Hugo Nominees 2005: Short Story



5. Shed Skin, Robert J Sawyer
In the future you can copy your mind into a superior robot body. But what happens to the old, inferior human you? That's the simple premise of Robert Sawyer's disappointing story. I like the idea, but the story seems far too pleased with itself for coming up with the idea, even though it's not particularly original and there's no interesting spin to it. It turns out the humans are shipped off to a home for old humans, where their every whim is catered to but they have no rights, no money, and no way out. That's my biggest problem with the story, that it requires me to accept that all the humans are hidden away while their robot forms take their identity, and no one seems at all bothered by this. My other problems are that the very ending seems rushed - the story seems happy to cover as many issues as it can think of, including a clumsy Civil War analogy, and then when it's done to stick a trite resolution on the end.

At this point you should go and read yhlee's earlier post, which in the review and the comments pretty much sums up what I feel.

4. Decisions, Michael Burstein
This is a tricky story to review without spoilers, but I'm going to attempt to not give too much away. The story opens with astronaut Aaron Eliassen locked in a cell when he returns from his mission to the edges of the solar system. He's locked up to try and prevent him causing paradoxes, as he's returned from his mission a week earlier than he left. The story then takes a couple of twists, both not entirely unpredictable, and steers straight for an ending that I really disliked. On the whole I had the feeling I was reading a story which might have made a decent episode of classic Trek, both in plot and in the straightforward nature of the stories, as well as the hero astronaut who saves the day.

3. A Princess of Earth, Mike Resnick
Resnick has two nominations this year, and the stories shame some similarities. The nameless narrator has lost his wife and his will to life, until a chance encounter with a man who may or may not be John Carter of Mars leads him to new hope. That's about it, really. Most of the story is the conversation between the two, as Carter is looking for his lost princess as the narrator searches for his lost love. Maybe I'm missing out on a extra dimension by not having read any of the adventures of John Carter. I hope so, as without it the story is straightforward, and pretty dull.

2. Travels with my Cats, Mike Resnick
In this story, the narrator Ethan has led an unfulfilled and aimless life, and longs for love. He remembers a book from his youth, the titular Travels with My Cats, and receives a series of visitations from the author of the book, who knows nothing of her life or the world past the last page of her book. I liked this more than the above story - it has a more of the lightness and magic that a story of this type requires, with a very slim plot and the success of the story hanging largely on our empathy with the main character. I can see why people would like this story, but it does nothing for me whatsoever.

1. The Best Christmas Ever, James Patrick Kelly
Despite cutesy robots and a last-man-on-earth scenario that isn't very new, this is the best story of the lot. It's the only story that evoked any feelings of being a different world to our own, it doesn't get too bogged down in sentimentality, and the ending's quite good. I don't have that much to say about it, because not that much happens, and it get first place mainly because of the writing, which I liked more than the other stories. As far as Christmas stories go, I much preferred Greg van Eekhout's In the Late December.

This might sound like I don't really think much of this set of Hugo nominees, and you would be entirely correct. I toyed with writing the one word review of "meh" instead of the paragraphs above. It's not that I actively disliked any of these stories, I just didn't find them interesting. They're all competently written, and they all feel safe and straightforward and easy to read. There's nothing experimental or exciting or really novel about any of them. I think it's trickier to write a really good short story than a novella or novelette, as you have so much less space to play with for worldbuilding and characterisation, but the Kelly is the only piece that comes close to building an alien Earth. I don't read a huge amount of short fiction, but I can think of at least half a dozen stories I enjoyed more than these: Luciferase by Bruce Sterling, Women are Ugly by Eliot Fintushel, Delhi by Vandana Singh,  Five Irrational Histories by David Moles, The Annals of Eelin-Ok by Jeffrey Ford. My main problem when filling in ballot is going to be where I put "No Award".

nhw has reviewed the short stories along with the rest of the Hugo fiction nominees here and includes links to other reviews as well.