A Progressive on the Prairie

Bookish marginalia

Several worthy book-related items have passed by recently so here’s a round up:

The 2007 Nebula Awards were announced last weekend. Michael Chabon’s The Yiddish Policemen’s Union won Best Novel. Since it is also nominated for the Hugo Award and the Sidewise Awards, I picked it up from the library yesterday.
Those awards came on the heels of the announcements of the winners of the 2007 LA Times Book Prizes. None of the winners show up on my list of books that I’ve read.
Richard Morgan’s Black Man won this year’s Arthur C. Clarke Award, given for the best SF novel published in the UK the prior year. For whatever reason, the book was published in the US as Thirteen. (Via.)
In light of Chabon’s Nebula win, io9 gives a crash course in alternate history novels.
Also showing there’s more to SF than sometimes meets the eye, io9 provides a list of 20 science books every SF fan should read. I’ve actually read three: Cosmos, The Coming Plague and The Code Book.
Speaking of prize winners, The Millions has an interesting analysis of the winners of and finalists for six major international book awards since 1995. Based on C. Max’s methodology, The Known World leads the pack.
Not all books receive awards and praise, regardless of their quality. Thus, John Scalzi collects a variety of authors doing something he did: posting some of their one-star Amazon.com reviews.