Best of the Year’s Bests? OMG
So a kind of in-genre joke myself and others had been telling over the last year or so has come true! Locus has revealed its best of the year list and it now has a category for bests of the year! (see after the cut) LOL! I love Locus, but…wow. You’ll also note that the one anthology with just about zero overlap with any of these anthos, Best American Fantasy, is not on the list. (And, the field is so small that you’ve got Strahan and Horton both on the list and part of the group deciding the list. Not a slam–just an observation.)
However, I think we’ll wear our absence as a badge of honor in this case, since The Thackery T. Lambshead Pocket Guide to Eccentric & Discredited Diseases also didn’t make the Locus recommended reading list, despite being a finalist for the Hugo, the World Fantasy Award, and the IHG Award. If you want to check out what Best American Fantasy is about, you can order it from Amazon or you can order it from me via Paypal and get a signed copy for $12 postpaid in the US. Send to: vanderworld at hotmail dot com.
I’d also say Locus would be better off adding a category for graphic novels, and adding a column on graphic novels, than just sticking The Arrival onto a list of art books. There is a wealth of great fantasy/SF material published in graphic novel form every year.
That said, check out the other categories, which do a decent job of covering the field–with the glaring, obscene omission of Dan Simmons’ The Terror and the slightly less glaring (given its small press origins) omission of Michael Cisco’s The Traitor.
I especially do not envy anyone who has to make a list of recommended novellas, novelettes, and short stories. It’s thankless and difficult work, and hats off to Locus to attempting to do this right every year.
Jeff
February 3, 2008 at 11:53 am
So does this win Best of the Best of the Best of the Year by default?
February 3, 2008 at 11:55 am
Ha! I do know that some have talked seriously about doing a best of the year’s bests, which would be…MAAAAADDDDNESSSSSSS….
JV
February 3, 2008 at 1:07 pm
A beautiful dream! By the year 2100 we could have Best Ofs to the power of 10 or higher. . .
Though by my back of the envelope calculations a Best Of X10 — in order to be properly diverse, unpredictable and interesting, and non-redundant with Best Ofs X2-9 — would require more annual base material in the form of books or short stories than there are atoms in the sun.
The air is thin up here in the higher reaches of Advanced Iterative Anthologizing.
February 3, 2008 at 1:11 pm
Jeff,
Not surprisingly I second your comments about graphic novels and Locus. Arrival wasn’t the only graphic novel that should have been mentioned. The excellent sf/fantasy comics Alice in Sunderland, I Shall Destroy All the Civilized Worlds, and All Star Superman all should have received mentions.
February 3, 2008 at 6:08 pm
I would actually be willing to dish out some money for the worst of the worst. In the best of the best you just know you are going to be running up against plots, believable characters, story arcs and all the other stuff that make reading such a chore.
February 3, 2008 at 6:38 pm
Brendan,
If you’re really wanting to do that, you could just go out and read the latest from Terry Goodkind, I suppose…
As for the Locus list, I see I need to read more SF works, although the fact that I recognize (and have read some of their other works) so many of the names on that list makes me wonder if that’s just a blip or if the SF field is that small.
Can’t quibble much over their Fantasy list, though. But as for the Best of the Year’s Best, I’m just waiting until they (or another, perhaps a blogger) will do a “Best of the Best of Year Lists” and then get some arguing over matters of taste and then have it devolve into a grabass fest. Maybe next year?