Noted for later book-buying

[alicebentley]

Over at SFSignal cherylmmorgan answers the question:

5. Which books do you think were missing from this year's list of Best Novel finalists?

Here are a selection of books that I would have liked to see on the shortlist ahead of some of the other books on the shortlist.

The Gone-Away World, Nick Harkaway; The Alchemy of Stone, Ekaterina Sedia; All the Windwracked Stars, Elizabeth Bear; The Enchantress of Florence, Salman Rushdie; An Evil Guest, Gene Wolfe; Memoirs of a Master Forger, Graham Joyce; Liberation, Brian Francis Slattery; Pandemonium, Daryl Gregory; Shadowbridge/Lord Tophet, Greg Frost; The Shadow Year, Jeffrey Ford; Last Dragon, JM McDermott; The Quiet War, Paul McAuley; The Two Pearls of Wisdom (Eon), Alison Goodman; An Autumn War, Daniel Abraham; Lavinia, Ursula K. Le Guin; Going Under, Justina Robson; Judge, Karen Traviss; Winterstrike, Liz Williams.

Here are a few more books that I have not read but have heard very good things about and which the voters might have considered:

The Knife of Never Letting Go, Patrick Ness; House of Suns, Alastair Reynolds; The Dragons of Babel, Michael Swanwick; Nation, Terry Pratchett; Wits' End, Karen Joy Fowler; Tender Morsels, Margo Lanagan; The Engine's Child, Holly Phillips; Half a Crown, Jo Walton.

Comments

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

It always amazes me that people can read all that the same year it's published, every year, in time to vote. I could probably do it, but that's about all I'd be able to get read. I'm as often reading something from 1960 as 2009 (actually, I'm very rarely reading anything that was published less than 5 years ago).

I guess if I paid more attention to authors, I might do better.

[alicebentley]

Through the bookstore years I was very plugged in to what was coming out by who, and usually got a fair amount of feedback on them from my customers. So even when I didn't have the time to read them all myself, I was directed to all the best stuff.

After closing the shop I just never got back into the massive reading I did before. And I haven't kept up on the many industry reports of what's coming out when. o this looked like a good chance to snag a reliable list of potential new books to buy (when I actually have the cash to do such things again).

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the various awards are at least a reading list. I've found quite a few good books going through them. I have also found some books that I found to be dreadful, and thought the pickings must have been mighty slim that year for it to have won. Either that or there was some politics or ballot stuffing going on.