Friday 19 June 2015

Hugo Reflections: Part 5 - 1993 to 2002


Now I'm into my fourth decade of reading SF.  I went to Helicon in 1993, but after this I didn't go to another convention again until 2002 when I return to fandom by attending ConJosé the 2002 Worldcon in San Jose, which was the first convention my partner ever attended.  Talk about being thrown in at the deep end.

Again the link for the Hugo Wikipedia page is here.
 
1993 to 2002 

Looking at the awards I have managed to read five of the eleven winners in this period, and only four of the forty nominees.  Given how few of the Hugo award winners and nominees I've read it's easiest for me to list them, rather than trying to encapsulate all the books I haven't read (check out the link for all the books).

The award winners I've read were: A Fire Upon the Deep by Vernor Vinge, Mirror Dance by Lois McMaster Bujold, Forever Peace by Joe Haldeman, A Deepness in the Sky by Vernor Vinge, and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling.  However none of these were bought because they were Hugo award winners, assuming that makes sense.  I was blown away by A Fire Upon the Deep and I've just snapped up anything by Vernor Vinge ever since.  Likewise for Bujold's work, and Rowling's books were read mostly so that I could talk to my clients at work who were enjoying the stories.

Therefore it's no surprise to find that of three the books nominated for the Hugo were by two of the authors in the award winning list: Memory by Lois McMaster Bujold, Brightness Reef by David Brin, A Civil Campaign by Lois McMaster Bujold, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling.

This seems to indicate a complete collapse in the number of books I'm reading, except I bought and read a whole bunch of books, even though I will qualify my statement by saying I wasn't reading as much during this period as I used to.  In this case mostly because I had a shed load of text books to read for the diploma in mental health studies I was studying for.  The job I then went into was quite demanding, which also had a considerable impact on how much I read. Still, saying that my book collection kept growing.

Part six link.

2 comments:

  1. Most of the books on that list are ones I've decided not to read, rather than simply not got round to. Though I did think The Curse of Chalion was excellent.

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    Replies
    1. I would expect the Bujold to be well written, but the subject matter is just not my cup of tea. My failing really, and no doubt my loss. I find it harder to commit to reading a book nowadays, its a thing, but I'm not sure what sort of thing, perhaps I know what I like and seek out those things that will meet that need. At the end of the day I read for enjoyments first.

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