Just getting this under the wire! The last day to nominate for the Nebulas is Feb 29, and the deadline for the Hugo is March 9.
So get your votes in!
If you’re curious about what I worked on last year, here is my list.
Anyway, one of the best things about Patreon is I can give my community a private RSS feed to listen to the exclusive shows. One of the worst things is, if you’re not familiar with an RSS feed, that’s a high bar to get over.
But now you can connect Patreon with Spotify and get the exclusive content on that platform, which is very user friendly. Learn more here.
And if you’re not a Patreon supporter yet, you can get ad-free, extended, and early episodes of my shows by supporting!
My publisher Ace just sent me the final cover for Chaos Terminal! I was lucky enough to get another design from the amazing Will Staehle. Release date is November 7, and you can preorder now, from Amazon or your local indie store (affiliate link).
Station Eternity is nominated for the Goodreads Choice Award for Science Fiction! If you’re a Goodreads user, please consider voting! My publisher is also giving away a copy of the book on Goodreads.
Since Nebula Award nominations are open, I am making my award eligibility post. It always feels awkward, but if you don’t know what I’ve done, then let this guide you.
I’m so excited to finally reveal this book cover. Will Staehle’s design is gorgeous and I am lucky to have such amazing art. A hint is below, but I think it will be sharper if you go to to the exclusive reveal at io9.com!
(Pst- you can preorder it from my Friendly Local Bookstore or Amazon now)
2021 was an editing year for me. This year I’m excited to publish a novel (Station Eternity out in October) and novella (“The Ophelia Network” out May 26), but I didn’t have any fiction out last year. I did, however, do plenty of work on Escape Pod and my podcasts, I Should Be Writing and Ditch Diggers.
Escape Pod is eligible for Best Semiprozine. Last year we had over 2,000,000 downloads of our weekly science fiction stories. In the past the magazine has been nominated for 2020, 2019, and 2017 Hugo Awards.
SB Divya and I are eligible (together) for Best Editor (Short Form). We have been co-editors in chief at Escape Pod for over …five? years now? In addition we did an anthology for Escape Pod’s 15th anniversary in 2020. We were finalists on the ballot for the first time for the 2020 Hugos.
I Should Be Writing is still going strong at season 18, and is eligible for Best Fancast. I took the show to Twitch to record it live, which has changed up the show’s energy considerably. In 2021 I released 85 episodes and download numbers reached half a million (that’s 500,000 if you like the zeroes). It has never been nominated.
Ditch Diggers is also eligible for Best Fancast. The show had some hiatus time last year, but Matt Wallace, several guest hosts, and I still managed 23 episodes with around 50,000 downloads. It was a finalist for 2016 and 2017 Fancast Hugo Awards, winning for 2017.
(I’m writing this early , so this will be edited with full nomination list soon)
Holy crap, y’all.
The Hugo Award nominations were announced today, and I can finally announce that not only did Escape Pod get nominated for Best Semiprozine, BUT also my brilliant co-editor S.B. Divya and I are nominated for Best Editor(s), Short Form!
In further amazing news, our sister magazine, Podcastle, was also nominated for Semiprozine!
There is so much amazing speculative fiction happening right now, if I stop to think about how our magazine is in the same fighting class as sites like Fiyah, Strange Horizons, and F&SF, I might actually get frightened and freeze up. I would love to go back in time and tell Young Mur what her career would turn out to be, but I don’t think she’d believe me.
I’ll be honest, though. The Escape Pod nomination isn’t that shocking because our team is phenomenal. I kind of hold on tight while Divya’s hard science brilliance shines and Benjamin C. Kinney’s management of our immensely talented and diverse associate editor team deftly handles all the incoming stories. With the thoughtful host spots of Tina Connolly and Alasdair Stuart (who has a slew of his own good news to share today!) and the skill of producers Summer Brooks and Adam Pracht, the magazine we create is a thing of beauty.
But credit also goes to our authors. We couldn’t bring our audience amazing content every week if you didn’t trust us with your stories.
The editor nod is just … still not real yet. Let me work on processing that.
Luckily I have time to process because the Hugos ceremony isn’t until December. Just … eight… more… months. (Thanks, Covid.)
I have been eyeing the platform Jemi for a while, wondering how I could use it to better connect with y’all. It’s different from Patreon, where you pledge to support every month. Here you support for a one-time reward, no subscriptions, no monthly fee.
I decided to focus most of my rewards (at first, anyway) on my Twitch activity. If you want to interact with me on a gaming level or give ISBW one specific topic that I’ll dedicate a whole live show to, you can determine my game or my topic over there. I’m also including a video pep talk, where I will send you a unique video pep talk to keep you going when things get tough, writing-wise, creativity-wise, or any other time.
These new interactions will be fun, and I am looking forward to seeing what the new platform will deliver. So check me out at Jemi!
(Note- Podcast archives and access to the discord, as well as all the other rewards, will stay the same over on Patreon. That’s not changing due to this addition.)
I’m thrilled to announce that the magazine I co-edit with S.B. Divya, Escape Pod, is a nominee for the Hugo Award for Best Semiprozine! While I’m bummed to be missing WorldCon this year (it’s going to be virtual because of the COVID-19 pandemic), I’m so honored to be part of this magazine’s team that creates such amazing work week after week. Thanks to the audience and the whole team!
I’m slowly returning to getting shit done, and wanted to make a few announcements: