but this was definitely a case of "literary fiction author thinks they reinvented the wheel" and I was pretty surprised to find it on a top-however-many list.
I felt like a surprising number of books on this list were literary fiction authors doing sci-fi, which is not necessarily inherently bad, but not what I expect from lists like this!
The Calculating Stars, by Mary Robinette Kowal I liked the complicated explorations of grief and Jewish identity, and the astrophysics flirting. Other parts were painfully didactic.
I was impressed with the Jewish identity stuff, and like the alt history. Less didactic would definitely have been nice.
The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, by Becky Chambers The alien worldbuilding was fun, other parts sanctimonious and underwhelming
I've been disappointed that Becky Chambers seems to have chosen to lean into the sanctimoniousness rather than the fun alien worldbuilding in the most recent books. (I did like A Close and Common Orbit and Record of a Space-Born Few.)
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 7/20/24 09:03 pm (UTC)Haha!
but this was definitely a case of "literary fiction author thinks they reinvented the wheel" and I was pretty surprised to find it on a top-however-many list.
I felt like a surprising number of books on this list were literary fiction authors doing sci-fi, which is not necessarily inherently bad, but not what I expect from lists like this!
The Calculating Stars, by Mary Robinette Kowal I liked the complicated explorations of grief and Jewish identity, and the astrophysics flirting. Other parts were painfully didactic.
I was impressed with the Jewish identity stuff, and like the alt history. Less didactic would definitely have been nice.
The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, by Becky Chambers The alien worldbuilding was fun, other parts sanctimonious and underwhelming
I've been disappointed that Becky Chambers seems to have chosen to lean into the sanctimoniousness rather than the fun alien worldbuilding in the most recent books. (I did like A Close and Common Orbit and Record of a Space-Born Few.)