It’s clear the standards for science fiction and fantasy have changed with the entry of professional writers into the game. I suspect this is what the Sad/Rabid Puppies are complaining about in their tug-of-war about the awards. I don’t think there’s any way to get to pro writers out of science fiction—they’re intent on making a living as writers and on continuing to do something they love. They write good stories, and excellent books—so much so that they’ve clearly crowded the less literary technical writing crowd out of both the Nebula and the Hugo Awards. They’re probably also crowding this group out of publishing contracts. I don’t think there’s any way the Puppies can change this.
However, these pro writers are trained in the Humanities, and not in the sciences. That means, as Trevor Quachri suggests in his debut interview, that they’re not likely to write hard SF or to submit a whole lot to magazines like Analog. The new pro online magazines like Clarkesworld or Tor.com have picked them up, instead. What does this mean for hard SF as a genre? Should the community be working to preserve it in some way? What could be done, at this point, to advance hard SF as a sub-genre?
Lela E. Buis 
Oct 10, 2015 @ 13:30:10
Lela,
I wouldn’t describe them as ‘professional’ writers. ‘Professional’ writers like Larry Correia are earning a full-time wage from their writing, but don’t have graduate degrees in fiction.
I’d describe them as ‘credentialled writers’. Or simply ‘literary writers’. They are, in fact, refugees from literary culture. Lit fic is (speaking from experience) snobbish about fantastical fiction but, with geek culture entering the mainstream, there are lots of literary writers who want to write about fantastical topics.
The lit fic writers will stay around so long as they’re still unwelcome in literary culture and in so far as they get prizes for writing literary fiction.
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Oct 10, 2015 @ 14:48:29
Thank for the comment. I mean that professional writers generally have a different background from the old model where scientists like Asimov or Clarke moonlight from their day job as SF writers.
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 15:57:45
I tend to think hard sf is in danger of itself, in that, as it is written now, it appeals to a dwindling demographic, actually. Nothing to do with how it is provided, per se.
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 16:30:13
Sean,
Who do you think is the ‘dwindling demographic’?
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 17:03:27
If we’re talking about traditional hard science fiction, which generally appeals to men, it could be argued that a shift in readership tastes might lead to a decline in that category. I think we are already seeing that, on several fronts.
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 17:26:38
Sean,
Even if I accept that hard SF “generally appeals to men”, then I’m still confused… The number of male readers hasn’t declined so, surely, there will be equally many people interested in reading hard SF?
You could argue that we live in a ‘science-phobic’ age. Or that many of the forthcoming innovations in science and technology will be in biology/comp sci, which are generally less associated with SF than – say – space travel… But not that there are fewer potential readers.
Have I got your argument completely wrong?
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 18:22:08
Stats in 2011 were that Analog’s circulation was up, but they seem to be the only pro holdout for this kind of very staid, old-fashioned hard SF. I do think the demographic is dwindling, or more magazines would be successful with this format.
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 19:41:22
Are you sure that any other magazines have recently tried to do short, hard SF? (serious question) The only ones I’m aware of are the recent Motherboard Terraform section, and Arc magazine (the snazzy digital SF title put out by the makers of New Scientist).
My take is that modern SF is dominated by publishers/writers with a humanities background, and the scientific content has gone down accordingly…
Analog isn’t particularly hard SF – I took out a subscription.
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Oct 17, 2015 @ 15:11:15
Apologies for the delay in responding. I’m not entirely convinced that the relative success of Analog in contrast to Asimov’s really means anything, because when we look purely at digital subscriptions, the latter is crushing the former and seems to be pulling further and further ahead. I almost wonder whether, over time, Asimov’s will have the higher circulation but that is at least five years away. (All the stats are available in the February issues of Locus, I point out, or in one of my spreadsheets.) Beyond that the inherent issue in thinking that there is indeed a market for hard sf is whether or not there is any consistent proof. There is very little of it being published in trade publishing (excluding The Martian, which could be an outlier) and then there is the question of enough material?
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 16:05:23
What’s your benchmark for hard SF? Clement hard? Niven hard?
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 17:16:08
I can’t see how to reply to Sean’s comment that “traditional hard science fiction, which generally appeals to men”.
A: Not ALL men!
