Genre Grapevine for July/August 2024
Thanks again for everyone's patience during the gap in my reporting while I recovered from covid. This column is a make-up for that gap and covers news from the last two months.
Five Women Raise Allegations Against Neil Gaiman, Who Appears to Wrongly Blame Behavior on Autism
Like many people I've long been a big fan of Neil Gaiman's stories, starting with The Sandman and going onward through Stardust, American Gods, Coraline, and other works. And like many Gaiman fans, I've been horrified by the recent revelations from five women that he allegedly sexually assaulted or abused them.
Since July, Tortoise Media has been running the series "Master: The Allegations Against Neil Gaiman." The first report on July 3rd detailed allegations from two women, one a former nanny and the other a fan of Gaiman's stories. Since then, more allegations and evidence have emerged, with Gaiman now accused of assault or abuse by five women. In one of these cases, Gaiman allegedly "pressured a mother-of-three to have sex with him in return for letting her live with her daughters at his property in upstate New York; and made her sign a non-disclosure agreement in return for a $275,000 payment to help her cope with post-traumatic stress and depression following their sexual relationship."
So far Gaiman has denied all the allegations while also not speaking on the record about what happened. But in a new Tortoise Media podcast released on August 27, Gaiman does speak in the form of an alleged 2022 recording of him talking on the phone with one of his victims. During the recording, Gaiman offers to pay $60,000 (£45,400) to the alleged victim.
When these reports first came out, allegations of possible political bias were raised against Tortoise Media. As journalist Annabel Ross explained, one of the main reporters on the story is "Rachel Johnson, sister of former UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, an avowed TERF who opined in The Spectator, 'It's hard not to pity Ghislaine Maxwell.'"
As Ross pointed out, "Problematic doesn't begin to describe it" before noting that "this was not a calculated commission on Tortoise's part" because Johnson "was the journalist originally contacted by the main accuser, Scarlett."
But like Ross I was reassured about the reporting when I saw that Johnson had teamed up with journalist Paul Caruana Galizia on the investigation. Galizia is a well-respected reporter whose mother was also a legendary journalist assassinated for her hard-hitting reporting.
While I may not trust Johnson and there are definitely flaws in how the podcasts are structured and presented, I don't think Galizia has an axe to grind against Gaiman. And the evidence presented to date by Tortoise Media is very persuasive, as are the heart-wrenching stories shared by these five women.
Many people in fandom were in shock when the first allegations against Gaiman emerged. However, that shock is now turning into anger and disgust, with others in the genre sharing their own takes and information. Stephanie Kay pulled together a thread tracking what other authors are saying about Gaiman while Michael Matheson discussed the power imbalances at play between Gaiman, his victims, and others in the genre world.
Matheson also discussed how at the Clarion Workshop there was evidently an informal "Gaiman Rule for instructors, named after Neil: 'Don't sleep with the students.'" While Clarion hasn't confirmed or refuted the existence of this informal rule, the separate Clarion West workshop did release a statement saying the "culture of silence and protecting prominent authors has been widespread in the SFF community" and needs to change.
In the 2022 recording contained within the new Tortoise Media report, Gaiman allegedly tries to rationalize his behavior to his alleged victim. "A few years ago," he said in the recorded conversation, "I was informed I was high-functioning autistic. Which is an interesting thing to learn about yourself when you're old. It did mean I sort of went, 'Oh ok, this is why I sort of sometimes find myself tiptoeing through human relations, and sometimes getting them very wrong.'"
At some point I imagine Gaiman will speak on the record about all this. Based on this alleged recording, people need to be prepared for him to try to blame being on the autistic spectrum for his horrific behavior. If he tries this, do not accept that excuse.
I'm also on the spectrum, in that same "high-functioning" category he discusses in the recording. I've always been extremely cautious in my approach to human relationships, the same as many others on the spectrum. When I meet someone, my biggest worry is trying to understand them and what they want. Despite what Gaiman's alleged recording implies, people on the spectrum – and neurodiverse people in general – do not go around assaulting or abusing people and then claiming we didn't understand what was going on.
Hell, anyone who has read Gaiman's fiction realizes that he damn well knows the difference between right and wrong. His fiction shows he understands how people should treat each other. One reason his stories found so many fans is because he revealed to readers deeply complex fantasy worlds where found families could be created, where people could treat each other with dignity and love no matter their differences, where we could make a choice to not hurt each others despite this universe making it so easy for people to inflict pain on others.
