Welcome to my LiveJournal. I'm a science fiction writer with a growing collection of published short stories, and my collection Unwelcome Bodies is currently available from Apex Publications. It includes, among other stories, "Captive Girl," which was a 2007 Nebula finalist and which made the 2007 Gaylactic Spectrum Awards short list. I started this journal to have a place to talk about writing and the writing life, although you'll probably notice various digressions into belly dance and politics.

Please note that anonymous comments that aren't signed will be deleted.

If I'm reading the new Nebula rules correctly, these stories of mine are eligible to be nominated in the short story category this year:

"The Kennel Club," Helix, issue 9, July 2008

"Minya's Astral Angels," The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume Three, February 2009

"Organ Nell," Apex Magazine, December 2, 2008

"...That Has Such People in It," Apex Magazine, July 6, 2009

"'Til Death Do Us Part," Shock Totem, issue 1, July 2009

Not that I think any of them are particularly Nebula-worthy, but I figured I'd post the list in case people disagreed. I'll happily email a copy of "Minya's Astral Angels" to any SFWA voting members who are interested in reading it. "'Til Death Do Us Part" is a 100-word zombie story, so I see no point in offering to email that to anyone.

And all it took was a disgusting story about organ harvesting. Who knew they were waiting for one of my icky stories to be nominated? And here I'd been pushing my nice stories their way for the past couple of years.

http://www.storysouth.com/millionwriters/millionwritersnotable2008.html

"Organ Nell" is one of the four stories that made the list from Apex.

Congrats to everyone on the list with me!

http://www.spectrumawards.org/nomform.htm

I think my only eligible work for 2008 is "Brushstrokes". If there's any work that people would like me to consider, please drop me a link! Nominations close April 15th.

The final ballot is out, and I am not on it. Woe!

Perhaps I shall lose it next year.

I've submitted my nominations, and now I sit back and wait to see if I get to add "Hugo Loser" to my empty awards shelf. *twiddling thumbs*

I just got my online voting info for the Hugos, so I shall remind people that my goal this year is to lose the Hugo. I lost the Nebula last year, so it's time to set my sights on losing something new.

So, if you'd like me to lose the Hugo, please consider nominating my story "Organ Nell" for the short story category (Apex Magazine, December 2008). Be sure to read it first to see if you believe it's worthy of losing a major award, though. Then, if I make the final ballot, for gods' sake, please don't vote for me! If I won the Hugo this early in my career, it would only give me a swelled head. Plus, it would totally ruin my plans of becoming a Hugo loser.

(To vote in the Hugos, you must be at least a supporting member of last year or this year's WorldCon. For more info, go to http://www.anticipationsf.ca.)

I'm not quite sure what's going on, but apparently the Stoker preliminary ballot hasn't been announced after all, and may or may not be final, so I may or may not be on it. So I've deleted the previous entry.

dsrtao brings up a good point. I'll have a better shot at losing if I ask people to focus their efforts on one story. So...

Poll #1330544
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 28

Which story should I focus people on in my quest to lose the Hugo?

The two that I like best are "Brushstrokes" and "Organ Nell." "Brushstrokes" is probably a stronger story, but it's only available in my collection. "Organ Nell," on the other hand, is free to read online.

A few days ago, I posted the list of all my Hugo-eligible work from 2008:

http://jenwrites.livejournal.com/721494.html

Just to make things clear -- I'm not asking you to nominate me so I can win a Hugo, I'm asking you to nominate me so I can lose a Hugo. I figure I've already lost the Nebula, so the next step up is to lose a Hugo. I'll worry about actually winning shit in a few more years.

So if you'd like to help me on my quest to become a Hugo loser, please nominate one or more of my fine stories!

Hugo nominations are now open: http://www.anticipationsf.ca/English/Hugos

So if you're inclined to throw a nomination my way, here's what I published in 2008.

