Reading the Hugo packet

Cafe Society
1

I mentioned this in the vorkosigan thread, and thought it might be worth starting a new thread to discuss it. I bought the Hugo packet again this year. (Technically, i bought “voting-only” access to the Hugo convention, but it comes along with a packet of digital access to most of the items that will be voted on.) For $50 i got a fat pile of epubs, and a few links to borrow books on Net Gallery, which is mostly a site to read pre-release copies of books and review them, i think, but is being used by a few of the more popular authors as a way to lend, rather than give away, the works.

You also get access to some movies and video games, but the video game links are limited and they ask people (like me) who won’t seriously use them to leave them for real voters.

Anyway, it’s really a lot of reading material for $50, and all of it is good enough to have been nominated for a Hugo award. I did this last year and loved it, so i did it again this year.

If anyone else is reading the Hugo packet, I’d love to discuss the books. (Or hey, if you want to discuss the movies, games, etc., go at it.) I’m going to ask that participants use spoilers, because i imagine if anyone joins me, people will read in different orders and at different paces.

There are a lot of categories, but the ones I’m reading are:

Best Short Story

“10 Visions of the Future; or, Self-Care for the End of Days” by Samantha Mills (Uncanny Magazine, Issue 63)

“In My Country” by Thomas Ha (Clarkesworld, Issue 223)

“Laser Eyes Ain’t Everything” by Effie Seiberg (Diabolical Plots, May 16, 2025)

“Missing Helen” by Tia Tashiro (Clarkesworld, Issue 226)

“Six People to Revise You” by J.R. Dawson (Uncanny Magazine, Issue 62)

“Wire Mother” by Isabel J. Kim (Clarkesworld, Issue 229)

Best Novelette

“Kaiju Agonistes” by Scott Lynch (Uncanny Magazine, Issue 62)

“Never Eaten Vegetables” by H.H. Pak (Clarkesworld, Issue 220)

“Rapport: Friendship, Solidarity, Communion, Empathy” by Martha Wells (Reactor, July 10, 2025)

“The Girl That My Mother Is Leaving Me For” by Cameron Reed (Reactor, April 2, 2025)

“The Millay Illusion” by Sarah Pinsker (Uncanny Magazine, Issue 67)

“When He Calls Your Name” by Catherynne M. Valente (Uncanny Magazine, Issue 65)

Best Novella

Automatic Noodle by Annalee Newitz (Tordotcom)

Cinder House by Freya Marske (Tordotcom; Tor UK)

Murder by Memory by Olivia Waite (Tordotcom)

The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar (Tordotcom; Arcadia UK)

The Summer War by Naomi Novik (Del Rey US; Del Rey UK)

What Stalks the Deep by T. Kingfisher (Nightfire; Titan UK)

Best Novel

A Drop of Corruption by Robert Jackson Bennett (Del Rey; Hodderscape)

Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor (William Morrow; Gollancz)

Shroud by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Tor UK; Orbit US)

The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow (Tor US; Tor UK)

The Incandescent by Emily Tesh (Tor US; Orbit UK)

The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson (Orbit US; Hodderscape)

At this point I’ve read all the shorter works, and if the novels i have read
A drop of corruption
Death of the author
The incandescent
The Raven scholar

And about a third of
The Everlasting

About the Vorkosigan books
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Is that a Murderbot story?

That’s one of the authors I’ve been following lately, though I haven’t read that one. Is it science fiction or fantasy?

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Yes, the first is a murderbot story.

I’d call the second, hmm, soft science fiction.

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I usually look to the nominee list to figure out what to read for the next year, but I’ve already read a bunch from that list.

  • A Drop of Corruption I liked this one, and the preceding one in the series. If you haven’t read A Tainted Cup, then start with that. If you don’t like it, then no point in moving on. I don’t know if talking about sub-genre is a spoiler, so it’s fractured fairy tale.
  • Shroud I also liked. It is harder sci-fi and heavy on the biology, because it’s an Adrian Tchaikovsky novel. If you like his stuff, this is an excellent example. Also believable characters (not all human) and emotion to go with the hard sci-fi.
  • The Incandescent* I think I liked her earlier book Some Desperate Glory more, but this was still very good. I’d rather talk about Glory, though.
  • What Stalks the Deep I’ve only read the first one in this series, but I’ve added the second, and will get to this one. It’s a T. Kingfisher fantasy, so again fractured fairy tale related.

