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Scholar and editor H. BRUCE FRANK­LIN, 90, died May 19, 2024 in El Cerrito CA. He taught one of the first university courses on science fiction literature while he was at Stanford University, and also wrote and edited numerous works of SF interest.

Howard Bruce Franklin was born February 28, 1934 in Brooklyn NY. He worked his way through college, graduating from Amherst College in 1955. He served in ...Read More

Glasgow 2024, the 82nd World Science Fiction Convention, was held August 8-12, 2024 at the Scottish Events Campus (SEC) in Glasgow, Scotland. Guests of honor were artist Chris Baker; authors Ken MacLeod, Nnedi Okorafor, and Terri Windling; fan guests of honor Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer; special guests were Samantha Béart, Meganne Christian, Tanya DePass, Catherine Heymans, Tendai Huchu, and Three Black Halflings. Registration provided provisional figures of 7,300 in-per­son ...Read More

The Science Fiction Poetry Association (SFPA) has announced the 2024 Dwarf Stars Award winners. The Dwarf Stars honor the best speculative poem of one to ten lines published in the previous year.

• WINNER: “关于树的无数可能”/ “the infinite possibilities of trees,” Xiao Xi, translated by Yilin Wang (Prism International Spring ’23; originally published in 风不止 [The Ceaseless Wind])
• Second Place: “All-Kinds-of-Fears,” Amelia Gorman (Dreams and Nightmares 2/23)
• Third Place: “Nikola

...Read More

The Science Fiction & Fantasy Poetry Association (SFPA) has announced the winners of the 2024 Rhysling Awards for speculative poetry.

Short Poem Category

• First Place: “No One Now Remembers,” Geoffrey A. Landis (Fantasy and Science Fiction 11-12/23)
• Second Place: “Language as a Form of Breath,” Angel Leal (Apparition Lit 10/23)
• Third Place: “The Day We All Died, A Little,” Lisa Timpf (Radon Journal 9/23)
• Honorable Mention: “Let Us Dream,” Myna

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The finalists for the Endeavour Award have been announced. The award recognizes “a distinguished science fiction or fantasy book written by a Pacific Northwest author or authors and published in the previous year.” The finalists are:

• Bookshops & Bonedust, Travis Baldree (Tor)
• Vampires of El Norte, Isabel Cañas (Berkley)
• Again and Again, Jonathan Evison (Penguin Random House/Dutton)
• Sleep No More, Seanan McGuire (DAW)
• Painted Devils,

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The 2024 Polari Prize Shortlists have been announced via social media.

Authors and titles of genre interest include Away With Words by Sophie Cameron (Little Tiger), Gwen & Art Are Not in Love by Lex Croucher (Wednesday), and Bitterthorn by Kat Dunn (Andersen), all in the Children’s & YA category; and Killing Jericho by William Hussey (Zaffre) in the Book Category.

The prizes are given to writers born or based ...Read More

Murmuration by Elizabeth Pike (self-published) is on the five-title shortlist for the 2024 Kindle Storyteller Award.

The award, launched in 2017, includes a £20,000 prize and “is open to writers publishing in English in any genre, who publish their work through Kindle Direct Publishing” on Amazon.co.uk. There were 20 titles on the “Featured Sci Fi and Fantasy Entries” and the shortlist itself includes titles from categories “Crime, Mystery, and Thrillers” ...Read More

by Nisi Shawl, Somto Ihezue, and Zhui Ning Chang

We’re in this together. That’s what publishing has taught me over the course of decades. That’s what this project, Publishing Taught Me, continues to teach me and all my friends. You, too. All my friends; all my relations.

Publishing is a community endeavor. If we analogize it in mechanical terms, we can say it has lots of moving parts: writers, readers, editors, publishers, marketers, printers.  Reviewers, narrators.  Illustrators.  Interns.  Sellers and librarians, and I may even be forgetting a few more important elements, but my point is, publishing is multiplex as hell: it’s full of clusters of different levels of fractal expressions of itself leading to and from its major, medium, and minor iterations.

So, we really need each other. Every one of us needs to be doing our best in order to make publishing do its best.

