ravenna_c_tan: (slytherclaw)

Hello and welcome to another ctan monthly updatet! It’s Pride Month, so today let’s talk about queer science fiction and fantasy.

First some housekeeping: Mailchimp has been driving me nuts, with the newsletter sometimes displaying so tiny on mobile devices it was illegible. I’m trying on a new template today, with new fonts. Please let me know if this one looks better to you (or worse!) than before so I can keep improving it.

Second, my apology this is a bit later than I intended, but I had knee surgery on Wednesday and as you can imagine it’s put a bit of a cramp into my schedule. I’ve discovered I would rather have my knee hurt and my brain work than be “pain free” but feel seasick from narcotics. Apparently opioids are not my friends! Bleah.

And now to my slightly linkbait-y topic: are we in a “Golden Age” of queer and trans SF/F? Yes, yes we are, end of essay.

Just kidding, of course I’m going to explain WHY my answer is yes.

Read the rest of this entry » )

Mirrored from cecilia tan.

ravenna_c_tan: (slytherclaw)

NebulasPostcard_600px

Ten Things I Learned at SFWA Nebulas Weekend

by Cecilia Tan

This past weekend was the SFWA annual gathering known as Nebulas Weekend, which is not only when the Nebula Awards are given out, but also a conference for professional science fiction writers. People tell me that in the past Nebulas Weekend was mostly a party/schmoozefest and not so much of a professional development seminar. That might explain why I never bothered to attend before. I go to plenty of schmoozefests at other cons and book industry functions where I can rub elbows with the elite writers and editors in science fiction/fantasy (viz: the SFWA suite at any Worldcon or World Fantasy, the SFWA annual “Mill & Swill” in NYC, ICFA, miscellaneous book launches and parties, various regional fan cons, et cetera). I didn’t need another one. But a pro development seminar for sf/f? Sign me up.

Before this, there was no open attendance professional development seminar for sf/f writers. There are the application-only writers workshops like Clarion, Odyssey, and Viable Paradise. There are science courses like Launch Pad and the Schroedinger Sessions. But nowhere within sf/f except occasional tracks or workshops at cons to learn career skills, i.e. self-marketing techniques, social media management, website management, legal issues, and so on. I had been advising writers I know to attend their nearest regional romance writer conventions (even if they didn’t write romance) in order to get some of that.

Thanks to the co-location of this year’s Nebs with BookExpo America, presentations at the conference included many by service providers of various companies in the publishing ecosystem, as well as the opportunity to sit down one-on-one to pick the brains of many presenters. (Schedule) Reps from Kobo, Draft2Digital, Patreon, Kickstarter, Amazon/KDP, Audible.com, and others were here, and also various members put themselves forth for brain-picking in the Ask an Expert area. So I picked some brains, went to some seminars, and here’s what I learned during Nebulas Weekend: (details below the cut)

1. We Clean Up Pretty Good
2. Kickstarters Should Be Pretty
3. At Patreon a Little Means a Lot
4. Dictate for Artistry
5. The Myth of Self-Publishing
6. White Knights and Online Harassment
7. Think Globally
8. You Can’t Be in Two Places at Once
9. John Hodgman is Really Funny
10. Not the Hugos or the Worldcon

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Mirrored from blog.ceciliatan.com.

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