My votes for the 2023 Hugo Best Novella
This year the Worldcon will be held in Chengdu, China, and the 2023 Hugo Awards, the Lodestar Award, and the Astounding Award will be presented on Saturday evening, October 21, at a formal ceremony at the Chengdu Worldcon.
Although I won’t be attending in person, I’m a Worldcon member and get to vote for the awards. Members also make the nominations, and the works or individuals with the most nominations become the finalists.
While all these works are solid and any one of them deserves to win, I was disappointed that no Chinese novellas were finalists.
The voting is by ranked choice, and here’s my ranking:
6. Where the Drowned Girls Go, by Seanan McGuire (Tordotcom) – Cora, a girl who has gone through a portal, faces bullying and institutional abuse as she tries to adjust to our world. This is part of the Wayward Children series. It’s a heart-wrenching story, but not quite a stand-alone.
5. Into the Riverlands by Nghi Vo (Tordotcom) – This story is part of the Singing Hills Cycle. A wandering cleric joins a group of travelers, and they share stories between episodes of epic martial arts in which they battle notorious bandits. Clever and consistently interesting.
4. A Mirror Mended by Alix E. Harrow (Tordotcom) – Fairy tales are filled with problematical characters and situations, and they get their comeuppance. The various versions of Snow White all lead to trouble, told by a witty but anguished would-be rescuer. A fun examination of metastory.
3. What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher (Tor Nightfire) – A very creepy retelling of “The Fall of the House of Usher” by Edgar Allan Poe, with an engaging voice and outstanding characters. Simply well done.
2. Ogres by Adrian Tchaikovsky (Solaris) – What seems like a fantasy story at first turns into a dystopia. Nothing more can be said without spoilers. The choice of second-person narration turns out to be important.
1. Even Though I Knew the End by C.L. Polk (Tordotcom) – In Chicago in the 1930s, the “White City Vampire” seems to be an ordinary serial killer, but a private detective knows that a lot more is at stake — more than she thinks, in fact. Can she protect her beloved? Demons, warlocks, and angels keep the plot twisting and turning. This novella won the Nebula Award.
