Award Awareness Nominations (or, What Amal Said)

[pameladean]

Seriously, what Amal said:

http://amalelmohtar.com/2014/01/09/of-awards-eligibility-lists-and-unbearable-smugness/

I am not eligible for any awards because I had nothing published in 2013, so I can't make a post of that nature.  But for those of you who are eligible because you did have something published, you would make my life much easier if you did make such a post.  I have a very difficult time remembering when a work was published and am not all that wonderful at recalling, either, whether it was a short story, a novelette, or a novella.  Sometimes I misremember who wrote what and become alarmingly entangled in an alternate universe where Mary Smith wrote what was actually Jane Brown's story but Google knows nothing of it, even though my mind is quite, quite sure that I have the facts of the matter correct.  (Someday I will tell you about the world where Meg Hutchinson wrote a song called "Iowa," but not today.)

Please help out all around by listing your accomplishments, if you would like to do so.

When I am eligible I will probably fail to make such a post because my organizational skills are minimal and, honestly, I probably won't remember what year my book was published any more than I can remember what year anybody else's was.  So I cannot throw any asparagus.  But if you are hesitating to make such a post because you fear to annoy me or people like me, you will really do quite the opposite.

Thanks very much to those of you who have already listed the stories of whatever length that you had published last year.

Pamela

Comments

[yhlee.livejournal.com]

I don't list eligibility things but God knows I still feel embarrassed to announce my own stories being out on my own damn blog. I don't mind people listing eligibility! I mind being direct-emailed out of the blue with VOTE FOR ME ME ME messages from people I've never even heard of, but that's something completely different IMO.

I feel less embarrassed about the stuff listed on my actual website, mainly because I'm convinced no one reads the website, mainly because it has no facility for comments so even if someone did read it I wouldn't be able to tell.

[pameladean]

Spamming people's inboxes uninvited is certainly a far cry from putting up a post aimed at people who read one's blog or LJ or Twitter feed or whatever anyway.

I'd say I'll go look at your website, but I don't want to alarm you. Anyway, I didn't mean to unfairly poke people who have a complicated relationship with their writing, just to encourage those who would like to make a post but feel it's somehow unmaidenly or, in a less gendered sense, purely selfish and aggrandizing, rather than being a service to readers.

P.

[yhlee.livejournal.com]

Also, Korean culture seems not to encourage putting yourself forward in that way as much as in places I've lived in the USA, although I'm pretty sure there's a gender component to that too.

[pameladean]

I wouldn't be surprised; there seems to be a gender component to almost everything.

Does Korean culture have a means for people to put one another forward, or does that entire aspect of things just not happen?

P.

[yhlee.livejournal.com]

In my limited experience someone else does the talking up for you, particularly if they're an elder/senior/whatever. But I have to note that I've never had to do this in any sort of business/employment context because from a Korean standpoint I am basically an American and, well, I've never worked in Korea. (This gets complicated--since I was partly raised in Korea, people would tend to expect me to get the basics right, and then get frustrated with me when I inevitably screwed things up, but usually once they hear my Korean--stumbling and American-accented--they get the picture.)

[pameladean]

Oh dear. Being liminal has its moments, I guess, both good and bad.

P.

[ethelmay.livejournal.com]

That is a very good way to put it. (There is a reason "liminal" suddenly became a word on everyone's lips. It is very useful.)

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

I'm not in any of the various award social sets, or don't write about the hip subjects, (nor am I capable of the kind of dazzle dazzle voice that breaks those usual boundaries) so the whole thing is kind of like a custom carried out watched from a distance.

I am so stupid--pressed send when I meant to return.

However, I will recommend two things: Greer Gilman's novelette "Cry Murder in a Small Voice," and also, very strongly, Francesca Forrest's beautiful, beautiful novel "Pen Pal," which there is nothing else out there like. Since she published it on her own (it fit no neat marketing niches) and she's not in any of the usual crowds, either, it hasn't a hope of being notices, alas, alas. It's one of the best things I read last year, and I read A LOT.

[pameladean]

I hit Send instead of return all the time. My hands apparently think all "done with this bit now" gestures are the same.

Greer's novelette is definitely on my radar, and I will find the Forrest and read it.

I don't write about hip subjects either. I call this the "beer and cancer" aspect of things. When I read Tim Powers's splendid Last Call, years after it won the World Fantasy Award, I told David, "I will never win a World Fantasy Award." "Why not?" "No beer and cancer." I didn't mean it literally, but to encompass that strange collection of subjects that seems to attract votes and nominations. Kind of like "not street-wise or hip or adult in a normal sense" and also "not dealing with subjects determined to be serious."

