Hugo Preliminaries - my nominees

I just submitted my nominations for the Hugo Preliminaries. I was unable to come up with 5 titles in the novel category because I seldom buy or read a book the year it is eligible. My list of novellas is equally short, but for a different reason, which I talked about here on October 27, 2008: I often find myself thinking that the stories are undermined by being longer than they need to be. That of course is only my opinion.

Meanwhile, I had too many choices in the short story category. Had I been allowed more than 5 nominations, I’d have added Michael Swanwick’s From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled, in Asimov’s (February). I’d have also listed a few more stories from Realms of Fantasy: MK Hobson’s The People’s Republic of the Edelweiss Village Putt-putt Golf Course (February), Jay Lake’s Achilles, Sulking in His Buick (December), Liz Williams’s Spiderhorse (August), Bradley P Beaulieu’s Lest Our Passage Be Forgotten (June), Kate Riedel’s The Summer of Lucy (June), and Eugie Foster’s Daughter of Bótù (June).

No, I’m not sure why most of the titles in that last category are fantasy. Maybe it’s because they tend to be of the length that, to me, works just right. Why they have that tendency, I know not.

Without further ado, here are my nominations. I hope that that, if you haven’t come across these nominees or the titles above, you will try and seek them out, and that they’ll give you as much pleasure as they rewarded me with.


NOVEL:

Earth Ascendant
Sean Williams
Ace

The Lost Fleet: Valiant
John G Hemry as Jack Campbell
Ace

Galaxy Blues
Allen Steele
Easton Press


NOVELLA:

Truth
Robert Reed
Asimov's (October/November)

The Philosopher’s Stone
Brian Stableford
Asimov's (July)

The Room of Lost Souls
Kristine Kathryn Rusch
Asimov's (April/May)


NOVELETTE:

The Ice War
Stephen Baxter
Asimov's (September)

Shoggoths in Bloom
Elizabeth Bear
Asimov's (March)

The Egg Man
Mary Rosenblum
Asimov's (February)

Lester Young and the Jupiter's Moons's Blues
Gord Sellar
Asimov's (July)

An Alien Heresy
SP Somtow
Asimov's (April/May)


SHORT STORY:

The Horned Toad in the Hubcap
Joe Murphy
Realms of Fantasy (October)

The Purple Basil
MK Hobson
Realms of Fantasy (October)

Gift from a Spring
Delia Sherman
Realms of Fantasy (April)

On the Bank of the River of Heaven
Richard Parks
Realms of Fantasy (April)

Empty Spaces
Michael Burstein
Collection I remember the Future, Apex Publications