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catsittingstillSo the Sad Puppies and Rabid Puppies Slate, between them, locked up the nominations and locked everyone else out of a lot of the categories, to the Puppies great glee and celebration.
However a couple of books came out last year that are *right* up the Sad Puppies' alley. They are Robert A. Heinlein: In Dialogue with His Century, Volume 2, the second part of a comprehensive biography of Heinlein, greatly admired by Sad Puppies (and he used to be on of my favorite authors also, by the way) and The Three-Body Problem, a hardest-of-hard SF novel by Cixin Liu (which I haven't read myself yet, but which I hear is excellent.)
Both are well thought of, including among fans who are not Sad Puppies, and both would have had a very reasonable chance at the Hugo Ballot in a normal year, the Heinlein bio in the Best Related Work section and Three-Body Problem in the Best Novel section.
I saw Larry Correia admit in a comment on his blog that he would have added the Heinlein bio to the Sad Puppies slate if he had known about it. I saw Vox Day admit in a comment at File 770 that he would have added The Three-Body Problem to the Rabid Puppies Slate if he had known about it.
Neither did, however, and the two slates made it impossible for other fans to put either work on the ballot.
Because slates don't just hurt those poopy heads on whatever you have designated the "other side." They hurt every non-slate work--emphatically including works the slate makers would have loved, if they had just permitted the other nominators to put them on the ballot.
This is why slates are so destructive to the normal nomination process that I feel they cannot be tolerated. I will be putting every slate work below No Award on my ballot.
However a couple of books came out last year that are *right* up the Sad Puppies' alley. They are Robert A. Heinlein: In Dialogue with His Century, Volume 2, the second part of a comprehensive biography of Heinlein, greatly admired by Sad Puppies (and he used to be on of my favorite authors also, by the way) and The Three-Body Problem, a hardest-of-hard SF novel by Cixin Liu (which I haven't read myself yet, but which I hear is excellent.)
Both are well thought of, including among fans who are not Sad Puppies, and both would have had a very reasonable chance at the Hugo Ballot in a normal year, the Heinlein bio in the Best Related Work section and Three-Body Problem in the Best Novel section.
I saw Larry Correia admit in a comment on his blog that he would have added the Heinlein bio to the Sad Puppies slate if he had known about it. I saw Vox Day admit in a comment at File 770 that he would have added The Three-Body Problem to the Rabid Puppies Slate if he had known about it.
Neither did, however, and the two slates made it impossible for other fans to put either work on the ballot.
Because slates don't just hurt those poopy heads on whatever you have designated the "other side." They hurt every non-slate work--emphatically including works the slate makers would have loved, if they had just permitted the other nominators to put them on the ballot.
This is why slates are so destructive to the normal nomination process that I feel they cannot be tolerated. I will be putting every slate work below No Award on my ballot.
no subject
Date: 2015-04-08 09:58 pm (UTC)http://makinglightpartial-feed.dreamwidth.org/profile
I'm sure there's a similar one on LJ, but this was handy. It pulls in the Making Light RSS feed so you can see in your reading list when there's a new top level entry on the blog. Of course, you'd need to go there to see comments and more details.
Hope this helps!