Hodgepodge

I just finished the last of the five novels and here are my comments:

The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon - A well written, often funny novel that is basically a murder mystery with a slight alternate history twist. To me, the alternate history angle is not strong enough to qualify it Hugo worthy. I know that alt history is a sub genre of sci-fi/fantasy but not all should be.

For example, Eric Flint has written two excellent alternate history novels: 1812 - the Rivers of War and 1824 - The Arkansas War. In this series he took one event, Sam Houston doesn't die in the War of 1812, and he uses it to paint a different picture of the scope of America's relations with the Native American Indians. Both are terrific stories and I recommend them highly (my review of 1824 is here). But there is no scifi or fantasy element at all to them and as such I would never nominate or vote for them as Hugo novels. On the other hand consider the 1632 series, also by Eric Flint (with various collaborators). In those books the alternate history is in your face - a chunk of W. Virgina is sliced out by unknown forces and plopped down in the middle of Germany during the Thirty Years war. That is definitely scifi/fantasy and would be worthy of Hugo consideration.

This is unfortunately (IMHO) why the small base of people nominating and voting on Hugo's has become an issue.

Brasyl by Ian MacDonald - I could not get into this story at all. It is filled with cultural references and hip language and tech, but the plot was razor thin and the characters were uninteresting. I guess I am a classicist when it comes to novels; I like a good plot with developed characters and good pacing. This story failed in all three IMHO. I could not even finish it which for me is rare.

Halting State by Charles Stross - Very similar to Brasyl in that the story, characters and pacing were not there. Again, lots of tech talk and web 2.0 references but not much story for me. Another unfinishable book. It was another Accelerando and while that won a Hugo I hated it.

Rollback by Robert Sawyer - Excellent story of a man who is able to undergo rejuvenation and carry on his wife's work and the issues that surround such a profound change. This is classic Bob Sawyer; taut story, excellent characters and well paced. He has a flair for this kind of story-telling and I hope he keeps writing these kinds of books for a long time.

The Last Colony by John Scalzi - The third book in the Old Man's War universe, and in many ways wraps up the story from the first book. I enjoyed the first two and this did not let me down. Humor, action, good characters and fast paced. A solid author and deserving of a Hugo.

Who am I voting for? I have narrowed it down to Rollback and The Last Colony but still can't decide. The favorite from what I can tell is Yiddish but hopefully Rollback or Last Colony can take the prize.

The review for Yiddish is here. Rollback and Last Colony I read before I started doing reviews, and I didn't think it was fair to do a review on the other two since I did not finish them.

Feel free to sound off.