Prize-Winning Sci Fi Novels of 2024

Let’s start with the winner of the Nebula Award for Best Novel: Some Desperate Glory, by Emily Tesh.

This is a cleverly crafted book, uniting several well-loved sci fi themes: space-station life, alien contact, AI overlords and alternate universes all come into play. But the overall result is fresh. The Chicago Review of Books put it well: “it’s hard to overstate how good this novel is at what it’s doing. Some Desperate Glory takes tried-and-true material and elevates it remarkably.”

Earth is destroyed, and our protagonist Valkyr is part of the vengeful human contingent left behind, living a meagre existence on their space station base. This militia is shot through with bigotry and cruelty, and faithful Valkyr reproduces all of this in her beliefs and actions.

So, an anti-hero?

I wouldn’t go that far; she’s a sympathetic character. You feel for her, but you can’t entirely like her – at the start.

There’s a clear character-arc for her throughout the novel. This is cleverly moved forward when the universe ‘resets’ to new timelines, which allow Valkyr to meet herself and her friends in different possible realities, and be exposed to new ways of thinking. But this isn’t a ponderous character study: the action is pacy throughout, and the stakes high. It’s very fun.

The next on the list is the winner of the Arthur C Clarke Award for Best Novel – it was also nominated for the Booker Prize. Tell us about In Ascension, by Martin MacInnes.

Yes, this is a literary entry on the list. It’s as much about the family relationships and personal experience of our hero as it is about scientific exploration.

There’s plenty of hard science in here, but it’s used not so much for boisterous adventure, as for a meditation on the wonder and strangeness of biological life. Not that there isn’t adventure. We follow Leigh, a biologist, first on a deep-sea dive and then on a space mission, both perilous. But the perils are uncertain and mysterious, and never become battles or action sequences.

In space, Leigh’s role is the provision of fresh growing plants on board for the small crew to eat. Space itself is of secondary interested to her – in her own words, ‘“Life is already alien, is already rich and strange…We don’t need to say it arrived seeded on a meteor to make it more so.”’ This is a book to re-awaken your wonder: the Times Literary Supplement described it as “a primer to marvel”.

And there’s room alongside two dangerous scientific missions for the personal story?

Well, that’s sort of the point – Leigh isn’t making time for her mother, while her sister stays behind with her. So we reflect on their differences as people, their different childhoods and difficulty connecting with each other. It’s not two separate strands; all of this is blended into Leigh’s experience of the world.

The winner of Locus Award for Best Sci Fi Novel is part of a highly lauded series… Tell us about System Collapse by Martha Wells.

Yes, this is the seventh work in the Murderbot Diaries series. The series has garnered awards galore: the first, All Systems Red, scooped the 2018 Hugo and Nebula for best novella, while the fifth (and first full-length novel), Network Effect, won the 2021 Hugo, Nebula and Locus for best novel. Wells has turned down several further nominations.

Do they need to be read in order?

It’s best that way, and All Systems Red is a lovely bite-sized place to start. The world-building is deft but dense, and the character relationships are a large part of the joy, so working through them in order is more rewarding. And System Collapse follows straight on from Network Effect.

‘Murderbot’ is the self-styled nickname of the protagonist, a former ‘SecUnit’ (security unit) robot that has slipped its control program and acts as an independent agent. It has a charmingly ambivalent relationship with the humans in its life, and a preference for spending time watching the thousands of hours of entertainment downloaded onto its system and being left alone. But, begrudgingly, it doesn’t actually want its humans to die.

Not letting the humans die is complicated in System Collapse. Our heros vye with corporate interests for the future of a planet and its colonists, who for their part don’t know who to trust. Muderbot’s team consists of humans, augmented humans, robots with organic parts and pure AI, all with their own well-sketched relationships. It’s fun, it’s fast-paced, it’s delightfully sarcastic and world-weary – full of lines like “we proceeded down the stupid tunnel, into the stupid danger.” Murderbot is all of us, getting on with the jobs we have to do, and doing our best to get on with the people involved.

In this novel, Murderbot’s narrative is frequently interrupted by <redacted>; you have to wait until about a third of the way in to learn why. It’s a new playful layer in an already playful narrative voice.

Next up is the winner of the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Narrative: Saga Volume 11, by Fiona Staples and Brian K Vaughan. This is once again in a series which has won previous Hugos, right?

Yes, this is the second Hugo for the Saga series – the first went to Volume 1 in 2013, so if you’re new to the series, you can start with another award winner. I’ve included it here with sci fi, but it’s regularly filed as science fantasy or fantasy too – and that’s indicative of the general playful richness of this world. Think space opera, with robots, but also with magic. It’s a very appealing world unconstrained by genre.

It straddles the epic and the personal with the same flexible ease. In this volume, you’ll move between the politics of a planet and a moon at war with each other, the machinations of assassins trying to find their victims, and the daily struggles of a single mother and her two pre-teen children trying to make ends meet. These threads all belong together – the mother is among those hiding from the assassins, and connected to the war effort – and the telling of all three levels is cleverly spliced together, sometimes flicking back and forth at speed. The result is a satisfying sense of moving parts seen from above, the narrative pieces clicking into place as you read.

And finally, tell us about the Nebula short story winner: Tantie Merle and the Farmhand 4200 by R. S. A. Garcia

Short stories are the lifeblood of science fiction; it’s always interesting to see the nominees and winners in this category. Tantie Merle and the Farmhand 4200 is a great example of how much can be accomplished in a small space.

Tantie Merle is having trouble managing her chores as she ages, with her children far away from her home in Trinidad and Tobago. To help out, her daughter sends her the highly sophisticated Farmhand 4200, which enthusiastically turns its learning powers to accomplishing any task Tantie Merle requires. This includes tying up the goat. Unimpressed, the goat eats it.

So the little Farmhand reconstitutes itself and sets its steely will to devising a method of successful goat-wrangling. You can’t help rooting for the little guy, who lets itself be eaten so many times over, while learning to knit with Tantie Merle in its time off. The story is light and full of laughter, and you feel almost tricked when you realise you have just read a story about labour rights, personhood and dignity.

And goats, of course.

Part of our best books of 2024 series