Rose-Owls and Pumpkin Girls

Last Thursday, while in a car on the way to Half-Price Books, my phone rang. It was an unfamiliar number, and so I answered warily, all too aware of the various scams people are currently conducting. "Hello," said a woman. "I'm looking for Seanan McGuire?"

"May I ask who's calling?"

She identified herself as from SFWA (the Science Fiction Writers of America). I identified myself as Seanan. Lots of identification happened, all while I was going "no, this can't be what I want it to be, because that doesn't happen."

She said, "I am pleased to let you know that your novella, Every Heart a Doorway, has been nominated for a Nebula Award."

I made a noise that only bats could hear. The driver did not run us off the road. The woman laughed. I said the right, polite things. I hung up.

I cried.

This is the first time I have ever been nominated for a Nebula Award (if you don't know what that is, details are here). I have wanted one for as long as I could remember, since I was a little girl and reading anthologies and authors with that amazing word on the cover. And now I'm nominated.

I am so happy.

The nomination period for the 2015 Hugo Awards and John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer is now open, and you can find more information at this link. Please keep in mind that you must have been a member of last year's Worldcon, OR be a member of this year's Worldcon, OR be a member of next year's Worldcon to be eligible to either nominate or vote.

A lot of people have put up their eligibility posts, and you can check the eligibility of your favorite authors by hitting their personal blogs. I posted a list of everything I published in 2014, and technically, it's all eligible, but let's be honest: that's a lot of stuff. If you were considering nominating any of my works, you're going to have a lot of reading ahead of you, and a probably split pool.

(Mira, with one novel and one novella, is in a slightly less conflicted place.)

Turning away from me, I would ask you to consider Sheila Gilbert for Best Editor, Long Form; Christie Yant for Best Editor, Short Form (the story of mine she edited, "Each to Each," is one of my best, and it's because of her); Chris McGrath and Aly Fell for Best Artist; The Librarians episode "And the Apple of Discord" for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short; and Book of Life for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long.

What do you think people should be considering for this year's awards?

You can see the full ballot for this year's Hugo Awards here, to be given out at this year's Worldcon, Loncon 3, to be held August 14th to 18th, 2014, in London, England. Supporting and Attending Memberships are still available.

Why am I saying this?

I am saying this because Parasite, written under the name Mira Grant, has been nominated for Best Novel.

It's a good ballot this year. It's a complicated ballot this year. It's a terrifying ballot this year. It's a troublesome ballot this year. But I am sharing it with some of my favorite people in the entire world; I am sharing it with Cat Valente's wonderful "Six-Gun Snow White," which is in the Best Novella category (and is hence not up against me YAY); I am sharing it with Charles Stross's Neptune's Brood, make it our first shared Hugo ballot since we became friends; I am sharing it with Pacific Rim and Mark Oshiro and Foz Meadows and Sheila Gilbert and so many amazing people. I want to hug them and shriek about how we made it, before we get raging drunk together, and it's wonderful.

If you nominated, whether you nominated me or someone entirely different, thank you. We are shaping the future history of science fiction, and that's amazing.

I will do my best to be worthy of you all.

Amy McNally has revived the proposal for a "Best Young Readers" Hugo (defining the category as "YA, Middle Grade, and Children's Books"), and has a beautiful, thoughtful deconstruction of many of the arguments against.

Go. Read. And remember...

We complain about younger people not getting into the community. About seeing teenagers pack up their toys and go home at a certain point. About wanting more people to become lifelong readers, and lifelong members of our social hyperspace. But we also tend to write off YA as "juvenile" (as if that were an insult; as if Heinlein and Norton and Gaiman didn't write for young adults), and all too often, shame the people who read it. We scoff at covers that cater to teen sensibilities, instead of adult aesthetics. We don't listen.

There is amazing stuff happening in YA. Concepts and stories are being built and explored there in ways that are difficult to impossible in adult fiction. From the big blockbusters like The Hunger Games to the sneakier stories like Unspoken, it's a medium that's bursting with potential, and bringing our younger voters in by recognizing what many of them are reading, while also bringing more adult readers to this amazing work...I just can't see that as a bad thing. At all.