Novelette:

"Brushstrokes," Unwelcome Bodies, Apex Books, February 2008

Short stories:

"Firebird," Unwelcome Bodies, Apex Books, February 2008
"The Kennel Club," Helix, issue 9, July 2008
"Organ Nell," Apex Magazine, December 2, 2008
"Sashenka Redux," Electric Velocipede, issue 14, May 2008
"Songs of Lament," Unwelcome Bodies, February 2008

There's no category for collections or anthologies, alas. Also, I'm past eligibility for the Campbell.

This time, the Carl Brandon Award, for works published in 2007. They give out the following:

The Carl Brandon Parallax Award. Given to an outstanding work of speculative fiction created by a self-identified person of color. This Award includes a $1000 cash prize.

The Carl Brandon Kindred Award. Given to an outstanding work of speculative fiction dealing with issues of race and ethnicity; nominees may be of any racial or ethnic group. This Award includes a $1000 cash prize.

Nominate folks here: http://carlbrandon.org/awards.html

Now, to figure out which of my favorite N.K. Jemisin stories to rec. Probably "The Narcomancer" for the Parallax Award and "Brides of Heaven" for the Kindred award.

I was trying to think if I had Kindred award-eligible stories this year. "The Last Stand of the Elephant Man" and "Mercytanks" are sort of vaguely appropriate, but not especially so. Next year, I may toss "Firebird" into the ring to see what they think, since the secondary story is about the protagonist not really caring about her blackness until...well, spoiler.

None of my currently-available stories are racking up Nebula recs anymore, alas. "Mercytanks" just timed out, and "The Last Stand of the Elephant Man" has been hovering at three recs for quite some time now. Ah well. If I were on the ballot two years in a row, it would just swell my head ;)

From Rob Gates:

The Gaylactic Spectrum Awards Foundation will continue to accept nominations for the 2008 Gaylactic Spectrum Awards through April 30, 2008. Nominations for the 2008 Awards should be for works originally released in calendar year 2007. The Awards offer three categories:
Best Novel, for any novel length work by a single author/author team; Best Short Fiction, for any work of fiction shorter than novel length by a single author/author team; and Best Other Work, for any work in any non-novel/short fiction form, including films, television, comics,
art, games, anthologies and more. We encourage nominations from anyone - including self-nominations.

Nominations can be submitted at our website at:
http://www.spectrumawards.org/nomform.htm

A complete list of the currently nominated works can be found on our website at:
http://www.spectrumawards.org/2008.htm

The 2008 Gaylactic Spectrum Award Winners and Recommended Short Lists will be determined by jury and announced at Gaylaxicon 2008 (www.gaylaxicon2008.org) in October.

If you have any questions, please contact us!

- Rob Gates
Gaylactic Spectrum Awards

As a reminder, these awards honor: "outstanding works of science fiction, fantasy and horror which include significant positive explorations of gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered characters, themes, or issues."

I just looked over the list of works that I had published in 2007, and the closest I come to having a story that qualifies is ("Mercytanks"), which deals with intergender issues. So I won't be doing any self-nominating. But as soon as they're open for the 2009 awards, you know I'll be telling them all about "Brushstrokes"!

One of the perils of being well-connected in this business is finding out that Hugo nominee emails have just gone out to everyone who qualified for the ballot. Ergo, since I have not gotten that email, none of my stories qualified this year.

Of course, there's always the chance that I have a story that could make it at the last minute if someone declines to be on the ballot, but somehow, I don't see that happening (someone declining, that is).

Honestly, making the Hugo and Nebula ballots in the same year would be a little ridiculous, so I'm not shedding any tears over this.

http://www.storysouth.com/millionwriters.html

This contest honors fiction that was originally published on the internet. The following stories of mine are eligible for the 2008 award:

Helix
http://www.helixsf.com
Story: "The Last Stand of the Elephant Man" by Jennifer Pelland (already nominated)
http://www.helixsf.com/archives/Oct07/fiction/Q2_pelland_elephantman.htm

Helix
http://www.helixsf.com
Story: "Mercytanks" by Jennifer Pelland
http://www.helixsf.com/archives/Apr07/fiction/Q4_pelland_mercytanks.htm

Coyote Wild
http://www.coyotewildmag.com/
Story: "Dazz" by Jennifer Pelland (already nominated)
http://coyotewildmag.com/spring_2007/content/pelland_dazz.html

If you're interested in nominating any of them, you can paste them in in exactly that format on the reader nomination form: http://www.storysouth.com/million_writers_award/2008/02/reader_nominations_for_2008_mi.html

Readers are only allowed to make one nomination, so use it wisely! If there's a story out there that you think is spiffier than any of the above, by all means, nominate it instead. But if you nominate one of mine, I'd appreciate it if you drop me a line saying which one so I can tell the editors of the above that they don't need to use up one of their three nominations on mine.

