Sidetracks - April 10, 2025

[helloladies]

Sidetracks is a collaborative project featuring various essays, videos, reviews, or other Internet content that we want to share with each other. All past and current links for the Sidetracks project can be found in our Sidetracks tag. You can also support Sidetracks and our other work on Patreon.

Renay

1. Now that that Hugo finalists are out, I'm on the hunt for commentary. Camestros Felapton has some.

2. Then, wildly, the TikTok FYP spit out two videos on the Hugo Awards Best Novel finalists: one from literarymadmax and another from literatureish.liz. I say wildly because I've been trying to train the algorithm to give me more SFF content for years and all it really wants to show me is Brandon Sanderson squee (no, thank you).

3. Then Dina from SFF Book Review came through, as always, with My Thoughts on The Hugo Award Finalists 2025

4. Voting for the Locus Awards ends on April 15th.

5. Samantha Mills won the Compton Crook Award for her novel, The Wings Upon Her Back. The award is given to the best debut in SFF/H.

6. Recap of Week #1 of Women in SF/F Month from Fantasy Cafe. Week #2 is happening now!

7. Seen on BlueSky: acquisition notice for a novel from Meg Elison:

Author of NUMBER ONE FAN and the Road to Nowhere series Meg Elison's FOUNDLING FATHERS, about young clones of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin, created by a right-wing cabal and raised in isolation, and what happens when they stumble upon technology they aren't supposed to see, to Jacob Weisman at Tachyon Publications, with Rick Klaw editing, in a nice deal, for publication in summer 2026, by Arley Sorg at kt literary (world English).

8. MURDERBOT TRAILER!!! Please tell me your favorite part. Mine is when Murderbot is like "ugh, eye contact." I have watched this a normal amount of times.

9. And speaking of Murderbot, there's a deal on Apple+ through April 24. I suspect they're about to do a brisk business.

10. I loved the adaptation of The Last of Us and have been looking forward to watching the season season, only to discover that they've already announced the third season.

11. I haven't listened to much music the past week but I did rewatch all the Shawna-verse videos. The latest one came out while I was preparing to post this entry and I had to stop and watch it twice. I'm truly embodying Murderbot with my beloved online serials. 😂

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