This is Amy's ballgame, so while you're welcome to comment here, I am declaring comment amnesty, and will only answer if I feel like it. Although I will moderate if folks get snappy. Remember, we're all in this together.

All right: we're getting some semi-heated discussion about the idea of a "Voting Membership" for the Hugo Awards. This proposal assumes the following:

1) That some people who want to vote, fairly and by reading/watching as many of the nominated works as possible, are prevented by the cost of a Supporting Membership.
2) That there is thus an untapped source of revenue for Worldcon, in the form of the Voting Memberships, and that this would be a large enough group to make up for the decrease in Supporting Membership sales.
3) That this would not interfere with the Hugo Voter's Packet.

Some of the concerns are as follows:

1) That the potential for voter fraud would increase with the reduction in initial price (IE, someone who was trying to vote-fix could buy three $40 memberships for the cost of two $60 memberships, thus allowing for a higher number of false/purchased votes).
2) That the decrease in Supporting Membership sales would not be countered by the increase in Voting Membership sales (Mary and John always buy Supporting Memberships, for $60, so they can vote; now that they can buy Voting Memberships for $40, they do that instead; Worldcon has essentially lost $40 in revenue).
3) That reducing the price too much would cause publishers to rethink participation in the Voter's Packet.

All of these concerns are valid.

The Hugos, like everything else about Worldcon, are a volunteer organization. They are not run by a fully trained team of crack voter fraud investigators; they're run by fans like you and me. Anything that increases the chances of voter fraud is something we need to seriously think about, for which reason I would not recommend reducing the cost of voting rights below $40—although I would also at that point suggest the creation of a "school age" voting membership, which costs $20 and is only available to fans ages 14-20 (high school and start of college). Trust me, when I was a senior in high school, $20 was a fortune, and I was not committing voter fraud. But I was growing into someone who would absolutely support and believe in these awards. Could someone buy themselves a Hugo? Yes. But someone could buy themselves a Hugo now. If Oprah wants a Hugo, she can buy it. People will gossip, and the community will find out, but Oprah will have her Hugo.

Now the finances are an important consideration. A lot of each Worldcon's seed money, according to my understanding, comes from Supporting Memberships and pre-Supports. If you take that away, we could wind up in a situation where there are no Hugos, because there is no Worldcon. And if the idea that the convention costs a lot of money, consider this: they have to make rockets, and Hugo rockets ain't cheap. They're incredibly high-quality pieces of statuary, produced in far too small a number to start getting "mass production discounts." (When I print a CD, for example, the first disk costs about $2,000. But the next 999 are free.) So in order to open the doors wider, we're threatening the income that keeps the infrastructure of the awards stable. That's part of why I don't recommend rushing into anything: I just think the conversation is a good thing to have.

Finally, there is the voter's packet, and that's where things get hinky. There's no guarantee, year to year, that the packet will exist; publishers are under no obligation to allow their works (often their most popular, and hence most potentially profitable) to be given away for free, and that's what this essentially is, since neither they nor the authors are seeing any royalties from this distribution channel. I am okay with that—for me to have gotten on the ballot in the first place, a lot of folks have to have read my stuff—but I don't make the final call. So what happens if we say "Voting Memberships are $40" and the publishers say "Great, you can't have our books"?

I don't know.

I know the first thing would be the authors getting punished. Orbit chose not to make the books by their nominees available in all formats this year, and while I do not criticize them for that choice, it did result in my receiving email that flat out said "I was going to vote for you and now I'm not because I hate this file format." People can be petty when thwarted, and I guarantee that if four authors have their books in the packet and one does not, that fifth author is losing, as well as taking a lot of shit. I don't like taking shit. I have plenty.

