Time for another meme. The Prometheus Award is one of the weirder science fiction awards in existence. Supposedly given for the best libertarian or libertarian friendly science fiction novel of the year, the award’s jury persist in rewarding Scottish socialists instead — Ken MacLeod won it three times already. Which means he’s got about two once of gold from them, as the award is a solid gold coin — half an ounce until 2001, a full ounce from then. Charlie Stross and Jo Walton are two other unlikely winners (thought they all used to hang out in rec.arts.sf.written. hmmm). In general, if you look at the list below it’s about evenly divided between fairly obvious libertarian or sympathising authors (L. Neil Smith, who actually founded the award for example) and those like Stross, Walton or MacLeod who just happened to write novels with libertarian themes even if not libertarians themselves and even though the political philosophy in these novels isn’t libertarianism either. This openmindedness is the award’s strength as without the more odd winners, it would be a morass of sucky libertarian power fantasies…
Anyway, usual rules apply: bold if I’ve read it, italics if I own it, both for the obvious and strikethroughs for those books I never ever expect to read. (Meme via James.
Dani & Eytan Kollin, The Unincorporated Man- Cory Doctorow, Little Brother
Harry Turtledove, The Gladiator- Jo Walton, Ha’penny
- Charles Stross, Glasshouse
- Ken MacLeod, Learning the World
- Neal Stephenson, The System of the World
F. Paul Wilson, Sims- Terry Pratchett, Night Watch
- Donald Kingsbury, Psychohistorical Crisis
L. Neil Smith, The Forge of the Elders- Vernor Vinge, A Deepness in the Sky
- John Varley, The Golden Globe
- Ken MacLeod, The Stone Canal
Victor Koman, Kings of the High Frontier- Ken MacLeod, The Star Fraction
- Poul Anderson, The Stars are also Fire
L. Neil Smith, PallasJames P. Hogan, The Multiplex Man- Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, and Michael Flynn, Fallen Angels
- Michael Flynn, In the Country of the Blind
Victor Koman, Solomon’s Knife- Brad Linaweaver, Moon of Ice
Victor Koman, The Jehovah Contract- Vernor Vinge, Marooned in Realtime
Victor Milan, Cybernetic SamuraiJ. Neil Schulman, The Rainbow CadenzaJames P. Hogan, Voyage from YesteryearL. Neil Smith, The Probability BroachF. Paul Wilson, Wheels Within Wheels
Yes, basically all the echt-libertarians (as well as Hogan, who was more of a loon) are not authors I ever plan on reading. The Niven, Pournelle and Flynn wankfest only escapes because I read it already when younger and dumber.