Decades ago, I used the Hugos to find new reads in my favorite genre. Not anymore. I don't want to read books based on someone else's political or social agenda. Moreover, I don't like other people to choose my reads in the hopes that they can brainwash me.
The sad part with this latest fiasco is that it wasn't the voters throwing a hissy fit. And from some of the leaked e-mails, it wasn't the Chinese government. The true story may never come out, but it's looking more and more like the 2023 conferences committee self-censored the nominees.
The question one everyone's mind is why. Were the members bribed by the Chinese business people who funded the brand-new building that housed the conference? Did the committee members think they were protecting the artist who might run afoul of the Chinese government? Or was this a back-end method for fascists to take over another institution?
It's sad. It's tiring. It's why I don't give a shit about winning an award for my writing. Because I've already been told I write radical feminist propaganda and I'm anti-white. *sigh*
I was taught that things need to be fair. And I took that lesson to heart eve though the people who taught me the concept were incredibly racist and misogynistic. The hypocrisy burns at times.
Regardless, I believe in picking out my own books. I believe in everyone having the right to express themselves. And I believe in everyone's right to read or view what they want.
P.S. If you need a rundown of the events, check out Abigail Nussbaum's blog post. It has all the same links I would have posted.
Which it did last week. And the outrage of writers is boiling on social media sites.
Why didn't I say anything before this? First of all, because no listens to me. I'm not successful by some people's standards, though I'm quite successful by my own standards.
I'm the old lady on the street who quietly gardens while her neighbors get into a kerfluffle over basketball hoops in the driveways and whose dog is shitting on whose lawn.
And I've found that concentrating on my garden keeps me healthier in the long run. Or at the very least keeps my blood pressure in check.
So I looked on with amusement at the torches and pitchforks raised by folks with their audiobooks on Findaway Voices. At the sight of the commoners calling for blood at their gates, Spotify revised their pathetic rights grab.
But frankly, I don't trust Spotify to keep things that way. They'll switch things back when no one's looking.
So here's your warning if you choose to listen: Get your audiobooks off Findaway. Create your own store. It's the only way to protect your rights.
I've also been re-reading a lot of Anne McCaffrey lately, and I found myself comparing and contrasting the Wilson twins with Anne's heroines, especially Killashandra Ree from the Crystal Singer series and Lessa of Benden Weyr from the Dragonriders of Pern series.
Why am I doing this? One concept emphasized in many of my early craft classes was if the story had a female protagonist, she must be likeable.
What the hell does this mean?
For a lot of writers and readers, this means the heroine is not allowed to have any flaws. Ironically, this means she needs to be polite, quiet, and demure. In other words, passive as fuck.
This behavior explains why I hated the Harlequin romances from the '70's and '80's, and I gravitated to fantasy and science fiction. For example, Lessa has a mind of her own. From the age of ten, she quietly sabotaged her home, Ruatha Hold, after it was conquered and her family murdered. When dragonriders appeared at Ruatha on Search for recruits, she manipulated their leader F'lar into dueling and killing the man responsible for her family's deaths.
F'lar still shakes Lessa and actually slaps her--actions that wouldn't go over well with a modern audience. Hell, it didn't go over well with F'lar's dragon Mnementh when the story was originally written in the '60's. But Lessa's fuck-you attitude more than makes up for F'lar's stupid and brutal behavior.
In Killashandra's case, she learns her voice is unacceptable to her teachers after ten hard years of training. Her dreams of being a solo performer are dashed in an instant. Her anger at being led on by her mentor cause her to leave the school while she tries to figure out what to do with her life.
She doesn't cry into her pillow in her dorm, which is what a "likeable" heroine would do. She ends up having a wild holiday with Carrick, a Crystal Singer, she met. When she tries to leave her home planet with Carrick, Killashandra's old mentor tries to stop her, saying she's mentally unstable. A tragic accident at the spaceport solidifies Killshandra's plan to leave home and become a Crystal Singer like Carrick.
Stubborn, angry young women, both of whom are everything I was told not to do.
Yet, Anne McCaffrey captured the warring needs within young people as they try to figure out themselves and their place in their worlds.
I found myself using Anne's examples in my own writing. I made the confusing juxtapostion of child and adult in one's teen years more intense by making the Wilson sisters identical twins. Are Kaley and Kirsten perfect? Hardly. But they are human. And I think that's the most important part of any character in the end.
But with popping knees, stiff hips, and sore shoulders, I took her advice. I'm glad I did.
Holy Crap! Don't get me wrong. The class is totally worth it, but after the first one, my hamstrings complained up a storm the next day despite all the water I drank and the Naproxen I took.
The crux of the class is gentle stretching. Nothing extreme. I guess I'm a lot older than I want to think. LOL
On the plus side, I treated myself to breakfast and got some writing done at Starbucks after class.
I'm going to keep at it for the rest of the month. Hopefully, the class will get easier, and I'll be able to try something new in the next level.
I had really looked forward to the end of the pandemic so I could go back to the George House near the University of Findlay campus. Unfortunately, it has gone out of business. The Timmies near our house had reduced their hours. The staff at the Timmies across town glare at you if you dare to sit and eat at one of their tables, nevermind being in your laptop. Cafe Amici has excellent coffee and no parking since it's downtown.
Why am I talking about coffee shops? Because sometimes, I need to get out of the house in order to write.
DH and GK used to laugh at my because I'd circulate from room-to-room on the first floor. When that didn't work, I go to the neighborhood Barnes & Noble or one of the nearby Starbucks. I know it's such a cliche. Also, I don't know why a change of scenario works to unstick my writing, but it does.
Best of all though, we now have two standalone Starbucks in town.
I've been stuck since the beginning of the year. Normally, I'd have half a novel done by now, but I'm struggling with edits since November. The cataract surgeries didn't help. Neither did my normal trigger of cleaning the bathroom. We bought this house so I could have my own office for crying out loud! And all I do is stare at the boxes I haven't unpacked yet.
So this morning, I grabbed Baby Blue and my Kylo Ren flashdrive and drove to the closest standalone Starbucks.
It worked! Solutions started clicking. My grilled cheese sandwich even got cold as I fixed the issues on the current manuscript. I came home feeling pretty good. I may have to go to Starbucks every day next week to keep up the momentum, but it'll be worth it.
