There’s been a lot of controversy regarding the Hugo awards lately. My problem with the Hugos, the Nebulas, and many other lists is that books as amazing as Claire North’s The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August don’t make the short lists.

According to Amazon, this novel was published in October 2014. Maybe it came out earlier in the UK, I don’t know. But if I’d read it a few weeks sooner, I certainly would have nominated it for both a Nebula and a Hugo. As it is, I didn’t hear of it until just a couple of weeks ago, when someone casually mentioned it on Twitter. Perhaps I’d heard the title before, but not with the enthusiasm and repetition that would cause me to sit up and take notice – and that’s truly unfortunate.

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August is about exactly what the title says. Harry August is a man who is born, lives, dies, and is born again exactly where and when he entered the world the first time. He is not the only so-called “Kalachakra,” and the lives he actually lives are never the same, one to the next. And there are complications, and there is a cause.

I love the character of Harry, with his curiosity and understated emotion. North portrays him convincingly as an increasingly brilliant man who has explored the world living his many lives and pursuing many experiences – and this despite the fact that North herself is not yet thirty years old.

I also love the way the story is written, with its gently detailed descriptions that make myriad places come alive without slowing down the story in an excess of detail, and with its nonlinear mode of telling. We shift continuously forward and backward in time and yet I never felt lost or impatient.

This is not a book about magic. It takes the fantastical element of repeated lives and extrapolates consequences in this world that we know, taking a major interest in the development of technology.

The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August is a wonderful achievement and I’m looking forward to reading more novels by Claire North.

Oh, and it did make the Arthur C. Clarke Award shortlist for best science fiction novel published in 2014. So well-deserved congratulations to the author on that!

If I had a category for “better late than never” on this blog, this post would be filed under it. I suspect most of you who stop by here are already familiar with Nexus, a 2012 first novel by Ramez Naam. But for those who are even farther behind in their reading than I am, you’ll want to add this novel to your reading list.

Nexus is an account of brain and body enhancements and the struggles of global society as the world tries to decide how to deal with the onset of trans and posthuman existence. This theme is one I’ve explored in my own work. Should society decide what it means to be human? What becomes of those who defy the consensus and push on beyond their naturally evolved limits? Those who want to hold onto a historical definition of what it means to be human might have good reason to fear posthuman minds — but despite the fears, might these technologies offer net gains? And in a world of many billions of people, is it even possible to ban the biohacking that could lead to a posthuman existence?

Nexus is full of fascinating philosophy, technology, and engaging characters, but it’s also a thriller, making it a compelling read. Honestly, there aren’t a lot of novels that truly hold my interest. This one did. It’s the first book of a trilogy. The second book, Crux, is already out, and book 3, Apex, releases in May.

Find more information on Nexus here at the website of the publisher, Angry Robot.

The 2014 Nebula Awards Nominations were published today. If you haven’t seen the list yet, you can find it here. A lot of the shorter fiction — those works published at Tor.com, Lightspeed, and Clarkesworld for example, are available to read online, so check those out if you get the chance.

Given the vast amount of fiction being published these days, the publicity that follows being nominated for an award like the Nebulas can be a real boost to a writer’s career, as I can personally attest after The Red: First Light was nominated last year in the novel category.

TRFL was initially self-published. (It’s being re-released by Saga Press/Simon & Schuster in June.) Back in December 2013 I posted on “Awards & Self-published Books” in response to Shaun Duke, who suggested there were logistical problems in considering self-published books for the major awards. If you’re interested in revisiting the discussion, my post includes links to Shaun’s, and there is a follow-up here.

A hearty congratulations to this year’s nominees!

This news just arrived from author David D. Levine:

As you may have heard, Seattle SF author Greg Bear recently had emergency cardiac surgery and spent a week in the hospital. The surgery went well and he is home and recovering, but he will not be able to tour or do other promotion for his brand new book War Dogs. Also, because of the ongoing Amazon-Hachette dispute, War Dogs cannot be pre-ordered from Amazon. However, it can be pre-ordered from Powell’s (http://www.powells.com/biblio/62-9780316072830-0) as well as Seattle’s University Bookstore, Mysterious Galaxy, and Barnes and Noble.

Greg is a fabulous writer and has always been friendly and extremely generous to other authors and Clarion West students. Please help support him by pre-ordering War Dogs, reviewing it, mentioning it in a blog, talking about it with friends, asking your library to order it, etc.

Spread the word!

Greg is a terrific writer, and he was a supportive voice early in my career. If you’re interested in reading War Dogs, please consider David’s suggestion. I’ve already ordered my copy!

Update: In the comments, Bill Martin notes that Amazon already has the Kindle edition available for download. So if you’re into ebooks, there’s another option.

One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer
This book was recommended to me. It’s the memoir of Nathaniel C. Fick as he recounts his experiences training as a marine officer and then deploying for the first time — just before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Fick soon found himself in Afghanistan, and later at the “tip of the spear” during the invasion of Iraq. It’s a fascinating recounting of both war and the incredible challenges of becoming a successful “recon” marine.

In One Bullet Away Nathaniel C. Fick mentions a reporter who was embedded with his platoon during the Iraq invasion. That reporter was Evan Wright, the author of Generation Kill — an account of Wright’s experiences riding with one of the teams in Fick’s platoon. Generation Kill is a compelling and very graphic narrative that passes over none of the less savory aspects of infantry life during the invasion of a foreign country. It also explores the personalities of a fascinating assemblage of marines, good guys and bad guys.

Reading these two books back to back was an interesting experience. I was intrigued by the differences between Wright’s and Fick’s versions of events. Not in the raw recounting of events — both were in agreement on the facts so far as I could tell — but there were often significant differences between what each author chose to describe and discuss, and in the tone in which their recollections are presented. The rawest version of the invasion has to go to Evan Wright.