B: There is, I think, the issue that SF that by any reasonable metric is hard SF will be classified as something else if it is seen as being created by or read by women. There’s room here for an entire humane experiment: take a large group of readers, give them a Chris Moriarty novel, tell a third of them Chris is a guy, a third Chris is a woman and the third nothing, and see if they think e.g. Spin Control is HSF.
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 18:13:16
I agree with this. Tiptree was right.
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Oct 14, 2015 @ 21:38:14
Vivienne, I agree with both your comments, that SF is now dominated by writers and publishers from the Humanities and that the science content of stories has dropped. I had assumed that Analog was holding the line on hard, science-based SF, but reading some of the stories recently, I agree with you the science just isn’t there. Hence the series of blog posts about the extinction of hard SF. I can’t find anything like the predictive stories that set precedents in the past.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 00:29:36
Analog may have pretensions of being the hard SF magazine but this is the rag that pushed dianetics, psionics, and the Dean drive, and published stories like the first Pern tale and the Telzey Amberdon stuff.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 01:51:05
That was all under Campbell, wasn’t it? That means it’s no reflection on either Schmidt or Quachri. However, the contents look somewhat inbred, published many of the same authors over and over. I haven’t looked at the essays, but the stories suggest hard SF submissions are an a low ebb. Quachri’s comments suggest this, too, as it appears he sees himself in the role of encouraging beginning authors interested in writing science-based stories.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 02:18:38
No, not at all under Campbell. “Detesters, Phasers and Dean Drives” was published under Bova, years after Campbell died.
More recently Analog has proved a warm haven for Jeffery D. Kooistra’s somewhat less than consensus science articles.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 10:54:10
Lela,
I’ve been avidly reading your blogging about hard SF. I write hard SF and I’ve never made an effort to write short stories because I didn’t see anything published in magazines like Strange Horizons or Interzone that reflects what I write. Also, my favourite authors tend not to win awards (e.g. Alastair Reynolds).
I’ve been wondering if there’s an under-served niche for a hard SF semiprozine. Not sure who the audience would be, though; it would need significant market research.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 14:23:45
It could be that there’s a niche. I’m getting the idea that what hard SF is published is not what the majority of SF readers are looking for just now, but I think good stories would fly regardless of hard science content. Nancy Kress does well, for example, with character driven hard SF.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 17:03:44
I haven’t read The Martian yet (boo 😦 ), but that’s problem-driven hard SF. It was apparently self-published online as it had been rejected by literary agents. That audience is not reflected in the short fiction market. And that raises a lot of questions for me.
My experience is that – in most cases – hard science content competes with other aspects of storytelling (or, at least, the author has priorities beyond ‘telling a good story’). And I suspect I’m more tolerant of that, if the ideas are interesting, than a publisher with a background in the humanities would be. From what I understand, for example, the protagonist of The Martian isn’t a deep or nuanced character.
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Oct 16, 2015 @ 00:48:49
I really don’t think hard SF has to interfere with either the literary elements of a story or the storyline. That is likely the problem with its acceptance by the general public, though. It’s always been written by technical writers who tell a cut and dried story. There’s no reason why hard SF shouldn’t incorporate literary elements, humor, or whatever.
I haven’t any experience with The Martian, either. I should get out to see the film, at least.
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Oct 16, 2015 @ 06:41:35
Out of curiosity, why do you think hard SF is unpopular with the general public?
What I meant by ‘compete’ is hard SF stories contain elements that wouldn’t need to be there in a straight literary story. Those can be handled effortlessly by a great writer, but most writers are merely good. And – judged on a purely literary basis – the story will always fall short of a one that makes no effort to contain real science. So, if you imagine this story is being read by publishers with a background in the humanities, why would it get off the slush pile?
Which leaves the question, why do I assume publishers with a background in the humanities aren’t interested in science…?
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Oct 16, 2015 @ 17:20:59
Hard SF is identified with science and engineering, and that often leads people to indulge in what Stanley Schmidt calls “clanking technology.” However, hard SF doesn’t have to be like that. It only needs a serious scientific base and some research on the part of the writer to get it right. This doesn’t mean that editors will buy it for the science content, though. What they’d really like to have is science set into a heartstrings story like Ken Liu’s “Paper Menagerie.”
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Oct 16, 2015 @ 18:58:14
Ah, now I think I understand… I just read the Paper Menagerie and realise that it wouldn’t matter to me if it had hard science content. I (embarrassed look) don’t like that type of story.