That means we can’t just passively accept the status quo—not when that status quo excludes many people. Race-based gatekeeping, gender policing, ableist submission tools, and the like—they’ve simply got to go if we expect our publishing community to flourish.

It’s an accomplishment devoutly to be wished, and something various elements of the enterprise have tried to achieve. Have we succeeded?  Now and then. Here and there.

This anthology is both a good assessment of how well we’ve done making publishing properly inclusive, and an excellent tool for doing so.

I was approached by SFWA for my feedback on this project back in 2022, when it was first proposed to the National Endowment for the Arts. It sounded like such a great idea! The plan was to create an online anthology of essays addressing the experiences of BIPOC authors, editors, etc., as they interacted with current and established publishing practices. The SFWA volunteers and consultants who were the plan’s architects recognized that paying for the work of marginalized authors and editors makes greater participation possible, so an integral part of the plan was to offer the authors professional rates while also compensating the project’s editor and editorial interns.  Win-win! I pronounced myself delighted!

I was even more deeply delighted to learn that SFWA had chosen me to head up the anthology.

Behind the scenes, our work began.  Some of it was pretty boring: schedule checking, protocol setting, calendar clearing, that sort of stuff. Some of it was fun and easy: I named the anthology Publishing Taught Me in honor of the Twitter hashtag #publishingpaidme, one of the means by which certain inequities we wanted to talk about were revealed.

Some of the work was fun and hard. The one task that felt particularly hard to me was hiring my two editorial interns. But I’m incredibly proud of my choices: Somto Ihezue and Zhui Ning Chang. Working with them has been pure pleasure. Their hearts and heads have proven indispensable to making this anthology as wonderful as it is to read, and I’m asking them now to chime in on this introduction.

ZNC:

It has been a joy to work on this with Nisi, Somto, the SFWA team, and all our contributors. In publishing, too often we chase the young and fresh and new, and so I was especially drawn to the idea of an anthology of essays that sought to recognise, celebrate, and reflect on the experiences of those who have been fighting for years for greater equity. To contribute some small part to this endeavor, among such fine colleagues and pillars of our community, was my honor.

The selection and editing process was extremely democratic—I learned a great deal from Nisi’s open, horizontal management of the entire project, and enjoyed bouncing off Somto’s keen eye and precise notes in our collaborative editing.

Some essays, in particular, have stayed with me: Diana M. Pho’s incisive insight into the editor’s role in the publishing process, and the challenges of balancing author care and business demands; Erika Hardison and Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas’s respective recognition of the labor and love poured in by slush readers and book reviewers, to help sustain stories from opposite ends of the spectrum; the contrast of Yoon Ha Lee’s cynicism and Emily Jiang’s faith in where and how our industry and our communities move forward from here.

I hope that, wherever you are on your publishing journey, this anthology will help bring you closer to what you wish to achieve. We can’t wait to read the stories you will tell. So come, step through the door and join us.

Somto:

“Learning is a life-long journey, not a process.”

Among editors, there’s a recurring phrase: Editing is a thankless but rewarding endeavor. There’s something about working meticulously with others, exchanging thoughts and ideas, lending your guidance, and being trusted with the words and stories of authors. It intimately connects you to the work, makes you a part of the story, a part of the journey—and working on the Publishing Taught Me anthology, this connection has been the reward. I will forever be grateful to have been brought aboard this project with Nisi Shawl, Zhui Ning Chang, the SFWA team, and the fantastic and brilliant contributors who trusted us with their words. This was a fulfilling process in many ways; every minute spent with the authors and my fellow editors was enlightening and a learning moment. From Yoon Ha Lee’s work, I learned that our experiences as authors can be valid and instrumental in our storytelling. Still, they shouldn’t be a cage hoisted up by the expectations of the industry and society. In James Beamon’s call to “Take Humor Seriously,” I learned that laughter might not solve the root problem when facing tragedies, but, often, it is the right prescription to know that things will be okay. In Kanishk Tantia’s story snippets, I learned the need for honesty, substance, and authenticity in our storytelling.

