Best Short Story 2021
Nov. 17th, 2021 07:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
factitiousNone of these felt amazing to me. I'm going to just write short opinions about them, and claim that this is on theme for the category.
"A Guide for Working Breeds," by Vina Jie-Min Prasad, is the only one I enjoyed strongly enough to rank above No Award, because I have a soft spot for silly little chatlog stories. Fun characters, amusing plot that doesn't go any longer than it needs to.
"Metal Like Blood in the Dark," by T. Kingfisher, is pretty close behind No Award for me, but didn't quite get there. The format of a fairy tale about robots is nice, and the pebble test to figure out what the deal is with lying was cute. Just needed more reason to care about Brother and Sister. Characterization's a weak point of a lot of fairy tales, really.
"The Mermaid Astronaut," by Yoon Ha Lee, has a clever idea in making The Little Mermaid about space travel, but the execution felt pretty twee and didn't do much for me. Could have been less direct: going off the planet and getting separated from those behind due to relativity would work as a parallel to giving up your fishtail for legs, without having a literal loss of a fishtail, but I guess actually being about a mermaid is a strong draw for a lot of people.
"Little Free Library," by Naomi Kritzer, didn't have much to it. It felt like the intro to a story that I'd need to read more of to assess. If it gets expanded on later, I'd check that out.
"Open House on Haunted Hill," by John Wiswell, feels like something you'd see circulating on Tumblr in a chain of replies to someone's brief post about haunted houses. I do read and enjoy Tumblr posts like that, but it's not what I want for Best Short Story of 2020.
"Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse," by Rae Carson, was what the title promises, no more and no less. Recommended if all you want is to read about someone giving birth in a dangerous situation and being a badass. Not recommended if that doesn't sound like enough on its own.
My votes: "A Guide for Working Breeds" > No Award > "Metal Like Blood in the Dark" > "The Mermaid Astronaut" > "Little Free Library" > "Open House on Haunted Hill" > "Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse"
"A Guide for Working Breeds," by Vina Jie-Min Prasad, is the only one I enjoyed strongly enough to rank above No Award, because I have a soft spot for silly little chatlog stories. Fun characters, amusing plot that doesn't go any longer than it needs to.
"Metal Like Blood in the Dark," by T. Kingfisher, is pretty close behind No Award for me, but didn't quite get there. The format of a fairy tale about robots is nice, and the pebble test to figure out what the deal is with lying was cute. Just needed more reason to care about Brother and Sister. Characterization's a weak point of a lot of fairy tales, really.
"The Mermaid Astronaut," by Yoon Ha Lee, has a clever idea in making The Little Mermaid about space travel, but the execution felt pretty twee and didn't do much for me. Could have been less direct: going off the planet and getting separated from those behind due to relativity would work as a parallel to giving up your fishtail for legs, without having a literal loss of a fishtail, but I guess actually being about a mermaid is a strong draw for a lot of people.
"Little Free Library," by Naomi Kritzer, didn't have much to it. It felt like the intro to a story that I'd need to read more of to assess. If it gets expanded on later, I'd check that out.
"Open House on Haunted Hill," by John Wiswell, feels like something you'd see circulating on Tumblr in a chain of replies to someone's brief post about haunted houses. I do read and enjoy Tumblr posts like that, but it's not what I want for Best Short Story of 2020.
"Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse," by Rae Carson, was what the title promises, no more and no less. Recommended if all you want is to read about someone giving birth in a dangerous situation and being a badass. Not recommended if that doesn't sound like enough on its own.
My votes: "A Guide for Working Breeds" > No Award > "Metal Like Blood in the Dark" > "The Mermaid Astronaut" > "Little Free Library" > "Open House on Haunted Hill" > "Badass Moms in the Zombie Apocalypse"