So what we need is a) a price point that does not cause the Worldcon to lose money to the point where it becomes unstable, and b) does not upset publishers, while also c) allowing fans who really want to be a part of this process to participate. And that's why I don't want to see the amendment that would keep this from ever becoming possible to go through. Not because I think the Hugos should be free, or want to see it turn into an even bigger popularity contest than it already is: because I think it's important to encouraging participation in the awards from an ever-growing number of fans. Whether it's saying "individuals can cede their voting rights to the convention to be re-sold for a lower than Supporting rate to low-income fans" or "teens vote cheap" or "we need time to think," I believe that thinking is what needs to happen. Not closing off the conversation when it's just getting underway.

To all those of us with memberships for the 2013 World Science Fiction Convention...have you remembered to cast your vote for this year's Hugo Awards? Because if you haven't, you're sort of running out of time; July 31st is your last day to vote. And hey, did you know that anyone can nominate, and vote, for the Hugo Awards? All you have to do is become a Supporting Member of this year's World Science Fiction Convention, which costs $60, but gets you access to the entire Hugo Voter's Packet, a veritable cornucopia of incredible fiction! We're coming up on the end of the "I can reasonably make it through everything in the packet" period, so this is a choice that should be made soon!

The Book Smugglers hosted this amazing post about the Hugos, and I want to quote one bit that really stood out to me:

"I highly encourage everyone, especially people who believe, like I do, that there’s space for YA recognition, more women, non-white, and international voices, to look at the membership options and if joining the process and the conversation around it is possible, give it a shot. See if it’s worth investing in each year. Nominate the people and things you love. Vote for the stuff you think represents the best of genre, the best of all the things that the future science fiction and fantasy fandom should remember."

We can shape the future of the genre, everybody, and that's amazing.

I'm going to be upfront here: I'm on this ballot, and there's no way people are going to look at this post and not think I'm shaking the tree for votes. And I do want to win! I'm not exactly alone in that—I'm pretty sure each and every person on the ballot wants to win, because we accepted the nominations. Wanting to win is human. But almost as much as I want to win, I want to know that if I lose, it will be because every possible voter looked at the works up for consideration, looked at their ballot, and made their choice fairly and well. I want you all to vote. I want to lose because I lost, not because there was a sale at Ben and Jerry's and we all got rightfully distracted because dude, ice cream.

Please. If you are eligible to vote, it has never been easier to get a clear view of the entire ballot. Thanks to the tireless efforts of the Hugo committee, we have an electronic voting package that is a bibliophile's dream; you can read and consider absolutely everything that's asking for your vote. And if you're not a member yet, but were thinking about it, you can still register with full voting rights if you do it soon.

And because I really love this quote, I am once again quoting Cat Valente (with updates to the cost of supporting membership made by me). Specifically: "A final note: you do not have to go to Worldcon to nominate and vote for the Hugos. You can buy a supporting membership for $60 and get that perk. I realize $60 is a lot to express an opinion, but every year we hear complaints about the ballot and every year I hope that my generation will vote a little more, because the Hugos are kind of a bellwether for the field, and I want new crackly risktaking goodness in there, too. Since I have no control over the price of the supporting membership all I can say is—give it a thought, if you have the scratch."

Make this year's Hugo winners the ones you think deserve those shiny rocket ships.

Vote.

And if you need some testimony about the non-fiction parts of the ballot, here are a few links (links do support my views):

spectralbovine has posted about why you should vote Mark Oshiro for Best Fan Writer. Mark is an incredible human being, as well as being a remarkable fan writer and just plain fan. I am so glad to have met him.

Joshua Starr has posted about why Sheila Gilbert deserves your consideration for Best Long Form Editor. Sheila was my first editor. She has enriched my work and my career in ways I can't even begin to describe, and I'm going to make my own post very soon. The amount of work she does for her authors is staggering. She has my vote even when she's not on the ballot.

The 2013 Hugo Awards ballot has been announced, and is as follows:

Best Novel.

2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson (Orbit)
Blackout by Mira Grant (Orbit)
Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance by Lois McMaster Bujold (Baen)
Redshirts: A Novel with Three Codas by John Scalzi (Tor)
Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed (DAW)

Best Novella.

