nonelvis | 2014 Hugo nominees: best novelette (Reply)

The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling; Ted Chiang
I was worried this was going to be that most terrifying of speculative fiction concepts – the ones that feel all too realistic. And it was: in this case, a lifelogging search app called Remem that allows people to call up any recorded memory, and which therefore allows you to determine the truth of a situation. We all know memory is imperfect, blurring edges over time and sometimes outright lying to us. What if we could conclusively determine the truth simply by asking our personal recorders to show it to us? How would that affect couples' memories of who started a fight, or a parent's challenging relationship with a child?

It's a great concept, but the life lessons were delivered with anvil blows instead of soft taps. Chiang intersperses his Remem narrative with a story about a Tivland youth learning to write, and how his exposure to European values and work as a scribe affects what he considers the truth. This secondary story is just as compelling as the primary narrative, but because both are making exactly the same points about the value of unaided memory, they feel more redundant than parallel. By the end, I was wishing this had been a shorter story without a duplicate narrative, where Chiang could have made his point quickly and precisely rather than repeatedly hammering it in.

[storyTitle, authorName]
Given that this author's presence on the ballot is so controversial, and that he and his oh-so-delightful minions may be searching for his name or his story's title, I'm not going to post it here. I did, however, read all the way through it, which is more of a fair shake than this author deserved, given his behavior online and the likely reasons for his appearance on the Hugo ballot. The story is incredibly mediocre – once I stopped laughing at the opening graf's purple prose, I got a story about … well, I'm not sure there was an overarching theme, to be perfectly honest, although the story involves an elf trying to understand the nature of human theology by illuminating a set of religious manuscripts, a potentially interesting concept if the author had bothered to explore it in more depth. (For a worthwhile exploration of outsiders attempting to understand human faith, I recommend Brad Torgersen's novella, "The Chaplain's Legacy," instead.)

I'm perversely pleased that this author has earned a No Award vote not because he's such a vile, misogynist, racist troll, but because his story is so ordinary it shouldn't have been nominated for a Hugo in the first place.

The Waiting Stars, Aliette de Bodard
This is the second Hugo-nominated story about living ships I've read this year, but "The Waiting Stars" treads slightly different ground from Ancillary Justice. Both address the nature of personal identity, but "The Waiting Stars" is a more intimate story about how wrenching it can be to lose everything that defines you. It's told from two different perspectives – the unknowing kidnapping victim, and the family mounting a rescue – and my only complaint about it is that it left me wanting to learn more about the cultural and interstellar war waged between the two factions in the story.

The Lady Astronaut of Mars, Mary Robinette Kowal
A sweet yet painful look at the world's first female astronaut and her struggle to decide whether to take one last trip into space on a mission for which she's uniquely qualified – but which will also force her to miss her dying husband's final days. The story is set on Mars, and while it's packed with traditional science fiction tropes, like alternate history and handwaving about fast interstellar travel that's still at sub-light speed, it's ultimately a story about human relationships in the tradition of The Martian Chronicles.

The Exchange Officers, Brad Torgersen
Competently written military fiction I'd probably have enjoyed more if military fiction were my thing, but I can generally take or leave it. The narrator and his fellow "proxy operator" (a "proxy" being a 7' humanoid, armored robot) were interesting enough, though ha ha, Torgersen, you are ever so funny for giving a female officer the nickname "Chesty" and then informing her (and us) that her nickname is based on Chesty Puller.

The verdict
1. The Lady Astronaut of Mars
2. The Waiting Stars
3. The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling
4. The Exchange Officers
5. No award