Working with Nisi and Zhui Ning was a reminder that we are eternal students. Nisi’s firm and exemplary work ethic, their commitment to care, and their acknowledgment of the weight of words when approaching a text as an editor—all exemplary in every way. On the other page, there was Zhui Ning’s punctuality, enthusiasm, and thoroughness—demanding that authors interrogate every statement and maximize their words and thoughts to their fullest potential.

And to our ever-readers, as you immerse yourself in this anthology, our fervent hope is that you learn with us the many ways we tell our community’s continuing story to each other.

This is the introduction to the Publishing Taught Me: A SFWA Anthology Project. The Publishing Taught Me project is overseen by multiple award-winning editor Nisi Shawl and two editorial interns, Somto Ihezue and Zhui Ning Chang. More information on this series can be found here: Publishing Taught Me: A SFWA Anthology Project – SFWA  

The post Introduction – Publishing Taught Me Anthology appeared first on SFWA.

Finalists for the National Book Awards (NBA) have been announced, including titles and authors of genre interest in multiple categories.

Fiction

• Ghostroots, ’Pemi Aguda (Norton)
• James, Percival Everett (Doubleday)

Nonfiction

• Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder, Salman Rushdie (Random House)

Young People’s Literature

• Buffalo Dreamer, Violet Duncan (Nancy Paulsen)
• The First State of Being, Erin Entrada Kelly (Greenwillow)

Translated Literature

• The Book Censor’s Library,

...Read More

The 22 MacArthur Foundation Fellows have been announced for 2024, including filmmaker Sterlin Harjo of feature Mekko (2015) and TV series Reservation Dogs (2021-2023); Ling Ma, author of Severance (2018) and Bliss Montage (2022); Jason Reynolds, author of the Stuntboy children’s superhero series and YA fantasy Long Way Down (2017); and writer and disability activist Alice Wong, who had an essay in Uncanny’s “Disabled People Destroy Science Fiction!” issue (2018). ...Read More

by John Ryan

Editor’s note: This piece is part of our Playtesting Game Narratives series, curated by SFWA’s Game Writing Committee.

When you hear about narrative in video games, positions such as writers and narrative designers might be the first roles you’ll think of. What people don’t think about is one of the most important roles in the game studio: Quality Assurance, or QA.

I want to talk about what QA does in a video game studio and how this overlooked discipline is an unsung hero of game development. While QA helps multiple departments in a studio, I’m going to focus on narrative for this article and on how game writers can best work with QA.

So how do QA and storytelling work together in a game studio?

This really depends on the studio. If you have a narrative-focused studio, then you’ll likely have some QA personnel (either internal or third party) that will be devoted to spotting narrative issues during their play passes. This isn’t always the case though. There’s a good chance your studio or your team will just have a general QA pool at their disposal. However, with proper context and communication, you can have these generalists help spot narrative issues in your game.

What QA Looks For in a Narrative Pass

From my experience, QA looks for plot inconsistencies, discrepancies in character voice, odd leaps in plot logic or dialogue, and/or missing dialogue (which is also an audio issue, but it’s something that narrative needs to be aware of). Also, spelling, grammar, and punctuation.

Eagle-eyed testers will also be familiar with your game’s proper nouns: titles, naming conventions, weapon names, and locations. When I was working on Guild Wars 2, both QA and the editing team would double-check map names and even look up if a Charr name in-game matched the rules for naming a Charr character. No detail was too small.

QA doesn’t look for the following during its narrative play pass: level design issues (like traversal issues), missing art assets (hey, where’s the painting I’m supposed to steal?), missing ambient audio or effects, missing character animations, or absent visual effects (like an explosion going off). QA will notice these issues and file bugs to the appropriate teams, however.

A Word of Context for Writers

QA isn’t there to be your servant. It will not be at your beck and call at all times. Depending on the stage of development, QA might be slammed with other requests from other departments. QA has a job to do for the whole studio, not just you in the narrative department.

Whether the studio is narrative-focused or not, the narrative team is responsible for briefing QA on what it should be looking for before it does its play passes. This helps narrative as well as QA. Narrative will get specific feedback about what QA finds, while QA can narrow the scope of its review.

