So I’ve heard a lot about the novel “Ancillary Justice” by Ann Leckie that sounds good and intriguing. Problem is, I’ve been hearing about it EVERYWHERE. It looks like someone has got the media hype machine cranked up to full volume, and that makes me suspicious. I’m thinking it may not be all that good, just the product of a lot of hype. I’ve gotten some good recommendations for SF novels here in the past, so I thought I’d ask: have you read Ancillary Justice and what did you think about it?
I haven’t read it, but I’m sure that there’s an industry centered around generating hype, and that it’s possible to basically buy this kind of attention for your show/book/movie/whatever. Genuine hype (like, say, for the Harry Potter books) starts small and grows over time. Fake hype just kinda explodes on the scene suddenly.
This debut novel won the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the British Science Fiction Association BSFA Award for Best Novel, Locus Award for Best First Novel, and it was named to the James Tiptree, Jr. Award Honor List, for science fiction or fantasy that expands or explores our understanding of gender. I’m not sure you could could get that far on hype.
Actually winning awards is EXACTLY what I think of when I think of hype. Look at the Oscars or for sheer corruptitude, the music industry awards. Doesn’t mean the book is not good, but would not judge it purely on that.
I don’t know about the rest of that list, but the Hugo is an SF fan-driven award (which obviously could be swayed by hype), while the Nebula is voted on by members of the SFWA – science fiction authors – which seems much less likely to be.
I read it before I heard of it–and when I saw this thread title, I was actually unsure if it was about the novel, since I had no idea until just now how well known it was. I picked it up as a random book at the library.
And I freakin’ loved it and made my wife read it, and she freakin’ loved it too. It has one of the more original premises I’ve read in SF in a long time and is very well-written.
I’m very happy to hear how well it’s doing; I really had no idea.
Getting one or two or three doesn’t mean that a book is good but when it pretty much sweeps the board you can virtually guarantee that it’s a well crafted piece of work, although it may not float your specific boat of course.
I’ve read it, enjoyed it, and admired both the ideas and the execution. Lots of popular books have one or the other, but not that many ace both.
Happy to have given money to the person who made such a fine thing. Curtesy of you prompting I see that the sequel is out and now I’ve just handed over my money for that too.
Winning all the awards means it’s at least worth reading.
I wouldn’t say it’s the greatest thing I’ve ever read, but it’s certainly arguably the best novel of the last year or at least in the running.
I had a few issues with some of the execution and some of the cutesy things Leckie did, but it was a solid read overall.
The sequel, “Ancillary Sword”, on the other hand, I thought a colossal waste of time and merely an obvious stepping stone to a third novel. And not a good stepping stone, as it didn’t really set anything up all that well and felt mostly like a placeholder.
It’s a lot harder to fix the Hugo, Nebula, Arthur C. Clarke, BSFS, BFA, Dick, Tiptree, Locus, and Crook awards than it is to fix the Oscars. In such cases as winners or nominees for those awards aren’t as good as one might hope, it’s because the writer is someone who has been writing for decades and gets a boost from having their name easily recognizable. This was Ann Leckie’s first novel. I can’t imagine how the praise for it could be merely hype.
