I'm curious, which past Hugo winners did you think were pretentious?
2013 - Redshirts - John Scalzi: Not the best in the field, I wanted Blackout or Captain Vorpatril's Alliance to win, but i'm not sure what was pretentious about it.
2012 - Among Others - Jo Walton: I didn't think this one was pretentious. Just kind of boring and pandering. Should have gone to Leviathan Wakes or Deadline.
2011 - Blackout/All Clear - Connie Willis: Again, doesn't seem pretentious, but i've been disappointed with all the Connie Willis i've read since To Say Nothing of the Dog and Bellwether. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, Cryoburn, and Feed were all better than this.
2010 - Paolo Bacigalupi's The Windup Girl and China Mieville's The City & the City: I had some serious concerns about the economics underlying the Windup Girl but thought it was otherwise okay. I've never really gotten people's fascination with China Mieville's works however. But neither seemed especially pretentious to me. Robert J Sawyer's Wake really should have won.
2009 - The Graveyard Book - Neil Gaiman: Okay, this year just sucked. I failed to inherit whatever gene it is that makes so many people like Neil Gaiman, nor have i yet found anything to like about Cory Doctorow or Charles Stross yet. I used to like Neal Stephenson, but his more recent work is just too... i dunno. And i haven't actually read Scalzi's Zoe's Tale yet because i just get annoyed by "let's tell the same story from a different perspective" books.
2008 - The Yiddish Policeman's Union - Michael Chabon: This was before i started going to WorldCon/voting in Hugos, and the only one i've read from that year so far is Scalzi's The Last Colony. Which was okay, but not something i'd have voted on myself. (I tend not to be a big fan of books from the middle of a long series for Hugo consideration in general.)
2007 - Rainbows End - Vernor Vinge: This on the other hand was a great year. I totally agree with the winner, but Naomi Novik's His Majesty's Dragon and Michael Flynn's Eifelheim were both great as well (though admitedly it took me a little while to get into Eifelheim.)
2006 - Spin - Robert Charles Wilson: I think John Scalzi's Old Man's War gave Spin a run for its money, but i don't think this was a poor choice.
2005 - Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke: Okay, i liked the book, but my opinion of it suffered from over-hype. I also thought at the time she seemed like a one-hit wonder, and i'm not sure if i should be sad or gloating about being (so far) correct. I haven't read The Algebraist yet, but in retrospect it's kind of sad Ian M Banks didn't win this year.
2004 - Paladin of Sould - Lois McMaster Bujold: Not her best book, but it was pretty good and it was definitely better than the other contenders that i've read, so this seems fine to me.
So that's ten years of Hugos. There are definitely some authors whose appeal i don't get, or at least haven't gotten yet (Neil Gaiman, China Mieville, Charles Stross, Cory Doctorow) but none of them really jump out at me as pretentious.
So what is it about them that bothers you?
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