Reading Horror Finalists for the Goodreads Choice Awards (because the sci-fi picks were terrible)

Okay, I was supposed to read the sci-fi nominees for the 2023 Goodreads Choice Awards. But...the list they came up with was pretty bad, so instead I pivoted to horror! Thanks to ‪@CriminOllyBlog‬ for splitting the list with me! This is reading the horror category of the Goodreads Choice Awards.
Why the Sci-Fi List is a No-Go 00:00
The Horror List Overview & TBR 07:31
How to Sell a Haunted House 17:43
Don’t Fear the Reaper 20:33
Rouge 22:36
The Finalists 26:41
The September House 29:43
The Winner 35:33
COLLAB PLAYLIST: • Reading the 2023 Goodr...
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A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher: amzn.to/3Rx6YNQ
Lone Women by Victor Lavalle: amzn.to/3TffQcc
Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno Garcia: amzn.to/3Rvzcsu
Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas: amzn.to/3t4IC4T
How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix: amzn.to/3taC9W8
Don't Fear the Reaper by Stephen Graham Jones: amzn.to/3t6Y7t4
Rouge by Mona Awad: amzn.to/3uMVlJP
The September House by Carissa Orlando: amzn.to/46RAbYp
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[@TiffReadsBooks]

I'm honestly so frustrated that Holly won. I just finished it and it's not even a horror, it is a thriller. It is Holly, a private detective, trying to find a missing woman. It's a good book, but is it best of the year? Absolutely not.

[@kathleenschwab4645]

I don't read much sci-fi, but my old babysitter published her debut These Burning Stars, and it was great. By Bethany Jacobs.

[@PrimmsBookCave]

I don't really consider myself a horror reader so I was surprised that I've read 4 of the nominees. You have convinced me to add Lone women to my TBR.

[@Beach652]

That's so interesting that so many of the nominees are just lightly speculative while all the hard core SciFi books are ignored!

[@SrtaMiette]

I have a “NOPE” shelf aka do-not-want-to-read-it-so-don’t-waste-your-time-next-time-you’re-looking-for-a-book-to-read and thinking GR is counting that as an “added to shelf” for an award… 😂😂😂

[@pucksandpaperbacks]

Looks like you had fun with this! That Grady Hendrix sounds good.

[@theaudiobookaficionado]

How to Sell a Haunted House was my favorite book of the year, I adored it. Clowns and campy horror are 100% my vibe 😅 need to pick up some more of these though!

[@cleverkrowbooks13]

I could not believe how terrible the sci-fi list was this year. I hate when they use less popular categories as dumping grounds. I would love it if everyone would stop voting for Stephen King just because he is a famous horror author. His recent books are not horror, nor should they win "best" anything over some truly phenomenal works that have been coming out. We all know he is great. Let other people get some notoriety now.

[@sphinxinherhat]

I took your comment about the science fiction list sucking to heart and went on a quest to see what might have been missed. Thomas at SFF180 helped with his annual list of things he was looking forward to this year posted at the end of last year. Bad fan! I found out a favorite writer(Ian McDonald) had a book out last year that I missed hearing about, but that should have met Goodreads criteria for inclusion. So did Corey Docterow.And there were writers with reader scoores above 4 that I didnt recognize but maybe should find out about. Redfern John Barrett wrote a book called Proud Pink Sky (reader score 4,20) that sounds like it would be right in your diversity ballpark and I'm wondering if you have read that one and, if so, what you think of it.

[@jessicaw1839]

I'm so glad you all are going for the horror category. These books hold so much more interest for me.

[@WildeBookGarden]

I finally read Lone Women and liked it a lot! I do still prefer Silver Nitrate (those are the only ones on this list I've read haha)

[@JJ-rx8ym]

I loved Mister Magic. It’s great starter horror with a perpetual sense of dread and unease throughout. More unsettling than horrifying. It also has religious undertones

[@TheWordN3rd]

Stephen King needs to pull a Rick Riordan and just ask not to be nominated 😅

[@CoreenMontagna]

Personally I loved In the Lives of Puppets. It’s only very very loosely based on some of Pinocchio’s plot beats. Edit: Puppets is to Pinocchio as Rouge is it Beauty and the Beast as you described it.

