George Orwell’s emphasis on clarity of language and objective definitions, exemplified in his seminal essay on “Politics and the English Language,” remains worth emulating in 2025 and beyond.
When so many so-called public intellectuals, columnists, opinion leaders and even professional economists embrace popular fallacies and use misleading language, it’s harmful both to literacy and liberty.
How pleasing it is, then, when a nationally known economist not only uses words accurately, in opposition to common misconceptions, misinformation and ideological bias, but also demonstrates how well he understands and appreciates Orwell’s classic fiction.
Many libertarians and other freedom-loving SF fans know that term well. For those who don’t recall, it’s an acronym for “There Ain’t No Such Thing as a Free Lunch.”
The Grand Master SF writer Robert Heinlein did his share to popularize the acronym in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. His bestselling, Hugo-winning novel, about a libertarian revolution on the Moon, was one of the first works inducted into the Prometheus Hall of Fame.
So did free-market economist and classical liberal Milton Friedman, who often quoted it over the years.
Both libertarians used the acronym to communicate the idea that nothing is truly free, and there’s always a cost to any decision.
But did the popular catchphrase inadvertently also spread a misunderstanding about economics?
Acclaimed fantasy author Howard Andrew Jones has passed away.
Jones, a Prometheus Best Novel finalist last year for Lord of a Shattered Land, died almost five months after being diagnosed with terminal brain cancer in September 2024, according to the Fandom Pulse blog.
Editor’s note: To kick off a new year of judging and for the sake of greater transparency about the Prometheus Awards, the Prometheus Blog is posting an occasional series of essays by LFS awards judges about how they view our distinctive award standards and how they apply them to weigh candidates and nominees.
The Libertarian Futurist Society has long had a hybrid process for choosing its annual award winners.
First the members nominate books for Best Novel, and books or other works for Hall of Fame. Then committees of judges review the nominees and select the best five in each category (or sometimes four or six) as finalist. The members read these finalists and rank them from best to worst, and their votes are totaled to select the winners.
Sometimes, a review of a good novel can have a lasting impact, even more than an award or award nomination – something to ponder as we begin a new year of the blog and of the Prometheus Awards.
Perhaps that might seem counterintuitive or even heretical, when it comes to the Prometheus Awards and its 45-year-old track record of more than 100 winners – 106 at last count, including 46 in the Best Novel category, 48 in the Best Classic Fiction category and 12 Special Awards.
Yet, that thought was sparked recently by what happened when I was rereading Rudyard Kipling’s 1912 story “As Easy as A.B.C.” – one of four classic works selected as finalists for the Prometheus Hall of Fame – and decided to research it further via Google.
When I googled the words “Rudyard Kipling and “As Easy as A.B.C.,” guess what popped up rather high on the Google web links?
Although the Prometheus Blog focuses primarily on posting reviews, essays, and updates newly written for timely publication, occasionally we have the honor of reprinting an older article or speech that remains timeless.
Poul Anderson (Creative Commons license)
One of the best highlights of 2024 on the blog was our reprint, as a timely Fourth of July remembrance, of a 1978 Leprecon speech by the late great Poul Anderson, one of the greatest libertarian SF/fantasy authors and a frequent Prometheus Awards winner.
Another blog highlight was an insightful addition to our occasional series on Economics in Science Fiction: LFS President William H. Stoddard’s essay on Aladdin’s Lamps, technocracy and “post-scarcity.”
Vernor Vinge at an SF con (File photo)
Finally, sparked by the passing last year of the major and widely beloved SF writer Vernor Vinge, the Prometheus Blog devoted more than one post to honoring the legacy of this brilliant and visionary author, one of only four writers to receive recognition (as Anderson did before he passed) with a Special Prometheus Award for Lifetime achievement.
As we begin a new year, with high hopes for a better and freer world, we include convenient links to all of the above stories, lest we forget.
While most reviewspublished on the Prometheus blog tend to focus on our Best Novel or Best Classic Fiction finalists or winners, other works deserve attention, too.
As time permits, and when nominated (or nominatable) works capture our attention and stimulate both enjoyment and further thoughts, we strive to bring it to the attention of Libertarian Futurist Society members and the wider public by writing about it – hopefully, in ways that make it clear how the work is relevant to Prometheus Award themes.
Here are excerpts from four such novels of note that we reviewed in 2024 – and that continue to deserve recognition and wide readership:
The four works selected as finalists for the next Prometheus Hall of Fame award span almost a century.
Rudyard Kipling File photo
From a Rudyard Kipling story published in 1912 to a Charles Stross novel published in 2003, the 2024 slate of finalists reflects a broad range of different eras, themes and literary styles.
Charles Stross (Creative Commons license)
Of the four Hall of Fame finalists for Best Classic Fiction, two are novels, one a story and one a song – demonstrating the wide variety of narrative or dramatic forms eligible for consideration each year among works that were first published, performed, recorded or aired at least 20 years ago.
One work appears on the Hall of Fame shortlist for the first time: Stross’ Singularity Sky, previously a write-in candidate for Best Novel after its initial publication by Ace Books in 2003. (Because of the 20-year rule, the novel only became eligible this past year for Hall of Fame nomination.)
The late great Poul Anderson has received unexpected and positive recognition from the 2025 Worldcon, set for Seattle.
Partly in honor of the previous Seattle Worldcon in 1961, the Worldcon blog has paid tribute to Anderson’s novel The High Crusade, a 1961 Hugo finalist.
Prometheus-winning author Sara Hoyt is nothing if not prolific – with quite a few novels in progress.
Sarah Hoyt, the 2011 Prometheus winner for Best Novel (File photo)
Currently listed on Amazon with 92 titles (including books she’s written and anthologies to which she’s contributed stories), Hoyt has written more than 50 books (including more than 40 novels) by my rough count – and counting.
According to a Mad Genius Blog post, Hoyt plans to write more novels and stories that will appear first on her fiction-focused Substack blog – with several already appearing serially, chapter by chapter.