After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall by Nancy Kress (Tachyon Publications)
The Emperor’s Soul by Brandon Sanderson (Tachyon Publications)
On a Red Station, Drifting by Aliette de Bodard (Immersion Press)
San Diego 2014: The Last Stand of the California Browncoats by Mira Grant (Orbit)
The Stars Do Not Lie by Jay Lake (Asimov’s, Oct-Nov 2012)

Best Novelette.

“The Boy Who Cast No Shadow” by Thomas Olde Heuvelt (Postscripts: Unfit For Eden, PS Publications)
“Fade To White” by Catherynne M. Valente (Clarkesworld, August 2012)
“The Girl-Thing Who Went Out for Sushi” by Pat Cadigan (Edge of Infinity, Solaris)
“In Sea-Salt Tears” by Seanan McGuire (Self-published)
“Rat-Catcher” by Seanan McGuire (A Fantasy Medley 2, Subterranean)

Best Short Story.

“Immersion” by Aliette de Bodard (Clarkesworld, June 2012)
“Mantis Wives” by Kij Johnson (Clarkesworld, August 2012)
“Mono no Aware” by Ken Liu (The Future is Japanese, VIZ Media LLC)

Note: category has 3 nominees due to a 5% requirement under Section 3.8.5 of the WSFS constitution.

Best Related Work.

The Cambridge Companion to Fantasy Literature Edited by Edward James & Farah Mendlesohn (Cambridge UP)
Chicks Dig Comics: A Celebration of Comic Books by the Women Who Love Them Edited by Lynne M. Thomas & Sigrid Ellis (Mad Norwegian Press)
Chicks Unravel Time: Women Journey Through Every Season of Doctor Who Edited by Deborah Stanish & L.M. Myles (Mad Norwegian Press)
I Have an Idea for a Book... The Bibliography of Martin H. Greenberg Compiled by Martin H. Greenberg, edited by John Helfers (The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box)
Writing Excuses Season Seven by Brandon Sanderson, Dan Wells, Mary Robinette Kowal, Howard Tayler and Jordan Sanderson

Best Graphic Story.

Grandville Bête Noire written and illustrated by Bryan Talbot (Dark Horse Comics, Jonathan Cape)
Locke & Key Volume 5: Clockworks written by Joe Hill, illustrated by Gabriel Rodriguez (IDW)
Saga, Volume One written by Brian K. Vaughn, illustrated by Fiona Staples (Image Comics)
Schlock Mercenary: Random Access Memorabilia by Howard Tayler, colors by Travis Walton (Hypernode Media)
Saucer Country, Volume 1: Run written by Paul Cornell, illustrated by Ryan Kelly, Jimmy Broxton and Goran Sudžuka (Vertigo)

Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form).

The Avengers
The Cabin in the Woods
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
The Hunger Games
Looper

Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form).

Doctor Who: “The Angels Take Manhattan”
Doctor Who: “Asylum of the Daleks”
Doctor Who: “The Snowmen”
Fringe: “Letters of Transit"
Game of Thrones :“Blackwater”

Best Editor (Short Form).

John Joseph Adams
Neil Clarke
Stanley Schmidt
Jonathan Strahan
Sheila Williams

Best Editor (Long Form).

Lou Anders
Sheila Gilbert
Liz Gorinsky
Patrick Nielsen Hayden
Toni Weisskopf

Best Professional Artist.

Vincent Chong
Julie Dillon
Dan Dos Santos
Chris McGrath
John Picacio

Best Semiprozine.

Apex Magazine edited by Lynne M. Thomas, Jason Sizemore and Michael Damian Thomas
Beneath Ceaseless Skies edited by Scott H. Andrews
Clarkesworld edited by Neil Clarke, Jason Heller, Sean Wallace and Kate Baker
Lightspeed edited by John Joseph Adams and Stefan Rudnicki
Strange Horizons edited by Niall Harrison, Jed Hartman, Brit Mandelo, An Owomoyela, Julia Rios, Abigail Nussbaum, Sonya Taaffe, Dave Nagdeman and Rebecca Cross

Best Fanzine.