Of what I’ve read, I’m not sure which I’d vote for, if I could vote. Maybe Shroud if I had to pick, but that might be my genre preference showing.

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Oh, interesting. I started Shroud and switched to another book after a few pages. But i guess i should try harder to get into it.

I don’t think genre is a spoiler.

I would not have called any of those “fractured fairly tales”, although there are a few fairly takes on the list. I would call a drop of corruption sf-flavored fantasy, and what stalks the deep horror.

I liked a drop of corruption a lot, but i thought the first in the series was better. (I bought this one before the nominations came out because i read the first last year and liked it enough to buy the sequel.) I certainly agree that you should try a tainted cup first, and see if you like it.

I was a little disappointed with what stalks the deep. It’s also in the middle of a series, and i thought the first was the best.

I haven’t read some desperate glory, but i thoroughly enjoyed the incandescent, so I should probably buy glory. For those who haven’t read it, The incandescent is a romance, with a nicely worked out magical system set in a magical boarding school, but the protagonist is a teacher, not a student. There’s danger, but I don’t think it’s a serious spoiler to say that it’s the kind of book where you expect the protagonist to survive. (Like, there’s danger in the Lord of the Rings, but Tolkien literally tells you in the prolog that Frodo wrote the story and that half a dozen of the main characters have copies of the book or their offspring are corresponding with each other. It’s not much of a spoiler to say that Sauron doesn’t conquer the world.) But i would say that it’s a major spoiler that the demon survives.

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It is also set in a boarding school, sort of. It’s a space station boarding school which contains the last of humanity. Not nearly as much romance as Incandescent, but the protagonists are teenagers, so if I recall there is age appropriate angsty romance. Not the focus of the book, more just how could a bunch of teenagers be locked on a space station without angsty romance?

You’re right, I was completely confusing it with another series, maybe by T. Kingfisher, that is a twist on Snow White, where the protagonist isn’t Snow White, but is investigating Snow White (for a brief and wrong description).

Tainted Cup and Drop of Corruption are the kaiju stories. I read those, too, and liked them, possibly more than Shroud.

The first few pages of Shroud are not the main story, just setting it up. I guess you could call it a road story. If you don’t get to the part where they’re “on the road”, then you’re not into the heart of the book. Like I said, though, it is an AT book, and if you don’t care for his style, then you won’t like this one.

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Probably Naomi Novik. Uprooted and Spinning Silver both qualify. Although… T Kingfisher rewrote the Goose Girl. So maybe you are thinking of her. There is one twisted retelling of a fairly tale, and two stories that kinda could be, in this year’s crop. They are Cinder House, the River Has Roots, and the Summer War.

I like many hard science fiction stories. I’ll give Shroud another try.

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The first one wasn’t a fractured fairy tale; it was a fractured “Fall of the House of Usher” (Poe).

I’ve read this. Very good. In the vein of her Uprooted and Spinning Silver, but shorter, and pretty much structured as setup->payoff, but the “payoff” is very satisfying.

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Yes, but i thought that was a minor spoiler. :laughing: It’s a really effective and well written update of the story, too.

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Just to be safe, I edited my post to “spoiler” that, although I think it’s pretty obvious and not much of a spoiler and is mentioned prominently in many descriptions of the book.

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It’s certainly obvious pretty early in the story. Like the things i said above that probably didn’t need to be spoilered.

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No, Hemlock and Silver by T. kingfisher is the Snow White one.

I haven’t read that one. I read a whole bunch of Kingfisher, starting with A Sorceress Comes to Call, and including the paladin series (more romance, some are fluffy ish, others very much not.and needed a break.

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Oh, i haven’t read hemlock and silver. I didn’t realize she literally had done a snow white rewrite. Now that i know, I’ll probably read that one, too.