HUGO AND VIVIAN SHOW PROGRESS

A couple of big things happened on the literary front this week. And though I usually just keep my head down and write, these events were specific to my two chosen genres—romance and science fiction—so I paid attention.

On Tuesday the World Science Fiction Society announced its nominations for this year’s annual Hugo Awards for the best works in science fiction and fantasy, Astounding Award for Best New Writer, and Lodestar Award for Best Young Adult Book. Unique among literary awards, these SF honors are chosen from among the nominees by the members of the World SF Convention (WorldCon) every year. That means not only authors, editors and publishers get a say in who wins the awards, but also fans of the genre. Due to the limitations of the COVID pandemic, the 79^th Annual World Science Fiction Convention, DisConIII, will be virtual, streaming from Washington, D.C.

In the past democratic ideal has sometimes worked more like mob rule in science fiction. Just a few years ago, the genre was turned upside down at the time of the Hugo nominations by the very idea that a woman—or a person of color—might win the top award. The World SF Society, which administers the award, and the Science Fiction Writers Association were roiled by a very open, very ugly controversy pitting the old guard of white, cishet males against a younger cohort of diverse authors—female, POC, LBGTQ+, the disabled, and their allies.

Though that process was painful, it did eventually break through the barriers to progress SF had built since the halcyon days of the New Age. And this year’s list of nominees is almost all women, people of color and representative of other diverse backgrounds. Amazingly, it looks just like any group of authors you might meet!

The Romance Writers of America® went through a similarly wrenching self-examination over the last two years, recognizing that the organization had A LOT of work to do in the area of diversity, equity and inclusion. Year after year, our own contest to honor excellence in romance, the RITA®, ended up with virtually NO nominees of color, LBGTQ+ authors or any other authors representative of marginalized communities. Worse, the nominated books themselves were seldom representative of the world at large, with almost every one full of white, hetero couples unchallenged by any disability.

 

Given the RITA®’s many problems, a reorganized RWA® decided to retire the contest and institute a brand-new contest with more objective judging standards. This is the first year of the Vivian® Contest for excellence in romance writing, and the finalists were just announced this week. It may be too early to tell whether the hoped-for improvements can truly be found in this year’s nominees. There are a few more people of color among the Contemporary Romance author nominees, and from the book descriptions that translates directly into more POC in the heroes and heroines that populate their nominated books. (One of the nominees is an old friend from my days in the Virginia chapter of RWA, Tracey Livesay. Congratulations, Tracey!) There is at least one LBGTQ+ author (congratulations,Laquette!), though there may be others I don’t know about. The Historical Romance—Long category remains the stronghold of veteran, best-selling authors, but inroads have been made by a new generation in other categories. Congratulations, in particular, to our Golden Heart sister Valerie Bowman for her nomination in the Historical Romance—Mid category.

I regret to say the Speculative Romance category remains dominated by paranormal romance, though we did have a nomination in the Best First Published Book category (Choosing Theo: The Clecanian Series (Book One) by Victoria Aveline). One big reason for that is probably that SFR authors remain gun-shy about submitting to RWA contests. I really hope we get over that.

On the other hand, I was a judge this year, and I have to say I wasn’t overly impressed with the SFR books I was given to judge. That wasn’t unusual. I’m a harsh, but fair, judge. Not many of the books I read in any category made the grade. The great thing about the Vivian® Contest is that there is an objective scoring system in place. Judges can’t just say, “Not a romance,” and get away with it anymore.

This is Vivian®’s first year, and there are bound to be criticisms. I thought there were a few tweaks that could have improved the score sheet, myself. Still, I hope to have a book to enter next year, and I encourage more of you to enter, too.

Cheers, Donna

 

THE VIVIAN LAUNCHES!

There is, of course, big news this week that affects every aspect of our lives as Americans and citizens of the interconnected world. But I won’t go on at length about that except to congratulate President-elect Joseph Biden and Vice-President-elect Kamala Harris on their electoral win. I have more to say about it on my personal blog here, if you’re inclined to check it out.

For a more narrow, writerly bit of news, this week (November 10) marked the opening of the completely revamped and renamed Vivian Contest for both published and unpublished romance, sponsored by the Romance Writers of America®. According to the RWA® website, “The Vivian recognizes excellence in romance writing and showcases author talent and creativity. We celebrate the power of the romance genre with its central message of hope--because happily ever afters are for everyone.”

The new Vivian Contest needs YOU!

You may remember from my earlier post that the old RITA contest went through an extensive overhaul after many years of nominees and winners that too often reflected a single, exclusive romantic perspective—that of white, cis-gendered, heterosexual and able-bodied authors and protagonists. There were no objective criteria for judging, which only reinforced these stereotypes, and categories were limited, too, discouraging participation from writers in our own science fiction romance world, who were consistently forced to compete in the Paranormal category. The old Golden Heart contest for unpublished writers had been eliminated altogether, leaving newbies with nowhere to go.

In the new Vivian Contest, judges will undergo mandatory training both for diversity and equity issues and to learn the new objective criteria for judging. They will be required to adhere to the rubrics for judging established by the contest committee (which were arrived at by a thorough and lengthy process with the RWA® membership). They will have more freedom to choose the subgenres and sensuality levels across the spectrum they feel comfortable judging and will be matched with entries based on the information about those sensuality levels provided by the authors themselves. (So, no outraged “Did Not Finish” scores from judges who unwittingly got spicy novels in their packets when they secretly preferred cozy contemporaries. And it’s more likely judges with some familiarity with SFR will judge SFR.)

The Paranormal category has been renamed to the more inclusive Speculative Romance category and will accept entries in three lengths (Long, Mid, and Short), as Historical and Contemporary categories have for years. This will not only give authors in this category more opportunities to win but will also expand the welcome for digital-only authors, who tend to write at the shorter lengths.

Unpublished manuscripts (and authors) will be judged under the new Most Anticipated Romance category. This is meant to replace the Golden Heart contest, and though it’s a compromise that leaves many veterans of the Golden Heart disappointed, at least there is some acknowledgement of the role of RWA® in nurturing newbie writers. It should be noted that there is an option for finalists in this category to have their entries made available to editors and agents on RWA®’s Qualifying Markets or Eligible Agents lists. So that’s something.

Currently there are no fees for the first book entered in the Vivian Contest! What have you got to lose? The initial cap for entries is set at 750. Once that cap has been met, second entries may be accepted. Those second books will be charged a fee of $50 for RWA® members, $100 for nonmembers. A final cap for entries will be set on November 23. Click here for more details.

Note that if you are interested in judging, you do not have to be an RWA® member to do so. Nonmember authors, critics, reviewers, librarians and booksellers are all eligible with certain restrictions. Deadline for judge signup is November 20. Click here for more information.

Cheers, Donna