Nebula Awards Showcase 2017

Okay, better confess my bias before I get started. Every year, I look forward to the Nebula Awards Showcase. Even for someone who reads as much sci-fi and fantasy as me, there are always worthwhile short stories and novels that elude me, and you’re guaranteed to read at least one cracker of a piece in the showcase that you would’ve otherwise missed.

As a home for outstanding short stories that show the incredible inventiveness that typifies science fiction, the Nebula Awards Showcase is hard to top. This year’s crop of stories was interesting because it definitely skewed more toward the emotional than the dry and scientific, making this one of the more accessible years for Nebula nominees that I can remember. Several of the stories resonated deeply with me, and the ones that didn’t weren’t any less worthy of my time.

Whether it’s a band struggling to get by in an overly-teched future or a spaceship designed to love its pilot unconditionally, an unlikely bond between human and dragon, or a wonderful tribute to Terry Pratchett, this is the breadth and depth of speculative fiction writ large: the crossroads of imagination, heart, and insight.