Reading Resolution Update: Before 2022

My 2022 Reading Resolution: Read or DNF every novel that has won a Hugo or a Nebula award, and acquire all the good ones.

I was going to keep track of my reading resolution this year by mentioning each book and what I liked or didn’t like about it, why I DNFed it if I did, etc… and then I thought about it a little more and realized that that’s a terrible idea. Perhaps if I weren’t an author myself, I could risk bringing down the wrath of the internet by broadcasting everything that I really think about these books, but that’s still a really stupid thing to do—not to mention, a great way to burn a bunch of bridges that, as a writer, I really shouldn’t burn.

Instead, I’m going to post a monthly update where I list all of the books that I read and want to acquire, all the books that I read and probably won’t acquire, and all of the books that I DNFed, without any book-specific commentary. I do think that having some public accountability will help me to keep this resolution, and I do intend to keep it. But because I anticipate DNFing a lot of books that have very, um, merciless fans, this seems like a better way to do it.

So here is how things stood on the morning of January 1st, 2022:

Books that I read and want to / have already acquired:

• Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein (1956 Hugo)
• Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein (1960 Hugo)
• A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr. (1961 Hugo)
• The Man in the High Castle by Phillip K. Dick (1963 Hugo)
• Dune by Frank Herbert (1966 Hugo and Nebula)
• The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin (1970 Hugo and Nebula)
• The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin (1975 Hugo and Nebula)
• Downbelow Station by C.J. Cherryh (1982 Hugo)
• Neuromancer by William Gibson (1985 Hugo and Nebula)
• Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card (1986 Hugo and Nebula)
• Speaker for the Dead by Orson Scott Card (1987 Hugo and Nebula)
• Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold (1992 Hugo)
• Mirror Dance by Lois McMaster Bujold (1995 Hugo)
• The Mule (included in Foundation and Empire) by Isaac Asimov (1946 Retro Hugo, awarded in 1996)
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling (2001 Hugo)
• Farmer in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein (1951 Retro Hugo, awarded in 2001)
• Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury (1954 Retro Hugo, awarded in 2004)
• Spin by Robert Charles Wilson (2006 Hugo)
• The Sword in the Stone by T.H. White (1939 Retro Hugo, awarded in 2014)
• Network Effect by Martha Wells (2021 Hugo and Nebula)

Books that I read and don’t plan to acquire:

• The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester (1952 Hugo)
• The Forever War by Joe Haldeman (1975 Hugo and Nebula)
• Gateway by Frederik Pohl (1977 Hugo and Nebula)
• Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson (1993 Nebula)
• American Gods by Neil Gaiman (2001 Hugo)

Books that I did not finish:

• The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by Robert A. Heinlein (1966 Hugo)
• Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes (1966 Nebula)
• Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny (1967 Hugo)
• Ringworld by Larry Niven (1970 Hugo and Nebula)
• Rendezvous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke (1973 Hugo and Nebula)
• Green Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson (1993 Hugo)
• Blue Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson (1996 Hugo)
• Forever Peace by Joe Haldeman (1997 Hugo, 1998 Nebula)
• The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin (2015 Hugo)
• The Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin (2016 Hugo)
• The Stone Sky by N.K. Jemisin (2017 Hugo and Nebula)