The Sword and Laser discussion

So the Hugos are pretty famously a kind of "People's Choice" award in that nominations and winners are chosen by fans, albeit fans who are Worldcon members. That has historically favored books from well known authors or books that have gotten a lot of buzz. This makes sense, because you can't nominate a book that you don't know about and more people will know about books that are from prominent names or that are talked about a lot.

There's nothing wrong with this, but it's struck me that there are probably a lot of books that are just as good as the nominees but that fly under the radar - hence this post.

What are some of your favorite books of 2019 that are from less known authors?

RULE: No books from popular, well known folk or that "everyone" is talking about. Examples... Charlie Jane Anders, Annalee Newlitz, Scalzi, Abercrombie, etc.

Harry Connolly released One Man: A City of Fallen Gods Novel in 2019. Connolly doesn't get as much attention as other writers, but I find his books eventful and entertaining.

A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World by C.A. Fletcher made my Best Novel Hugo list. Blood of Heirs by Alicia Wanstall-Burke is the first book in a long time I found both POVs to be engaging. Self Published in 2018 otherwise best Novel for sure.The House of Sacrifice by Anna Smith Spark finished her Empire of Dust series. Made my Hugo list for Best Series. If you really want to read more books from the "Unknown Author" check out Mark Lawrence's SPFBO (Self Published Fantasy Blog Off) contest if you enjoy Fantasy as a favorite genre.
https://mark---lawrence.blogspot.com/... And ending Feb 7th all the books in the contest are only 99 cents.

I really like Harry's work. In fact, his The Great Way fantasy trilogy (first book here The Way Into Chaos ) was most enjoyable. It's a conscious attempt to write epic fantasy with lots of events, world building and characters but without the 'tourist' verbiage (the pages of description of the countryside or something that tends to stretch things out and garner reviews like "I loved the writing but nothing really happened for 200 pages...").

As such, it's richly imagined with good character and an intricate but understandable plot but its entirely complete within 3 books.

By the twin criteria of “published in 2019” and “non-famous author” I have only one book: Velocity Weapon.

It’s old school space adventure that I thoroughly enjoyed. The only thing I didn’t like is that it doesn’t have a proper ending, instead setting up for a sequel.

My review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Well all of these are books that were advertised to me in an email or some other format, but they are written by authors I was not previously familiar with, so they possibly fit the bill??

Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh
The Water Cure by Sophie Mackintosh
Looker by Laura Sims

Two books come immediately to mind.

Clarice Starling's incredible debut The Luminous Dead, a fraught novel of caving, exploration, and isolation.

Sisters of the Vast Black, by Lina Rather, for which I'd use the tagline "nuns in space" - which sold the book to me because I've long been fascinated by both fictional and true stories of true and contemplative faith. Sisters of the Vast Black is a beautiful novella.

Also, I haven't read it yet but going by how fantastic her first two novels were I'd definitely recommend taking a look at Nicky Drayden's Escaping Exodus.

Escaping Exodus is much more conventional then her previous novels – and when I tell that about a novel with humans travelling through space inside giant living beasts it means something… ;-)

Joe Sherry wrote: "Two books come immediately to mind.

Clarice Starling's "

There’s actually someone with that name? That *has* to be a pen name. I gotta see this.

Oh, it’s Caitlín. You had me there for a second.

Well, Clarice, have the lambs stopped screaming?

;-)

Oh, son of a....!

Sigh. Also, thank you. I have to go fix the Nerds of a Feather Recommended Reading post this weekend now, too, because my brain was broken.

These are all four stars or more:
The Gurkha and the Lord of Tuesday
Aftershocks
Luna: Moon Rising
Interference
The Bird King
Blood of Empire

Trike wrote: "By the twin criteria of “published in 2019” and “non-famous author” I have only one book: Velocity Weapon.

It’s old school space adventure that I thoroughly enjoyed. The only thing..."


Liked it a lot too.

Let's amend the rules here slightly to "books you read in 2019 regardless of publication date" BUT that are still from under the radar authors.

Yeah, I know that moves this away from what awards do but... 1) my post my rules and 2) I'm not actually awarding anything :)

Hm, interesting situation. It's easy to think of the Hugos as "People's Choice" vs. the Nebulas as "Critic's Choice." Isn't necessarily so as the Hugo voters tends toward SF to the exclusion of some great Fantasy, as well as progressive causes. So we now have the Dragon Awards as closer to a People's Choice. I find all of them crapshoots, varying widely from year to year.