I first heard of T.C. McCarthy through the War Stories anthology, and I just finished reading his novel Germline, winner of the 2012 Compton Crook award — a first-novel award presented annually by the Baltimore Science Fiction Society.

In summary, Germline is the most absorbing SF novel I’ve read in some time.

As I get older, it’s harder for me to really connect with a novel, to be pulled in by it. So much of the time, reading feels like an intellectual exercise — but that wasn’t the case with Germline. I found this effect especially interesting because there were aspects of the novel I would have resisted, if they’d been handled with less skill.

Germline is military science fiction, but it’s not about glory or heroism or interstellar battles or even tough choices. It’s about the destructive hopelessness of war, even for the survivors, and reminds me a lot of stories set in World Wars I and II.

The story takes place on Earth in Kazakhstan. This is no brush war: the theater is large, and it’s an all-out slugfest, with no regard for civilians. It’s supposed to take place in the future, but to me it felt more like an alternate history, using some weapons still-to-be-invented. Also, there are a couple of plot points that didn’t add up for me — but there’s no such thing as a perfect book. Where this story really excels is in the characterization. There’s great depth in the protagonist, Oscar Wendell, as he interprets the effects of war on himself and the men around him. The story Oscar tells is grim, grim, grim, but it’s not without friendship, caring, and devotion.

The title, Germline, refers to genetically-engineered soldiers, who do exist in the book, though to me they were not what the book was about. So in retrospect, the title seems a little odd. But that’s a trivial point. If you haven’t read T.C. McCarthy’s Germline yet, grab a sample and check it out. You’ll know early on if this is a book for you.

My novel The Red: First Light was short listed for this year’s Nebula award, along with seven other works, some of which I’ve read or intend to read. But I blush to admit I was unaware of Helene Wecker’s fantasy novel The Golem and The Jinni until it appeared on the list.

I don’t think the title is particularly enthralling, but it does tell you exactly what constitutes the story’s essential core: by strange chance an artificial woman made of clay – the golem – and a spirit creature founded in fire – the jinni – arrive in 19th century New York City and ultimately find that their paths intertwine. (more…)

Tis award season in the writing world, and while I don’t read nearly as much fiction as I’d like — I am a slow reader — I do like to share the novels and stories that I’ve especially enjoyed. Here are three impressive pieces of short fiction:

“The Wreck of the Mars Adventure” by David D. Levine
This is a novelette published last fall in the anthology Old Mars, edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois. The idea behind the anthology is a return to the fantastical, early days of science fiction, and David does this with no-holds-barred. “Mars Adventure” is a fantasy — it involves a 19th-century airship voyage between the planets in a solar system where there is breathable atmosphere everywhere. The setup reminds me a little of Karl Schroeder’s world of Virga, but “Mars Adventure” is a different sort of story, fun, swashbuckling, and very clever. For SFWA members, reading copies are available in the forum.

“In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind” by Sarah Pinsker
As you can gather from the title, this is a more serious story, a tale of human relations and the secrets we keep from one another. Published by Strange Horizons, it’s available to read online.

“The Schrödinger War” by D. Thomas Minton
This is a war story: a quantum tale of battles fought and re-fought, and fought again. I thought it was very well done and I’ve been surprised and perturbed by how little notice it’s gotten. So go check it out! Published by Lightspeed, it’s available to read online.

Over the past year or so I’ve read several disparaging comments about my favorite kind of science fiction — the hard stuff. So I thought I’d address some common misconceptions about the sub-genre in a post that published today at io9.com. Please check it out and let me know what you think.

This has been an amazing year for my story “Nahiku West” which has been included in a few best-of-the-year anthologies and was the second place finisher for the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award. But for his 30th iteration of the annual collection The Year’s Best Science Fiction, Gardner Dozois chose my other science fiction story published in 2012 — “Nightside On Callisto” — which originally appeared in Lightspeed Magazine.

Gardner has been successfully presenting his collection for a full three decades, and the 30th brings together many stories by diverse authors. If you’re behind on your short fiction, here’s a chance to make it all up at once! Stories included in this volume are:

“Weep For Day” by Indrapramit Das
“The Man” by Paul Mcauley
“The Memcordist” by Lavie Tidhar
“The Girl-thing Who Went Out For Sushi” by Pat Cadigan
“Holmes Sherlock” by Eleanor Arnason
“Nightfall On The Peak Of Eternal Light” by Richard A. Lovett And William Gleson
“Close Encounters” by Andy Duncan
“The Finite Canvas” by Brit Mandelo
“Steamgothic” by Sean Mcmullen
“In The House Of Aryaman” by A Lonely Signal Burns” by Elizabeth Bear
“Macy Minot’s Last Christmas On Dione, Ring Racing, Fiddler’s Green, The Potter’s Garden” by Paul Mcauley
“Twenty Lights To “the Land Of Snow,” Michael Bishop
“Astrophilia” by Carrie Vaughn
“What Did Tessimond Tell You?” by Adam Roberts
“Old Paint” by Megan Lindholm
“Chitai Heiki Koronbin” by David Moles
“Gods Of Risk” by James S. A. Corey
“The Water Thief” by Alastair Reynolds
“Nightside On Callisto” by Linda Nagata
“Under The Eaves” by Lavie Tidhar
“Sudden” by Broken And Unexpected” by Steven Popkes
“Fireborn” by Robert Charles Wilson
“Ruminations In An Alien Tongue” by Vandana Singh
“Tyche And The Ants” by Hannu Rajaniemi
“The Wreck Of The Charles Dexter Ward” by Sarah Monette And Elizabeth Bear
“Invisible Men” by Christopher Barzak
“Ship’s Brother” by Aliette De Bodared
“Eater-of-bone” by Robert Reed