“And that is why the Sad Puppies campaign is important. In recent years, my rate of “discovery” of new cool authors has slowed to a crawl – and I’m not the only one. Scifi/fantasy literature sales are trending in the wrong direction at a meteoric rate. When I was 15, award-winning meant great fiction. Now that I am 35, award-winning means I am not finishing the book.
Query: with everything I just wrote, does it surprise anyone still reading that I didn’t know I could vote on the Hugos until Sad Puppies 2? I was shocked to learn it. No wonder the insular cliques are running the show, the rest of us don’t even know we’re supposed to be contributing to the script.
The only way to change that is to erect a big tent and get everyone in. People like the trufen who scoff at me are already there. Sad Puppies have showed the rest of us that we can join too. And as a bonus, since SP3 started, I have a list of new authors to check out so long I can’t even remember them all at once. Everybody wins!
That’s what it’s really about. I just spent 1,300+ words telling you why my fandom should count. That doesn’t invalidate anyone else’s fandom. I am still laboring to understand how “fandom” became a contest. My whole life, “fandom” has meant that I can share books, and games, and movies with people with similar interests, and they will share theirs with me, and we will both get enjoyment.
Comments
8 responses to “Under a Big Tent”
Hmm, in my browser, the dog picture is full size, and blows off all of the sidebar.
Sigh… I go fix. Why this theme can’t handle thumbnails, I will never understand!
I am grateful to the SP campaign for introducing me to so many new authors as well. My husband and I are both avid readers, although until we found Larry Correia’s books we had virtually stopped reading all SFF due to the lack of entertaining storylines. Thanks to many of Larry’s suggestions, we’ve rediscovered our love of SFF. It is a shame that where fandom once meant that everyone was included since we were all misfits, now some are guilty of doing exactly what was done to them years ago.
We’re trying to make it back into an award for fans, not just a small selection of fans. The more the merrier!
Ok, so i need to change my theme. Got it. Thanks for the share. 🙂
Not your theme, Mick, mine. I’d added an illustration when I quoted your post.
And thank you, for the nicely reasoned and rational post on the kerfluffle. I appreciated it.
Now that I am 35, award-winning means I am not finishing the book
Now that I’m pushing 60, “award winning” means I can keep scrolling the list at amazon and not waste the money on at least one selection. So the Hugo still has a place. SP3G8 will throw sand into the money-saving gears if too much fresh blood is injected into the selection process. I’ll need to read the crap again. Eeeek!
Hey guys, thanks for the clicks, I put up a free fantasy fiction short story yesterday! 🙂