[@JayGTheAwkwardBookworm]

I really want to read Silver Nitrate 😤

[@Silverraine1]

For scifi I dnf'd In the Lives of Puppets because it's a guy going on an adventure/quest with his robot friends - it's cute but adventures are boring and I wished there was no love interest. Starter Villain is basically puss-in-boots with lots and lots of talking, I liked it but imo Kaiju was much better. And I loved Murderbot, as usual! The only left on my TBR is Jinn-Bot because it was pitched as Aladdin+Murderbot. I might try the Children of Time series next year.

[@jessparra]

How to sell a haunted house has been my fav read of the year. It’s the only book on grief I’ve actually related to. The last paragraph is exactly what it feels like to go through loss with your sibling at your side

[@mariyajaveedkhan159]

Me toi.. Yet holly won😢😢😢

[@emmal7510]

I'd read two of the SF nominees, eventually. I'd read Starter Villain and got hold of System Collapse during the voting period. (Both were fun reads, imo.)

[@giantcupofcoffee]

I read The Deep Sky and, not being a sci fi reader, I was struck by how they spent the whole book in the lab in the spaceship doing computer math. Like the ~wonder of space wasn’t there. It’s part of what I disliked about Project Hail Mary. It didn’t feel like he was even in space or anything exciting. I wonder how common that is. Shrug. Mister Magic is about religious trauma. You can tell that it meant a lot for the author to tell that story, but I don’t think you can surprise people with that. Not sure if it’s a spoiler but I thought I was reading a book about lost media and swerving into religion was a weird accidental meta thing of like…the author tricking us and dragging us into her own trauma.

[@darkroseguild4685]

Sci-fi dosent always mean space,space is just easier setting if you think about it. Sci-fi is science fiction so it’s all about the science in the fiction. Space is just really a setting.

[@BeautifullyBookishBethany]

Really interesting about Mister Magic! That kind of makes me more interested TBH. And yeah, sci-fi can look like a lot of different things!

[@lesliepowell-mccarty7067]

I read all but 2 of the books in the horror category and would have been happy with any of them winning. I did vote for Holly because I loved it but it should have been in the thriller category. I'm glad I was able to vote for The September House for debut novel. Oh and Black River Orchard by Chuck Wendig didn't make it but it is great!!!

[@devlyn873]

To me Vampires of El Norte felt mostly like historical fiction that dipped it's toes into both romance and horror

[@mariyajaveedkhan159]

How to sell a haunted house was by far my favorite book. It made me laugh it make me scared and it made me cry❤❤❤

[@thefairylibrarian3282]

I agree that the scifi list is terrible, but there's one thing i'll give them credit for. At least they don't reduce scifi to only space opera which i've seen a lot of people who don't read scifi do. But yeah...

[@NightOwlReader2790]

Before I actually start the video, I wanted to say that judging by the expression you gave on the thumbnail, it doesn't look like you had a great time with at least some of the nominations. I am interested to see exactly how bad GoodReads did this year in regards to the category you've chosen.

[@lusalma5404]

I used to read more sci-fi though it was usually romantic sci-fi... Catherine Asara, Anne McCaffrey, Patricia Kenneally, Ann Aguirre, . I do read far, far more fantasy and romance. Ironically I did listen to Natural Beauty and enjoyed it.

[@bookswithtofucado]

So frustrated holly won😢 😢😢😢

[@Frea_]

Wait, who's Amal Awad?

[@BeautifullyBookishBethany]

Oh! That's actually a different author. It's possible I misspoke when I meant Mona Awad because I'd been talking about a book recently by Amal Awad.

[@solrm122]

So no one in the collab is actually reading the sci-fi? aw dissapointing. ((of course you are allowed to read whatever makes you happy, but someone else could have picked up Sci-Fi if you didn't have the time))

[@BeautifullyBookishBethany]

Yeah, unfortunately no one wanted to pick it up!

[@jadejeb3295]

I definitely recommend Chain-Gang All-Stars even tho it's not super sci-fi heavy, the discussion on prison abolition and the characters are just amazing and interesting. really recommend!! also lovely video thank you 🫶💙