On Saturday December 18, 2021, they presented the awards for the 2021 Hugo Awards. For those who don’t know, they’re sort of the Oscars for the field of science fiction and fantasy. So, for genre writers and nerds (like me) they’re a pretty big deal. The first award was presented in 1953, and together with the Nebula, the Hugos mark the highest acknowledgment an Science Fiction and fantasy (SFF) writer can get.
Yesterday, a fanzine I was a guest contributor to won one.
In February of 2020, Paul Weimer reached out to me and asked if I would help him on a ongoing project he was working on for the fanzine called the Mind Meld. He was looking for essays on what books modern authors would choose if they were teaching an Intro to Science Fiction/Fantasy class. I wasn’t the only writer asked to do this, but I was excited when they included my submission and published it. It was the first work I did with Nerds of a Feather. So, when the editor thanked the writers, I felt thrilled (I even blurted out from my seat in the audience, “I won.”) After all, I may not have been the captain of the boat, but in the smallest way I was one of the crew… and maybe they would not have gotten to this port without me.
After the ceremony, I found Joe Sherry, the editor who accepted the reward on behalf of the publication, the writers, and team, we snapped a picture. We celebrated together because it’s amazing to discover where those rocket ship-shaped words we launch into space (or the internet) might take us.
