I recently finished reading the Hugo Award nominees for Best Novel and Best Novella. As with the Nebulas, I hadn’t originally planned to read the novellas, but half of them were also on the Nebula list, so I figured why not. Here are my personal rankings:

Best Novel

A Sorceress Comes to Call, T. Kingfisher: A Regency-ish novel of manners featuring magic and an older, snarky heroine? Sign me up. One of the things I particularly liked is that this is a story about magic told from the POV of non-magical people who are just trying to figure out what’s going on.

Someone You Can Build a Nest In, John Wiswell: This was so charming and weird. There were some gory moments but since they’re presented through the monster’s POV they worked well and weren’t too gross, more matter-of-fact. It was hard for me to choose between this and Sorceress for my top pick, but I listened to both of them on audio and I think the cadence of the narration in this one might put some people off. Once I reframed it as part of the performance, it worked and stopped bugging me.

It’s interesting that my top two from the Hugo list were also on the Nebula list. Someone You Can Build a Nest In won the Nebula, so hopefully A Sorceress Comes to Call will win the Hugo.

Service Model, Adrian Tchaikovsky: This was so fun and funny, especially given how much I enjoy Regency/Edwardian/Victorian settings. But the plot starts to feel repetitive and the ending felt rushed. But it made me laugh out loud more than once and there are several scenes that vividly pop to mind when I think about this book.

The Ministry of Time, Kaliane Bradley: If you have to pick one genre to categorize this book, it isn’t sci fi or romance, which is what the marketing would have you believe. It’s literary fiction (whatever that is, but that’s an opinion for another day) with elements of sci fi and romance. Anyway. I love the concept but there’s a bit too much going on, and not enough time spent on certain elements of the plot. But, it does hang together and I enjoyed it quite a bit.

Alien Clay, Adrian Tchaikovsky: I have Feelings about an author having two books on the list in the same year. I’m not questioning the process, but I also don’t have to like it. Anyway, this was another interesting world, but there were long stretches where nothing really happened. But if you like books that go deep into alien biology, this is the book for you.

The Tainted Cup, Robert Jackson Bennett: Great characters and an interesting world, but there are too many long stretches of exposition and not enough action. If you like the Sherlockian thing where the Eccentric and Wise Solver of All Mysteries explains how it all went down, then you’ll enjoy this. If you just get irritated, skip this one. This was on the NYT’s list of best sci fi and fantasy from 2024, (gift link) so when it came up at my last book club meeting at least two people who’d been planning to read it took it off their TBRs. Take that, NYT Books.

Best Novella

The Butcher of the Forest, Premee Mohamed: This is a dark fairytale that I thought was really well-done. The descriptions of the creatures were great and the ending worked well.

The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain, Sofia Samatar: This one does a good job of only explaining what’s necessary, and not explaining a key, but fairly obvious, element. I appreciated that.

What Feasts at Night, T. Kingfisher: This is the second book in a series, and since they’re novellas I read them both. I liked this one a lot more. It was more humorous, which I think worked really well for the scenario and characters. There was also more time devoted to helping you understand the characters, where the first one spent that time on worldbuilding. Which honestly…I’m not sure was really necessary, especially in a novella.

The Tusks of Extinction, Ray Nayler: I got a bit confused in the opening of this and had to stop and read the synopsis to figure out what was happening. I also think there were maybe a few too many perspectives here, but it does work.

The Brides of High Hill, Nghi Vo: This is 5th in an existing series which I did not read, as it’s more of a standalone. I do think it works as a standalone, but I could tell I was missing a lot from not having visited the world before. Anyway, I couldn’t tell you what this book was about. I’m not sure if I missed a key moment (I listened to this) or if I just didn’t pick up on something, but the ending came out of nowhere and made no sense to me.

Navigational Entanglements, Aliette de Bodard: The main action of the plot was good but this needed more character development and less of the repetitive interior monologues.