It’s the sort of story my mother-in-law reads, i.e. all about the intricacies of family life and not much happens. There’s nothing wrong with it, but I prefer thrillers and crime stories.
I wonder whether the issue is that science fiction is a setting, as much as a genre, and there’s been a shift in prize-winning short fiction from thriller/crime/adventure to more introspective/literary work as SF&F ideas have become mainstream.
So there may be two issues. First, that – for me personally – I don’t like a shift towards *mother-in-law* fic. Second, that no one is writing mother-in-law fic about hard SF topics, such as – for example – a mother’s relationship with a daughter she genetically engineered, who doesn’t take after her in fundamental ways (my currently parked novel has a young woman genetically modified to be a sociopathic serial killer. This obviously causes issues for her relationship with her mother…).
I’m currently doing some research for a blogpost on the state of the short fiction market and the feedback I’m getting is that the short fiction market is growing, not shrinking… That may suggest that fantastical and speculative settings are indeed mainstreaming. Interesting times.
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Oct 16, 2015 @ 19:48:58
“Paper Menagerie” left me scratching my head, too. Regardless of its sweep of all the major awards, it’s not my cup of tea. Plus, there were some plot holes. Sentimentality is clearly the big winner, though.
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Oct 19, 2015 @ 06:32:45
I remember you mentioned sentimentality in an earlier blogpost. After reading “Paper Menagerie”, I now know what you mean. It reads a little like watching one of those Hollywood movies that elicit pat emotion. The sort of film that has images of a child cupping their hands around a cocoa mug on a porch, watching autumn leaves falling in the garden, intercut with them holding a dying grandparent’s hand – all accompanied by a soulful orchestral score.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 02:24:32
Not at all all under Campbell I mean.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 02:34:35
Speaking of Bova, the fact that the fraction of women in Analog went from 6% to 19% under him, then fell by half as soon as he left is suggestive.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 02:43:51
Earlier blogs have discussed research on the proportion of women published by the pro magazines. Daily SF and Clarkesworld have the best records, at just about 50/50. Without checking, I think Analog has the worst record for diversity.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 04:09:45
That would not surprise me. Nor would learning women don’t submit to Analog because historically Analog doesn’t buy SF written by women.
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Oct 15, 2015 @ 04:13:25
Now and then they publish a story by a woman. I’ve sent them a few over the years, but have always been rejected. I have a science/engineering background, too. It may be as noted above, that it’s not quite hard SF if women write it. It could be my stories aren’t what they’re looking for, too. 🙂
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Oct 16, 2015 @ 15:51:18
Thanks for all of this 🙂 I’ll go away and research 🙂
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Oct 17, 2015 @ 15:40:15
Why does this site let me reply to some comments but not others?
“There is very little of it being published in trade publishing (excluding The Martian, which could be an outlier) and then there is the question of enough material?”
If Niven-hard is hard SF, then there’s no shortage of hard SF. Heck, just looking at Tor 2015 http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/publisheryear.cgi?23+2015
Echopraxia
Architect of Aeons
The Affinities
Pillar to the Sky
A Darkling Sea
Lockstep
Ragamuffin
Shipstar
Transhuman
Luna: New Moon
Sly Mongoose
The Dark Forest
Death Wave
The Causal Angel
All look at least hardish.
In fact, in recent years there’s been something of a revival of a subgenre of hard SF, the interplanetary adventure, to the point I can actually be fussy about IA and still have books to read.
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Oct 18, 2015 @ 13:45:19
*cough* It may be being published, but the issue is whether or not it’s actually selling. You probably can guess the answer to that :p
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Oct 18, 2015 @ 13:49:34
And in relation to the overall market, with hundreds of titles being published, every year, your examples are far and few between, and actually reinforce the position that hard sf is a poor sell.
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Oct 19, 2015 @ 06:33:50
Sean,
I think this needs some investigation. In my ‘research queue’ 🙂 Thanks.
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Oct 17, 2015 @ 17:32:21
To respond to Vivienne’s thread, go to the top of it and click “reply.” Then your comment will show up at the bottom of the thread. I’ll wait for her to reply, but I believe she is making a distinction between hard SF and SF setting.
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Oct 17, 2015 @ 17:35:46
Oops. Sorry. That was Sean’s comment.
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The trouble with hard SF… | Futures Less Travelled
Nov 02, 2015 @ 08:02:19