Saturdays in Books

This is part of a series of posts reviewing categories in this year's Hugo ballot. I'll be discussing the entries, the voter packet, and my ballot. I've nominated and voted most years since 2011, when I figured out that all I had to do was join Worldcon to get to do so.

Two sequels and several set in space. The downside of this list is that Orbit tends to only include excerpts. The upside, there's only one Orbit title I didn't already own.

• The Collapsing Empire, by John Scalzi (Tor) - 3 Stars. Fun romp, fun narration, but did not love.

• New York 2140, by Kim Stanley Robinson (Orbit) - DNF'd early, could not get into.

• Provenance, by Ann Leckie (Orbit) - I DNF'd this pretty early. Great writing, but not at all my style of story.

• Raven Stratagem, by Yoon Ha Lee (Solaris) - 4.5 Stars. An excellent book. I look forward to reading the conclusion of this trilogy.

• Six Wakes, by Mur Lafferty (Orbit) - 4 Stars. A solid read I enjoyed quite a bit.

• The Stone Sky, by N.K. Jemisin (Orbit) - 5 Stars. One of the best books I read last year and easily the top of my ballot for this award. An excellent conclusion to a brilliant series.

So, yeah, kind of an obvious top of ballot here in The Stone Sky. I really liked both Six Wakes and Raven Stratagem. It's a hard choice, but I think Raven Stratagem will go next on my ballot. Fourth with be Collapsing Empire, and I just won't include the two novels I didn't finish. Wow, this is usually not such an easy category for me.