Not another project

[james_davis_nicoll]

2025 prometheus award best novel finalists:


Alliance Unbound, by C.J Cherryh and Jane S. Fancher (DAW)
In the Belly of the Whale, by Michael Flynn (CAEZIK SF & Fantasy)
Cancelled: The Shape of Things to Come, by Danny King (Annie Mosse Press)
Beggar’s Sky, by Wil McCarthy (Baen Books)
Mania, by Lionel Shriver (HarperCollins Publishers)

Back in 2017, I reviewed a cross-section of the finalists. I am not going to in this case even though I do like a good generation ship novel and I have fond memories of McCarthy's books. The Cherryh/Fancher falls under a different project, and I am not reading another Shriver for free.

Comments

[petrea_mitchell]

Thanks for alerting me that the next Hinder Stars book finally got published, I want to check it out. While I find most of Cherryh's work from this century tedious, and the one solo Fancher book I've read was worse, I was pleasantly surprised by Alliance Rising.

[sylvanwitch]

Anecdotally, I was browsing a small-town (US) bookstore sci-fi section yesterday and noted that there was only a single novel authored by a person I could identify as a woman; otherwise, it appeared to be entirely male authors, leaning heavily toward more conservative, military sci-fi stuff. This list reminds me of that store's sci-fi purchasing person.

[(Anonymous)]

Cancelled seems an odd choice for the Prometheus award, since it seems to be a rant about the horrors of people being able to choose who to pay attention to, as opposed to the golden past when the government would simply arrest people with offensive opinions (like George Carlin or Lenny Bruce). It's almost like the libertarian futurist society is actually a club for people all in favor of big government, as long as it agrees with them

[elusis]

Well as you can see, the "free speech advocates" are all furious about the US government trying to defund universities and public TV/radio because a few people in power don't like some of the viewpoints expressed, making it clear that...

[touches earpiece]

... sorry, I'm just getting an update from my producer....

[(Anonymous)]

Judging by the blurb and comments, it's an "anti-woke" book, with right-wing propaganda about the evils of cancel culture ramped up to eleven(ty).

[philrm]

I wouldn't read a Shriver for money.

[patrick_morris_miller]

I wouldn't read a Shriver if there was a gun to my head.

(Any relation to the famous Shrivers?)

[philrm]

Not that I'm aware of.