic robot stories (even if the robot is also a killer robot). The most recent volume was OK, as it turns out that Murderbot does actually have a space for friendships and possibly even growth, making it a bit more than a one-joke story. It's on the Best Novel ballot and won the Nebula and Locus (SF), and the whole sequence is now qualified in the Best Series category for the first time. Also has an enthusiastic fanbase which may get it the award, but again not with my vote.
4) The Lady Astronaut Universe, by Mary Robinette Kowal - I read the first and third of the trilogy, The Calculating Stars and The Relentless Moon, and the original novelette (two of them won the respective Hugo ballots of their years, the votes are not yet in for the last). Full marks for descriptions, but really not convinced by the scenario of a devastated mid-twentieth century USA turning towards liberalism and space flight; we should be so lucky... and the plot twists in the latest book really challenged my suspension of disbelief just a bit, as did the postscript after the main action of the book was over. Best of luck to Kowal personally as she has ended up chairing this year's Worldcon after the dramatic events of June, in which I myself had a hand.
3) The Interdependency, by John Scalzi - I read the first two of the trilogy, The Collapsing Empire and The Consuming Fire. The first volume had grand sweeps of interstellar space, the second concentrates very much more on court politics in the capital of a galactic empire which is being undermined by the collapse of the wormhole network on which it depends. The political and sexual intrigue is well done, but I keep running into the same problem with Scalzi's books, which is that all the characters sound the same
2) The Daevabad Trilogy, by S.A. Chakraborty - I read the first two of the trilogy, The City of Brass and The Kingdom of Copper, and got 100 pages into the third, The Empire of Gold. This is a tremendously assured tale set partly in eighteenth century Cairo but with links to the world of djinns. Lots of court politics, well sketched characters and intricate plotting. A really good bit of secondary world-building. I admit that I put down the third volume because voting deadline was looming and I knew from the first hundred pages that it probably wouldn't change my ranking, but I may come back to it.
1) The Poppy War, by R.F. Kuang - this was the only Best Series finalist where I read the entire set of volumes, The Poppy War, The Dragon Republic and The Burning God. As with Chakraborty, it's a big fantasy trilogy, with politics, military strategy, young woman protagonist and dark magical forces which are difficult to control and threaten to destroy the world and our protagonist, whose successes and flaws are very well portrayed. I thought it a tremendous series; ticked a lot of my boxes and it emphatically gets my vote. As noted above, I'm not sure that mine will be a majority view. I suppose that the fact that I would probably not have read this if it had not been a finalist is a point in favour of the Best Series category. From the adminsitrator's or conscientous reader's point of view, it's still a lot more work.
2021 Hugos: Best Novel | Best Novella | Best Novelette | Best Short Story | Best Series | Best Related Work | Best Graphic Story or Comic | Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form | Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form | Best Professional Artist and Best Fan Artist | Lodestar | Astounding