Of Science Fiction and Puppies

Possibly there were more qualified (and snappier) writers to sum up the Hugo shenanigans for the mundanes, but my editor asked and I answered with "Why Are All my Science Fiction Friends Screaming About Sad Puppies?"

If you're a long time fan and have been following along even tangentially, I say nothing new here. Mostly it's a link salad to some of the more awful things known about Vox Day and his Rabid Puppies (the more stridently vocal right wing of the already right-of-center Sad Puppies). My only new insight is that I, too, have never really felt the Hugos were "all that" in terms of pointing out what was the best in my field, but I have long used the nominee list to get a good sense of "what is trending" in science fiction/fantasy.

I will say here (as I do there) that I do think the Hugos are worth fighting.

If it were true that the Sad Puppies actually promoted the idea of fun-loving, non-navel-gazing science fiction, I might be one of them. Ironically (perhaps), yesterday I posted my review of The Girl in the Road in which I make some very snarky comments about what I call "NPR science fiction."

I like my science fiction to have a lot of vim and vigor. I'm very much uninterested in novels that are ONLY explorations of inner spaces. My favorite stuff (and the very best, IMHO,) is when you have high action AND deep thinking. Human beings are political creatures. To imagine a book that was apolitical sounds dreadful to me. Also it sounds impossible. I just read a book The Way Inn by Will Wiles which is basically about how plastic and empty hotels are and how literally soul-sucking they can be. Even that book had a thematic/political point: banality is evil. When you find comfort in emptiness, you probably should consider the value in spending a bit more time naval gazing. That's basically what this book was saying.

But none of this is REALLY what the Puppy's conversation is about. If it were, the puppies wouldn't complain about the Hugo's NEVER going to their sort. Lois McMaster Bujold has a few of these coveted rockets, and I don't see how she's not exactly what they should be excited about: action-oriented, fun, and... oh, right, she talks a lot about GLBT issues and gender and ability. Never mind she's published by Baen (their supposed favorite publisher). Lois doesn't count because her epic space battles have girl/queer cooties on them.

Ah, I could go on, but, ultimately, all this has been said already. Over and over. By smarter people than me.

It's really interesting the culture of backlash, though, of which the Hugo malarky is clearly part of. I mean, we're living in very weird times. On one hand there's so much moving forward. On the other, there's Indiana.