The Decade In Review: 1970's

I have to say, the 70’s were a pretty awesome decade for Science Fiction!  I struggled to finish my reviews in as timely a pace as the previous decades as a result of moving and just being generally busy with other things, but for the most part, the decade went pretty smoothly.  Though I checked almost all the books out from the library, some of them were e-books that get checked out through amazon which was a pretty neat experience but due to kindle issues, I ended up reading all on amazon’s e-reader for the web which practically burned my eyeballs out.  I really dreaded staring at the computer screen for so long sometimes.

But ANYWAY…

The last ten years were very good.  In fact they resulted in not one but TWO perfect HEP Scores for Le Guin’s The Dispossessed, and McIntyre’s Dreamsnake.  Both women authors and both fantastic writers.  My review was actually quoted by bookviewcafe.com and the Dispossessed became one of my most viewed Hugo reviews. 

All in all the HEP scores were up.  The average HEP score has steadily gone up from 16.75 in the 50’s and 18.63 in the 60’s to 20.70.  If this keeps up, the next few decades are going to be great!

Getting back to the women of the decade…HEY! This is the first decade that included female winners and they made a strong first showing.  No less than three different women, won four different years.  I’m really happy about that, and I’m really happy that they wrote some damn good books.

The 1970’s consumed fully 2530 pages for an average of 281 pages each year.  This decade also included 1 audiobook for 9 hours 41 minutes of joyful listening time.  Though that is a fair number, it is actually over 1000 pages less than the 1960’s (though there was a tie in 1966).  So why don’t I just get to the graph, I know you’re all waiting for it (maybe?):

As far as the actual writing of reviews, I certainly feel much more confident about what I write, though I so often try to rush my reviews that I’m always a little disappointed that I didn’t spend more time.  Despite that disappointment, there was the quotation for Dreamsnake and I also won May’s GMRC review poll, so all in all I feel pretty good about the last decade.  Here’s how it shook out:

As usual, none too pretty, but hey…actually, I don’t have anything else to say about it…

As to the future, the 1980’s are shaping up to be magnificently long books, so it’s going to be rather interesting to see how it all pans out.  I still have The Gravity Well and what will probably be an insane M of the P competition between U. K. Le Guin’s epic novels.

Once again, THANK YOU SO MUCH to everyone for following along, listening to my rants, struggling through my writing and taking the time to comment.  Everyone's support has kept me going this long and I know it is what will help me through the final years.  I also need to thank and mention my book sources for the decade, which consist mostly of the public library but also to friends who have loaned books to me, knowing there is a child in the house who does damage to everything (me).  So, here is the shake down on the book sources from all the way at the beginning:

Speaking of the years, I am nearing the half-way point in this challenge.  I should do something big, like eat a whole bunch of cheese or something cool like that.  Maybe I’ll get a nice shiny new die!

But in all seriousness.  Thank you everyone.  Especially my understanding and tolerant wife.  You’re the best, lady!