How to Get the Most Out of QA

Be proactive about this. Engage with QA from the start. If you don’t have a dedicated narrative QA team, then give QA detailed guidelines about what your team is looking for and the best way to send feedback to the writers. This is an ever-evolving process, so be ready to constantly communicate new targets to the QA team when necessary.

Speaking of, also tell the QA team about already identified problems. This saves QA from writing bugs it doesn’t need to and saves you the headache of getting multiple bugs for the same issue. And trust me, duplicate bugs are an aggravation you don’t need. I have lost count of all the times I’ve seen developers (dumbass younger me included) seethe with contempt and send QA a bitter note saying (paraphrasing): “Stop sending me this, you moron.”

You want to get ahead of this mindset. You need to see QA as more than a bunch of nitpicking elves who send you bugs that eat at your creative confidence. You need to see all the hard and thankless work QA does in the shadows. Be kind. Why?

The Unsung Heroes

Because QA is often the punching bag of the studio—the most grueling work with low pay and little prestige. Think of it this way: when QA does their job, it isn’t noticed. Compare that to when you have great dialogue, engaging audio, awesome vistas, or kick-ass cut scenes. All those devs can take a bow. Players never see the hard work QA has done to flag all the issues. However, when something blows up or breaks a game, everyone points their fire at QA: “Why wasn’t this obvious bug spotted?”

I’ve also seen QA framed as the pit where talent comes from, not where talent is. At ArenaNet, QA was at one time our farm league, where testers worked their asses off to be noticed and then “promoted” into design, art, audio, programming, or writing. QA was a stepping stone, not seen as a valid career path. As you can imagine, it gave the impression that QA was a place you wanted to cycle out of as fast as possible. The pay sucked and the respect wasn’t there. The older I get, the more I see this as unfair.

QA isn’t disposable. It’s a team vital to making a functioning, immersive game. Give QA the respect it deserves. When you work with them, be clear about what you want them to look for. Be clear about how you want them to give you feedback. And be clear that you appreciate their hard work.

After all, QA is there to help save you from yourself. Honor that.

John Ryan is a veteran game writer/narrative designer who has worked on franchises including Fable, Horizon, Marvel’s Iron Man, Guild Wars, Destiny, Forza, and Lily’s Garden. He’s brought stories to life across multiple genres and platforms, including VR and XR. He is currently working on two unannounced projects but is always looking for the next adventure. He currently lives near Seattle with his wife, two cats, and a growing backlog of games on his Steam account. You can read more about him and his work at his site: johnryanwrites.com.

The post QA and Storytelling in Video Games appeared first on SFWA.

The Future Worlds Prize for Fantasy and Science Fiction Writers of Colour is open to submissions from unpublished writers of color based in the UK until January 26, 2025.

The winner will receive £4,500, one runner-up £2,500, and up to six shortlisted authors will each receive £850. All writers will also receive mentoring from one of the prize’s publishing partners: Bloomsbury, Daphne Press, Gollancz, Hodderscape, Orbit UK, Penguin Michael Joseph, ...Read More

StokerCon 2025 has announced their Guests of Honor: Scott Edelman, Paula Guran, Adam L.G. Nevill, Joyce Carol Oates, Gaby Triana, and Tim Waggoner.

StokerCon 2025 will be held June 12-15, 2025 at the Hilton Stamford Hotel & Executive Meeting Center in Stamford CT.

For more information, see the official website.

While you are here, please take a moment to support Locus with a one-time or recurring donation. We rely on ...Read More

The winner of the 2024 Washington Science Fiction Association (WSFA) Small Press Award for Short Fiction has been announced:

• WINNER: “A Bowl of Soup on the 87th Floor”, Kai Holmwood (DreamForge Anvil 3/11/23)

• “Six Meals at Fanelli’s”, Annika Barranti Klein (Fusion Fragment 4/23)
• “Baby Golem”, Barbara Krasnoff (Jewish Futures)
• “Interstate Mohinis”, M.L. Krishnan (Diabolical Plots 6/16/23)
• “Better Living Through Algorithms”, Naomi Kritzer (Clarkesworld 5/23)
• “Machines”, Jennifer R. Povey

...Read More