However, broadening the kinds of work that can be nominated and win seems worthwhile. And there has to be some kind of attention brought to them for that to have any chance of happening. If I were better organized I'd make a list.

P.

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Oh lord. I think of them as politics & cancer stories. There really is a perceivable pattern! Heh!

I think making lists of other things is like shaping water . . . OTOH if one has influence, maybe it's more like sculpting ice?

[pameladean]

Hee!

I meant a list of works that don't have that award aura, rather than the things in them or not in them. The latter is certainly very nebulous, even if we did construct similar phrases to express it.

P.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

But I don't write about beer and cancer either.

OK, there is a bit of cancer in MRC.

But I don't write those kinds of things and I have won awards. (Nor do I announce my eligibility.)

[pameladean]

Good grief, I should never do comments without tea. I have deleted my weirdness and will reply properly later. I confused you with Skylarker. I guess that's less awful than it might be. Sky sky sky.

P.

[pameladean]

All right, once more with tea.

As I said to Sherwood, I didn't literally mean beer and cancer; she said beer and politics, and that might be more literal, but probably not much. I meant a constellation of topics or maybe attitudes towards the world outside which an award nomination is much less likely. I think that while you may not do much with the beer side of things, you do a lot with the politics/cancer side, in the way you construct your societies, in the alternate-history books, in the deep layers of the way you think about how the world works.

I actually think Sherwood does that too, specifically in the Inda books.

I also didn't mean that announcing one's eligibility was any kind of guarantee of winning anything. But it should raise awareness that one and one's work exist. I don't think that you personally much need to do that at this stage. And earlier on you did that quite naturally by your participation in online fandom.

But if one feels that a lot of good and deserving work is going unnoticed, then encouraging its authors to speak up about it isn't a bad way to proceed. It's not the only way, but it's not a bad way.

P.

[papersky.livejournal.com]

I'm just saying I'm not male, I'm not American, I'm writing about what I want to write about, I do not announce my eligibility, I don't get nominated a million times and then eventually win, and yet I exist and have won awards. I feel kind of invisible.

I'm not saying anything about anything anybody else should or should not do, but when people say it is NECESSARY to do this stuff to win awards, well, datapoint.

I thought I understood what you meant by "beer and cancer" but clearly I don't. You were talking about the World Fantasy Award. Tooth and Claw won the World Fantasy Award. No beer, no cancer, politics only in the invisible sense. There's a podcast where Jonathan Strahan and Gary Wolfe are raving about Among Others and they both confess they never read T&C because dragon cooties. And yet, this book which sold so little it has only barely earned out after ten years, won a major award. A juried one, to be sure, but the one you were talking about.

[pameladean]

I don't think it's necessary -- or sufficient, for that matter -- I think it's useful. And I think you are largely invisible in this discussion because you are less invisible in a larger sense. I also don't think Amal was really giving out stringent, you-must-do-this advice on how to win awards, because there isn't anything useful to be said about that. She had a larger point about awareness and about the annoying pronouncements made by people who think posting such a list is immodest and unbecoming. They probably think that posting about one's writing progress is equally distasteful. My discussion with Sherwood is just a tangent. Sherwood was explaining why she doesn't bother to post lists of eligible work, and I identified strongly with her reasons.

As for the politics of T&C, they seem pervasive to me. I mean, you literalized 19th-century gender stereotypes, some of which are not dead even yet. The book pokes fun at evolutionary psychology, too. (I don't say you did that, because I don't remember your talking about it, but the book does.) I suppose there must be people who read the book and didn't see that, but I bet the WFC judges weren't among them. (Now a judge for that year can come up and say, "Well, actually..." and I'll be mortally astonished.) As for people who are put off by dragon cooties, don't get me started. Pfui. I honestly don't see how anybody could agree to be a WFC judge while laboring under such a burden, though.

Any award has outliers, too. I don't actually think T&C is one, though I could see a decent argument's being made that it is; but there are some other winners that don't have what I mean by beer and cancer-or-politics. There are almost always several works on the ballot that fall outside those lines. They mostly don't win, is all.

I suppose I should admit that I overstated the beer and cancer case for dramatic effect. It was very lowering, however, to read Last Call and see so much that I don't do, don't want to do, or can't do, all in one package, with "Winner of the World Fantasy Award" on the cover. It was a swift, emotional, intuitive response. That's why I was so tickled to see that Sherwood had a similar reaction and a similar capsule description.