If this is more like an "Indie" award, well then, I've got some eclectic choices.

First, my absolute fave Indie author by a long shot, Dennis E. Taylor, has nothing new this past year. Hrumpf! But the Bobiverse is still great. Gimme more!

My other Indie reads tend towards the Libertarian viewpoint. As S&L is more of a general interest SFF site, I don't tend to go on about them here. But to join in the fun for this thread, my best recent reads on that:

* The Powers of the Earth / Aristillus books by Travis Corcoran. An updated take on Moon is a Harsh Mistress, but instead of a penal colony it's Libertarian escapees from a socialist, bureaucratic Earth. LOTS of discussion of Libertarian ideology. Two books, each of which won its year's Prometheus award. Uplifted dogs, self interested but friendly AI, LOTR overlays on the Lunar surface, and even a sop to Cavorite.

* The Torchship Trilogy, Karl Gallagher. A look at how various systems deal with a malignant AI presence that can infiltrate and destroy worlds. Fusion ships allowed in all systems, but navigation devices may not be. Imagine piloting a fusion ship with a sextant and hand calculations. Includes a chaotic-good amoral female MC dedicated to helping her system and ending war by whatever means she can.

* Hidden Truth books by Hans Schantz. A current day Earth where scientific advancement is curtailed by a worldwide cabal. The setup has some high school students wondering why their library's dusty copy of an old textbook contains more than other texts. It's almost portal fiction in the way they jump to opposing a vast conspiracy. Includes for me the most eclectic love scene in fiction, where in the second book two characters fall in love over a chalkboard talking physics. Only Hans could pull this off.


More general interest is the Maggie for Hire books by Kate Danley. It's dimension-walking, vampire staking fun with plenty of cussing. The series is up to 16 books and Kate has only done novelettes recently. I enjoyed the Valentine's day one as well as the beach visit. These books are fun and cheap. It's like Buffy with much more swearing and leather.

Planetary Anthology Series: Pluto, has the most hilarious chicken story I have read in, well, ever. Mutant chickens marauding around a Pluto colony, what else ya want?

Dunno if Gail Carriger is overall too popular to make the criteria, but she has some self published items that should qualify. The Fifth Gender is a good read but fair warning, it's an M/M romance and heavy on the sex. Other books provide additional detail and character development for her Parasol Protectorate books.

Rick wrote: "Let's amend the rules here slightly to "books you read in 2019 regardless of publication date". Yeah, I know that moves this away from what awards do but... 1) my post my rules and 2) I'm not actually awarding anything :)"

In that case mine would be all Bujold all the time, because I did the entirety (-1) of the Vorkosigan series last year. While some books were okay, I thought a couple were genuinely great, and the totality was terrific.

The only other 5-star SF was Fahrenheit 451, which was actually as good as everyone always said.

My 5- and 4-star list is mostly Bujold: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list...

John (Taloni) wrote: "Planetary Anthology Series: Pluto, has the most hilarious chicken story I have read in, well, ever. Mutant chickens marauding around a Pluto colony, what else ya want?"

That looks like a fun collection. Thanks for bringing it to my attention!

John T - I don't think the choices *need* to be from indie publishers etc... basically it's anything you really liked, from an author that is under the radar, that you read in 2019. And yeah, the "Hugos = People's Choice" isn't precisely accurate but if you look over the noms for the last several decades they tend to be books that were either by known authors or that had a lot of buzz. That doesn't mean they weren't worthy nor is that true in every case.

Mostly, I want to explore things that we all read last year from authors who deserve to be known better. I'll put up my list tonight...

Jessica wrote: "Silver in the Wood by Emily Tesh

I loved this so much I instantly preordered the sequel. Not without its flaws, but it was everything I wanted Naomi Novik's 'folklore' novels to be. It's novella length too, if it sounds interesting and you're looking for a short read.

This should be a real award. What shall it be called? The "Smallgos"?

Tamahome wrote: "This should be a real award. What shall it be called? The "Smallgos"?"

High five.

Joe Sherry wrote: "Sisters of the Vast Black, by Lina Rather, for which I'd use the tagline "nuns in space" - which sold the book to me because I've long been fascinated by both fictional and true stories of true and contemplative faith. Sisters of the Vast Black is a beautiful novella.

Also, I haven't read it yet but going by how fantastic her first two novels were I'd definitely recommend taking a look at Nicky Drayden's Escaping Exodus.

"

I have these two in my TBR - looking forward to read both!