2004 Nebula Nominees
Posted on February 15, 2005 Posted by John Scalzi 6 Comments
As I was on the Nebula short fiction jury this year, it behooves me to post the final list of Nebula nominees (list gacked from Gwenda Bond):
2004 Final Nebula Ballot
Novels
Paladin of Souls, by Lois McMaster Bujold (Eos, Oct 2003)
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, by Cory Doctorow (Tor, Feb 2003)
Omega, by Jack McDevitt (Ace, Nov 2003)
Cloud Atlas: A Novel, by David Mitchell (Sceptre, Jan 2004)
Perfect Circle, by Sean Stewart (Small Beer Press, Jun 2004)
The Knight, by Gene Wolfe (Tor, Jan 2004)
Novellas
“Walk in Silence,” by Catherine Asaro (Analog, Apr 2003)
“The Tangled Strings of the Marionettes,” by Adam-Troy Castro (F&SF,
Jul 2003)
“The Cookie Monster,” by Vernor Vinge (Analog, Oct 2003)
“The Green Leopard Plague,” by Walter Jon Williams (Asimov’s, Oct/Nov
2003)
“Just Like the Ones We Used to Know,” by Connie Willis (Asimov’s, Dec
2003)
Novelettes
“Zora and the Zombie”, by Andy Duncan (SCI FICTION, February 4, 2004)
“Basement Magic,” by Ellen Klages (F&SF, May 2003)
“The Voluntary State,” by Christopher Rowe (SCI FICTION, May 2004)
“Dry Bones,” by William Sanders (Asimov’s, May 2003)
“The Gladiator’s War: A Dialogue,” by Lois Tilton (Asimov’s, Jun 2004)
Short Stories
“Coming to Terms,”by Eileen Gunn (Stable Strategies and Others, Tachyon
Publications, Sep 2004)
“The Strange Redemption of Sister Mary Anne,” by Mike Moscoe (Analog,
Nov 2004)
“Travels With my Cats,” by Mike Resnick (Asimov’s, Feb 2004)
“Embracing-The-New,” by Benjamin Rosenbaum (Asimov’s, Jan 2004)
“In the Late December,” by Greg van Eekhout (Strange Horizons, Dec.
22, 2003)
“Aloha,” by Ken Wharton (Analog, Jun 2003)
Scripts
The Incredibles, by Brad Bird (Pixar, Nov 2004)
The Butterfly Effect, by J. Mackye Gruber and Eric Bress (New Line
Cinema, Jan 2004)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, by Charlie Kaufman & Michel
Gondry (Anonymus Content/Focus Features, Mar 2004)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, by Fran Walsh & Philippa Boyens & Peter Jackson, based on the novel by J.R.R. Tolkien (New Line Cinema, Dec 2003)
I’m personally excited for Cory Doctorow, who is a friend of mine, that he made the final list, and of course I wish all the rest of the nominees good luck as well.
If you’re curious as to what I did on the Nebula short fiction jury, well, I and my fellow jury-mates looked through material to see if there was any story/novelette/novella we thought was overlooked, and if so, we had the ability to add one title in each category. Long-time observers of the Nebula process will see if we did, but otherwise I prefer not to note if we added a nominee or not; every Nebula nominee should be evaluated on his/her writing, not by the process through which he/she landed on the ballot.
Oh noes! More “propaganda”!
I’m personally sorry that Bradley Denton’s “Sergeant Chip” fell off the novella ballot in the last round; to my mind it’s the best SF story I read last year.
I’m not alone in this; David Hartwell tells me he’s using it as the very first story in his latest Year’s Best SF collection. Meanwhile, Jane Yolen and I are using it as the volume-closer for our forthcoming Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy for Teens.
Re: “Sergeant Chip”. Ah, good, I wasn’t a bad mommy for having my 11 year old daughter read it… ;)
Amidst all of the usual publishing suspects, you see:
“Perfect Circle, by Sean Stewart (Small Beer Press, Jun 2004)”
Now you’ve just got to love this because:
a. it shows that quite small publishers can compete; and
b. you just have to love the name!
Perfect Circle was a hell of a book, and Sean Stewart is a hell of an author. Great to see him on the list.
Perfect Circle was a hell of a book, and Sean Stewart is a hell of an author. Great to see him on the list.