Friday short fiction #9: the 'short story' Nebula Award shortlist

Nick Derington  Nebula Awards  2008
Last week saw the shortlist for the 2010 Nebula Awards. Of the seven short stories six are online and listed below; the seventh is Felicity Shoulders's 'Conditional Love', of which there's a podcast, but these days I honestly prefer to read. If the written story is ever made available online I'll write it up as well later, so I'll withhold making any predictions on what may be the winner (to be announced on 21 May).

Adam-Troy Castro, 'Arvies'  (LIGHTSPEED MAGAZINE, AUGUST 2010)
This is the most science fictional of these listed here and functions as a kind of far future descendant of Brave New World, yet Castro only hints at whatever downsides there may be, if any, to this bizarre, semi-human society. A very confident and rather disturbing story, and one that managed to make my skin crawl a little, I've also nominated this for the 2011 Million Writers Award.

Harlan Ellison, 'How Interesting: A Tiny Man'  (REALMS OF FANTASY, FEBRUARY 2010)
I reacted with an almighty "meh" to this. Riffing on Frankenstein, it's typically Ellison and therefore does have several strengths, but his trademark rage is sounding a little muted here and dare I say repetitive? But this probably deserves more analysis than I'm prepared to give it.

Amal El-Mohtar, 'The Green Book'  (APEX MAGAZINE, NOVEMBER 2010)
Essentially about a book that can write itself and is aware it's being read, this is a story that needs a lot of untangling. There are several points of view all jockeying for position towards a rather interesting conclusion, and after a couple of readings – necessary, really – I think this is one of those stories that risks being a triumph of style over substance. Nevertheless El-Mohtar clearly writes with poetry in her heart, and this is an interesting selection for the Nebulas.

Kij Johnson, 'Ponies'  (TOR.COM, 17 JANUARY 2010)
Ouch, again, after re-reading it. This is a very different story from 'Spar', her Nebula winner last year, and hits its target with perfection (it also made me recall a few points in this long WaPo article about mean girls that I read last week). Full marks for getting me to read a story about unicorns twice, but however memorable and concise it may be it still feels like the kind of tale Johnson could probably knock off before breakfast. Maybe it's not far-reaching or substantial enough to be a deserving winner of a Nebula, but what do I know?

Vylar Kaftan, 'I'm Alive, I Love You, I'll See You in Reno'  (LIGHTSPEED MAGAZINE, JUNE 2010)
Others have done near-future relativistic love stories but this one is noticeably elegant and beautifully crafted. Certainly the easiest read of all these nominations and probably the most enjoyable.

Jennifer Pelland, 'Ghosts of New York'  (MAURICE BROADDUS, JERRY GORDON, eds., DARK FAITH, 2010)
This story must have been a tough sell, and I gather that despite it obviously being very well written Pelland had difficulty finding the right home for it. There must be a significant number of 9/11 ghost stories out there and I've read a couple of rather forgettable ones, but this one works especially well because it relentlessly pulls you into its tight, spiral compositional structure and yet also provides a final release. It's the 10th anniversary of 9/11 this year but that ought not be the reason this story wins, if it does.

Favourite short story of the week: Joanna Russ, 'When It Changed'  (HARLAN ELLISON, ed., AGAIN, DANGEROUS VISIONS, 1972)
I've just read Russ's The Female Man so I was pleased to be able to go back to 'When It Changed' online as it's one of only a few Whileaway stories, written a few years before the novel from which it has a slightly different premise. This was a deserved Nebula winner in 1972 (as well as a retroactive Tiptree winner in 1995), and I'm now on the lookout for her story 'A Few Things I Know About Whileaway'.