Banana Wings edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
The Drink Tank edited by Chris Garcia and James Bacon
Elitist Book Reviews edited by Steven Diamond
Journey Planet edited by James Bacon, Chris Garcia, Emma J. King, Helen J. Montgomery and Pete Young
SF Signal edited by John DeNardo, JP Frantz, and Patrick Hester

Best Fancast.

The Coode Street Podcast, Jonathan Strahan and Gary K. Wolfe
Galactic Suburbia Podcast, Alisa Krasnostein, Alexandra Pierce, Tansy Rayner Roberts (Presenters) and Andrew Finch (Producer)
SF Signal Podcast, Patrick Hester, John DeNardo, and JP Frantz
SF Squeecast, Elizabeth Bear, Paul Cornell, Seanan McGuire, Lynne M. Thomas, Catherynne M. Valente (Presenters) and David McHone-Chase (Technical Producer)
StarShipSofa, Tony C. Smith

Best Fan Writer.

James Bacon
Christopher J Garcia
Mark Oshiro
Tansy Rayner Roberts
Steven H Silver

Best Fan Artist.

Galen Dara
Brad W. Foster
Spring Schoenhuth
Maurine Starkey
Steve Stiles

John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.

Award for the best new professional science fiction or fantasy writer of 2011 or 2012, sponsored by Dell Magazines (not a Hugo Award).

Zen Cho
Max Gladstone
Mur Lafferty
Stina Leicht
Chuck Wendig

Those of you with keen eyes may have noticed my name a time or two. So here are my firsts for this year:

First woman to appear on the ballot four times in fiction categories alone.
First person to appear on the ballot five times in a single year.
First person to appear on the ballot with a purely self-published work ("In Sea-Salt Tears," Best Novelette nominee).

Here are some other fun facts: this is the first time Sheila Gilbert, my editor at DAW, or Chris McGrath, who is responsible for the October Daye covers (as well as many, many more) have appeared on the Hugo ballot. As of this year's ballot, every novella or novel-length work in the Newsflesh series has appeared on the Hugo ballot. I have essays in two of the works in Best Related Work. Urban fantasy in any form rarely makes award ballots, and I have two October Daye-universe novellas on this ballot.

Fringe is on the ballot for the first time ever this year. So is Mark Oshiro of Mark Reads, which is just amazing. The whole ballot is amazing.

I have eaten nothing but ice cream today. I have cried a lot.

I am grateful and honored and terrified and fragile and amazed, because this ballot represents the best of 2012 in a very concrete way. I see so many works there that blew my mind, and I look forward to experiencing the rest.

Thank you so much. I will try very hard not to let you down.

It's 2013; the nomination periods for many awards are now open; this is my "what I did in 2012 that is eligible" post. There are many such posts on the internet, but this one is mine.

Novels.

Ashes of Honor
Blackout (as Mira Grant)
Discount Armageddon
Velveteen vs. The Junior Super Patriots

Novellas.

"San Diego 2014: The Last Stand of the California Browncoats" (as Mira Grant)

Novelettes.

"Rat-Catcher"
"In Sea-Salt Tears"

Short Stories.

"No Place Like Home"
"We Will Not Be Undersold!"
"One Hell of a Ride"
"The Flower of Arizona"

Best Related Work.

Chicks Unravel Time, featuring my essay, "Waiting for the Doctor: The Women of Series Five."
Chicks Dig Comics: A Celebration of Comic Books by the Women Who Love Them, featuring my essay, "Summers and Winters, Frost and Fire."

...so that's my horses in this potential race. And while they aren't my horses, exactly, I urge you to consider my editor, Sheila Gilbert, for Best Editor, and my cover artists, Christian McGrath, Aly Fell, and Lauren Panepinto, for Best Artist.

I will be posting more shortly about the Hugos in specific, and why you both can and should be a part of the process, but this is mostly about my eligible works. Having put them down for your consideration, I will now go away again. Bye!