Yeah, everyone knows that no current science fiction writers give a damn about character or emotion.

No kidding. He seems like the perfect person to talk about scifi, since he loves it SO MUCH. Or not. Yeesh. I mean, it's one thing to be bitchy about a specific book, but to sweepingly say the whole genre sucks, in your first column (at least I"m assuming first--the front page is all "New SciFi column!")? Um. Way to piss off the people who would be reading you.

yep, I'll go with annoying

to sweepingly say the whole genre sucks, in your first column

I don't see where he says that. Or what he does say that isn't true.

OK, sorry--sweepingly say that the entire genre *currently* sucks.

"I cannot do this in good conscience because if you were to immerse yourself in most of the sci-fi being published these days, you would probably enjoy it as much as one enjoys reading a biology textbook or a stereo manual."

And while I agree there's a lot of dreck, there's a lot of dreck in EVERY genre. And it doesn't really seem to be the way to introduce a new column. Especially given that while getting people to read a scifi book they might otherwise not read is a great goal...a lot of the people reading your column are going to be people who currently enjoy scifi. So saying it almost all sucks really isn't a great foot to start off on, it seems.

This:

if you were to immerse yourself in most of the sci-fi being published these days, you would probably enjoy it as much as one enjoys reading a biology textbook or a stereo manual

Is either not true, or no more true about sci fi than about any other genre, and there seems a subtext to me that he's talking about what makes sci fi different from other genres.

But he's not saying most of it is bad. He's saying most of it will not appeal to the average non-SF reader. The thrust of the article is: this is a good book. However, I can't recommend it to people who don't normally read SF, not because the story isn't interesting, but because

What is missing from "Counting Heads" that Marusek's earlier stories had in abundance is what you humans call emotion — a reason to care about his characters, so that observations like the preceding one would carry the impact they deserve.

Instead of focusing on the characters, the author's busy with world-building. That's why he's comparing it to stereo instructions, and that's what he's saying is typical of SF. Most of fiction is bad, yes. But I don't think you can say "most fiction, good and bad, has this same flaw." Whereas it is extremely common even in good SF.

He's saying most of it will not appeal to the average non-SF reader.

I'm probably an average SF reader and I don't see the appeal of stereo manuals or bio textbooks.

Now, if he's saying most of everything is turgid, fine. But that's not how I parse that quote above, not even a little.

But as a SF reader, I would rather read a book that had good characters and emotion. Him suggesting that SF readers might enjoy things that are not good enough for other readers is a little insulting, I think.

ita, did you read the whole article? Because out of context, I can see it, but in the article what he's implying seems pretty clear to me. It's specifically about ignoring the human element in favor of "Looky at this world I made up, and the funny words I invented to describe it." Other genres have their own problems, but I think treating the characters as simply an excuse to talk about abstracts is pretty specific to SF.

Him suggesting that SF readers might enjoy things that are not good enough for other readers is a little insulting, I think.

It's a matter of different priorities. SF readers as a whole value the world-building, the ideas, the exploration, and will forgive flaws in the more fundamental aspects of storytelling. And those are the stated priorities, so that's fine, but you can't dismiss characterization and nuanced writing in favor of neat ideas, and then complain when the mainstream thinks a lot of SF consists of cliched characters running around speaking technobabble.

I did read the whole thing. But I can't read that quote any other way, and so it colours my interpretation of the rest of the article, rather than the other way around.