This was a very unaccomplished week for me, for many reasons. Ah well. Hoping to go into this week feeling rested and relatively sane.
Accomplishments
Writing
– Submitted “Powder of Sympathy” to Interfictions
– Wrote 397 words on Lioness
– Attended writing group meeting
Reading
– Read “ReMemories,” by (fellow VP17er!) Nancy S.M. Waldeman, in FantasyScroll magazine
Other Media
– Played Caverna for the first time (and won!)
– Played four games of Mansions of Madness
– Watched The Imitation Game
– Watched the livestream of the 2015 Hugo Awards (technically much of this happened on 8/23 East Coast time, but OH WELL)
– Listened to Writing Excuses 10.32, “Combat, with Marie Brennan”
Social
– Hosted a visit from my dad
– Drinks with Kevin
Rejection Log
If I’m going to be submitting stuff regularly, I think keeping track of this as part of the L&A is probably a good idea.
– “Remember to Die,” DSF, Aug 21st. Need to find my next market for this. Dark magic realism with cake and death, 700 words… any idea who would like this?
Links (Hugos edition!)
It was well past midnight, East Coast time, when the Hugos even started being awarded, but in case you are curious — it went well, from my perspective. Puppies got closed out in five categories (best related work, short story, novella, editor – long form, and editor – short form), where it was decided that No Award was better than any of the dreck they had nominated. I will for a long time remember the satisfied smile on Tananarive Due’s face when she read “The Hugo voters have decided that in this category there will be no award,” and the applause that went up in the auditorium when she did. (David Gerrold looked less happy about it — at one point he said, “Applause is acceptable; booing is not”).
Sadly, my beloved The Goblin Emperor did not win Best Novel, but from all I can tell, The Three Body Problem is a worthy choice. (I did not vote myself — I did not feel well-enough informed about the various options).
- 2015 Hugo Awards
- Who Won Science Fiction’s Hugo Awards, and Why It Matters
- What the Alternate Hugo Ballot Would Likely Have Been. This one kind of irks me, because it’s thanks to the Puppies that my pal Django Wexler got closed out of Campbell Award nomination in his final year of eligibility.*
I know there are people on both sides of the controversy who are all like, “None of this matters, it’s just a stupid rocket.”
But, you know. That stupid rocket matters a lot to a lot of people, including me.
When I was just a young girl trolling the library for the (at the time, rare) SFF books, it mattered.
When I first started writing SFF, it mattered.
When I went to my first WorldCon (2004, in Boston), and saw Lois McMaster Bujold accept the Best Novel Hugo for Paladin of Souls, and give the shortest, most eloquent acceptance speech I’ve ever heard, it mattered.
It mattered when I first voted (2005, in LA), and it broke my heart that Kelly Link’s “Magic for Beginners” lost Best Novella to Connie Willis’ “The Inside Job” — though I knew they were both works of great value.
I’ll probably never win a Hugo (let alone get published), but it still matters to me. It’s something to aspire to. It’s something to believe in, as a symbol that our genre is more than just ephemeral stories we tell ourselves around campfires — more than just the flickering shadows of unicorns and rockets on cave walls.
Anyway. Next year I resolve to buy a supporting membership and nominate, in my small effort to make sure the system isn’t gamed again. Of course that means reading a lot of stuff that comes out this year, but that seems like a small price to pay.
* Which is kind of hilarious, because his Shadow Campaigns books are everything the Puppies (the sad variety, at least) pretend to like — military fantasy, a rip-roaring good story, etc. Except it has lesbians (and straight women, too) making effective choices and being badass in various ways — so you can tell where the Pups’ real priorities lie.
