I was interested to see your discussion of The Ministry of Time. There was a Spanish TV series by that name starting in 2015 which the wife and I found intriguing, though it dropped off our radar at some point. This sounds like the setup is similar, though set in Britain and from the sound of it rather more facile.
This year's Prometheus Award for best novel of 2024 has five entirely different nominees: Alliance Unbound, by C. J. Cherryh and Jane S. Fancher; In the Belly of the Whale, by Michael Flynn; Cancelled, by Danny King; Beggar's Sky, by Wil McCarthy; and Mania, by Lionel Shriver. They're also nominated by a specialized subgroup of fans, but one that is avowedly so. I must confess that I would have liked to throw Cancelled across the room, but I felt obliged to finish it . . .
In my vote, I ranked Cancelled below No Award, and earlier this evening I deleted its file. So definitely not that one. I don't think Mania is one of Shriver's better novels, even within its domain of satire. The other three are all at least competently written and somewhat interesting, but Alliance Unbound and Beggar's Sky are respectively the second and the third of series (each with a further volume to follow); you would do better to read the initial volumes, Alliance Rising and Rich Man's Sky, both of which won Best Novel, and I think deservedly so. In the Belly of the Whale is by a good writer (sadly no longer with us), and is interestingly strange (he has a future where the three dominant languages in space are Mandarin, Spanglish, and Tamil); if you feel like reading a heterotopia, and one whose institutions are decaying in an unplanned way, this may be worthwhile, though it wasn't my top choice.
Alien Clay was also nominated, but didn't get chosen as a finalist, and I think rightly not. Its biology is interesting—based not on the living organism as a centrally planned entity but as based on a kind of biological subcontracting, an idea that used to be popular in libertarian economics—but its plot seems to have implications that are anything but libertarian, and indeed are rather horrifying, though the author seems to suggest that they're a happy ending of some kind.
Thanks! I've been enjoying some of Cherryh's other books; maybe I'll go on to that series.
What you say about nominating middle books of series reminds me of how the Hugos recently introduced the "Best Series" award. I wholeheartedly support that, as I'm planning to mention in my next Hugo Ballot post. (Which will be in several weeks; I still need to finish reading the Best Novella nominees...)
I totally agree with you about "Alien Clay." It's strongly anti-oligarchical, but not libertarian. In fact, even if we take the symbiotes as just as willing to serve human goals as they seem to be, they leave a door wide open for all sorts of democratic totalitarianism. Just having telepathy doesn't mean you all agree even on the goals, much less on means. We saw how they killed the informer; I can easily imagine other groups with symbiotes hurting other despised minorities.
And if we do suppose the symbiotes have their own goals - that open door can easily lead to places far more horrifying.
I was interested to see your discussion of The Ministry of Time. There was a Spanish TV series by that name starting in 2015 which the wife and I found intriguing, though it dropped off our radar at some point. This sounds like the setup is similar, though set in Britain and from the sound of it rather more facile.
This year's Prometheus Award for best novel of 2024 has five entirely different nominees: Alliance Unbound, by C. J. Cherryh and Jane S. Fancher; In the Belly of the Whale, by Michael Flynn; Cancelled, by Danny King; Beggar's Sky, by Wil McCarthy; and Mania, by Lionel Shriver. They're also nominated by a specialized subgroup of fans, but one that is avowedly so. I must confess that I would have liked to throw Cancelled across the room, but I felt obliged to finish it . . .
I haven't heard of any of those either - would you recommend any of them?
In my vote, I ranked Cancelled below No Award, and earlier this evening I deleted its file. So definitely not that one. I don't think Mania is one of Shriver's better novels, even within its domain of satire. The other three are all at least competently written and somewhat interesting, but Alliance Unbound and Beggar's Sky are respectively the second and the third of series (each with a further volume to follow); you would do better to read the initial volumes, Alliance Rising and Rich Man's Sky, both of which won Best Novel, and I think deservedly so. In the Belly of the Whale is by a good writer (sadly no longer with us), and is interestingly strange (he has a future where the three dominant languages in space are Mandarin, Spanglish, and Tamil); if you feel like reading a heterotopia, and one whose institutions are decaying in an unplanned way, this may be worthwhile, though it wasn't my top choice.
Alien Clay was also nominated, but didn't get chosen as a finalist, and I think rightly not. Its biology is interesting—based not on the living organism as a centrally planned entity but as based on a kind of biological subcontracting, an idea that used to be popular in libertarian economics—but its plot seems to have implications that are anything but libertarian, and indeed are rather horrifying, though the author seems to suggest that they're a happy ending of some kind.
Thanks! I've been enjoying some of Cherryh's other books; maybe I'll go on to that series.
What you say about nominating middle books of series reminds me of how the Hugos recently introduced the "Best Series" award. I wholeheartedly support that, as I'm planning to mention in my next Hugo Ballot post. (Which will be in several weeks; I still need to finish reading the Best Novella nominees...)
I totally agree with you about "Alien Clay." It's strongly anti-oligarchical, but not libertarian. In fact, even if we take the symbiotes as just as willing to serve human goals as they seem to be, they leave a door wide open for all sorts of democratic totalitarianism. Just having telepathy doesn't mean you all agree even on the goals, much less on means. We saw how they killed the informer; I can easily imagine other groups with symbiotes hurting other despised minorities.
And if we do suppose the symbiotes have their own goals - that open door can easily lead to places far more horrifying.
I think I've read everything by T. Kingfisher aka Ursula Vernon. I'll give "The Tainted Cup" a try. thanks.