Thanks, and happy nominating!

Andy and I have discussed the trip some more, and we've decided that if it turns out we're getting a good tax refund, then we're going, and we'll probably splurge and stay in the convention hotel. If we either break even with taxes or are just getting a small amount back, then we'll take up a friend's generous offer of crash space. And if we owe money...well, that will probably kill it dead.

Needless to say, we'll be sitting down to do taxes this weekend.

I'm still waiting to hear back from the person in charge of the Nebula banquet to find out if we want to spend the extra money on it. If nothing else, as a vegetarian in Austin, I might run the risk of not being properly fed if I don't have total control over what I choose for dinner. And it would be monumentally stupid to be food-deprived immediately before the awards.

I'm also going to call JetBlue to see if it's at all possible to get their Tuesday return airfare price on Sunday or Monday. I'm not sure if "I'm up for an award--here, you can see for yourself if you Google 'Jennifer Pelland' and 'Nebula'" counts as a reason for an airline to bargain the price of a ticket down, but I figure it's worth a try. If nothing else, JetBlue has a direct flight from Boston to Austin, which would be really sweet.

Right now, the cheapest way to and from Austin appears to be American, which can get us there and back for $740 (combined) no matter which day we head in or head back. The catch is that we'll have to leave Boston in the wee hours of the morning, and arrive back in Boston around midnight. We could beat those prices on JetBlue if we left on Friday and returned on Tuesday. I may call JetBlue in a day or two to see if there's any way to talk them into giving me the Tuesday fare on Sunday. I suspect the answer is no, but it's worth a shot. I may also see if there are cheaper hotels within walking distance of the Nebula hotel. And I'm also trying to find out if it's possible to pull this off without a rental car.

We'll be doing our taxes next weekend. If it turns out we're getting a refund, I think we'll do this.

It looks like we can fly in on Saturday morning, then fly back Sunday evening, for $750 total. It's not a huge savings in ticket prices, but it saves us several days worth of expenses (hotel, food, misc).

Still not great, but a little better than the other options.

So I grossly misread the JetBlue site. The tickets to get two adults to Austin won't come to a mere $320, they'll come to over $800. And from what I'm seeing on Expedia, that's actually not a bad price (although I found a flight that'll save me $90 but has slightly less pleasant times). And that's not counting the hotel costs. I'm trying to figure out if it's worth spending over $1000 to lose an award in person.

ETA: My husband has managed to scrape up some cash, so he'll actually be able to help out with the costs, but I'm still hesitant to spend the money, considering our financial situation right now.

ETA2: Flying out of Manchester or Providence doesn't help with the costs at all. However, I just booked my WisCon flight, and it came in at $292. How is it that I can fly to a rinky-dink airport in Wisconsin for so much less than a major airport in Texas?

So now that we're down to the finalists, I figured I'd take another look at the stats for the various categories:

Novels: 4 men, 1 woman; all SFWA pro markets

Novellas: 2 women, 4 men; 5 SFWA pro markets, 1 semi-pro

Novelettes: 4 men, 3 women; all SFWA pro markets (I believe); 1 web-published piece

Short stories: 4 women, 2 men; 4 SFWA pro markets, 2 semi-pro; 1 web-published piece

Scripts: all men; 5 professionally broadcast, 1 web-broadcast

Andre Norton: 5 women, 2 men; can't tell the level of some of the markets

So, my story is in a clear minority for having been web-published, but while women aren't quite as prominent as men on this ballot, if you disregard the script category, we're just about equal.