P.

[naomikritzer]

I feel tremendously uncomfortable doing the "here's what you could nominate me for" posts; it both feels like bragging, AND it forces me to face my own issues regarding my writing and what I've accomplished in a year. Amahl's post was probably what got me to do it. Usually, I procrastinate endlessly on the grounds that I want to do an electronic version of the stories that were published in paper magazines, but first I have to check my contract to make sure I'm allowed, and eventually it's too late. This time I just put up the list.

Personally I like the lists for the same reason you do: I have a terrible memory for what I've read and who wrote it. Probably the most noteworthy example of this was when I was absolutely positively 100% convinced that "Mom and Dad at the Home Front" was written by Jane Yolen and in her "Sister Emily's Lightship" collection. She was a little surprised when I attributed it to her on a panel we were both on. (Whoops.) It took me a long time to place the story, because I also couldn't remember the title, just the plot. (You know all those stories where the kids find a magical token that lets them travel between worlds? This is a story about those kids' parents, who realize what's going on and try to figure out WTF their responsibilities are here exactly.) It's by Sherwood Smith, FWIW. Awesome story.

[naomikritzer]

And it looks like you can read it free: http://bookviewcafe.com/bookstore/book/whispered-magics/

[pameladean]

Oh, excellent! Thanks.

P.

[pameladean]

I feel uncomfortable too, at the idea of putting up such a post. I don't really care about the bragging side of it at this point; I guess the edge of that has been worn off by seeing enough people just matter-of-factly put up their lists. But looking at the dearth of accomplishment, as I see it, in any give year, yes, that's extremely difficult.

Your mix-up of the two stories is exactly what my brain does from time to time. I burst out laughing reading it, though it's not so much of a joke when you get That Look from people wondering what is wrong with you or what universe you come from.

P.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

I'm not even sure whether digital-first publications qualify for any of the awards.

[pameladean]

Ack, sorry, replied to the wrong comment.

I don't know about original e-book eligibility, but it's something that will have to be acknowledged at some point.

P.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

I think RWA is being quicker to recognize digital publications in their contests and awards, but they do want at least a p.o.d. version submitted for the Rita Award.

My stuff straddles the lines between f/sf and romance; it's interesting to note the differences between the two communities.

RWA's Published Author Network requires that a publication make a certain amount of money before qualifying the author. Our local chapter has a loop for those who are published, regardless of earnings or format.

Is SFWA membership limited by earnings, or is it that qualifying publishers are needed?

[pameladean]

I am not currently a member, but I believe this is unchanged -- it's qualifying publications that are needed -- one novel sale or three pieces of shorter fiction. For short fiction, there's a minimum per-word payment below which the magazine or whatever is not considered "professional," and stories published in it don't count. I don't recall if there's a similar definition of a professional book publisher.

I certainly have the impression that the romance side of things is saner in some regards.

P.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

Becoming curious, I googled a bit and found the qualifying criteria for SFWA:

* Three Paid Sales of prose fiction (such as short stories) to Qualifying Professional Markets, with each paid at the rate of 5¢/word or higher (3¢/word before 1/1/2004)(This will be changing to 6¢/word in July 2014), for a cumulative total of $250, minimum $50 apiece; or

* One Paid Sale of a prose fiction book to a Qualifying Professional Market, for which the author has been paid $2000 or more; or

* One professionally produced full length dramatic script, with credits acceptable to the Membership Committee.

The problem with a lot of the digital-first publishers is that there's no advance, although 35-40% royalties. I still haven't made nearly $2000 on either of my novels yet; though that may improve now Kensington's bought Lyrical as their digital-first imprint.

A friend of mine with Montlake (Amazon's own digital-first imprint) said she's making over $40,000/yr on her books with them. But they have killer distribution.

[pameladean]

Thank you, that's very interesting. $2000 is a pretty small advance.

I do hope being with Kensington raises your sales numbers.

P.

[skylarker.livejournal.com]

Thanks. There's even the possibility of an advance if they decide to do a print run.

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

Of course there's complex grey terrain in the middle, but on one side is the black spam showers, and on the other is the assumption that people take the initiative to come to your blog because they're interested. A simple list of here's what appeared last year is fine. Scalzi, master of keeping his blog interesting, also adds comment threads for others to list their work on his blog, and for fans to post suggestions. But few have his prominence.
But hell yes, self-promotion can be polite and proper.