Based on what Gaiman's accusers have said, he betrayed not only them but the very message behind the stories he created.
That said, I also want to share what Diabolical Plots wrote: "When a writer is rightfully outed as being abusive/hateful, I hate to see takes like 'I knew there was a reason I didn't like their work'. It only adds to the fallacy that equates quality of work with quality of character which is a HUGE part of how abuser artists are justified in the first place! You're not complicit if you liked an author's work before you knew they treated people poorly. You're not virtuous if you hated the work. That attitude just makes it easier for other abuser artists, because people will use their wonderful art to judge their character until people know better."
Read the entire thread from Diabolical Plots.
To sum all this up, I keep coming back to something I heard at this year's Hugo Awards ceremony. When Nerds of a Feather, Flock Together won the Hugo Award for Best Fanzine, senior editor Adri Joy gave a moving and powerful acceptance speech. And she closed that speech by saying, "Finally, I want to give one personal opinion, which is that Neil Gaiman can fuck off into the sun."
Joy was speaking for many people in the genre, including myself.
Genre Community Flees X-Twitter
In July, Elon Musk endorsed Donald Trump in this year's race for the U.S. presidency, resulting in a new rush of people X-ing out of their X-Twitter accounts. And this followed the even larger numbers of people who have already left the platform since Musk took over. And none of that even takes into account the current problems X-Twitter is having in Brazil and the European Union over spreading disinformation.
A number of alternative platforms have attempted to replicate the connections and conversations that took place on X-Twitter at its peak. The decentralized social platform Mastodon quickly grew in popularity once Musk purchased X-Twitter, but the difficulties in connecting with people there along with the system being harder for people to easily understand and use has kept the platform from reaching its true potential.
Bluesky has become a very popular X-Twitter alternative, with an interface that is easy to understand and use. Readers of this column may have noticed that I frequently link to genre discussions and information on Bluesky. The reason for this is that people in the SF/F genre have really embraced Bluesky, with conversations taking place there that I don't see on other social media platforms.
However, while Bluesky has seen an increase in users over the last two months, I believe most of the people currently leaving X-Twitter in the genre and overall writing community have instead shifted to Threads, the social media platform owned by Meta.
When Threads launched last year, I was one of the more than 100 million people who created accounts. However, at the time I wasn't impressed enough to keep using the platform. Few of my friends were there and I didn't see the critical mass of people needed to create the vibrant discussions I desired. I also wasn't thrilled with supporting a platform run by Mark Zuckerberg.
While this last point remains true, in the last year Threads had changed massively. Everyone I know in the genre and writing community now appears to be on Threads, and when I check the platform the algorithms continually pull me into discussions that are both interesting and civil.
And this trend has accelerated over the last two months, with new people and groups moving to Threads and trying to connect with each other. As Arachne Press said, "Like a lot of people we've ditched x. Looking for poets, publishers, authors, booksellers, librarians, musicians, singers, designers, artists, voice actors, book reviewers, and other bookish friends to talk books and music with."
And while Bluesky shows me discussions from people in the SF/F genre, Threads connects me with people across all literary genres. As Sophie B. Murphy said:
"New writers who have migrated from Twitter: WELCOME! You have just joined THE most active and robust social media network of writers I have encountered anywhere on the internet. Here, people post about their writing every day, ask questions, help each other navigate big milestones, and joke about coffee, punctuation, and the woes of the profession. Even better? They do it all while being, for the most part, REALLY nice. I've made so many friends here, and I hope you do, too."
All that said, I still love Bluesky. And Bluesky is also innovating, recently introducing "starter packs" that allows people to quickly follow a number of grouped accounts. This is a great way to connect with a community or friend group in a short amount of time. Maria Haskins, for example, created two starter packs for SFF magazines and podcasts – all you have to do is click "follow all" and you instantly are connected with the accounts of all those publications.
Because I report on the SF/F genre, I won't be deleting my X-Twitter account, which I need to access information posted there. However, I also won't be posting much on X-Twitter going forward. The platform is so full of misinformation, racism, hate, anger, shadow bans and hostile algorithms that it's nearly worthless.
Instead, Bluesky and Threads are now my go-to social media platforms, with Mastodon a distant third.
As Crockett Houghton said about Threads but with words that also apply to Bluesky, "I'd rather have 5,000 followers who are into books and film and writing and laughter, who interact and have fun than I would 30k who remain silent and uninterested. So- thanks, friends."
SFWA Updates
Following my report last week about what the hell's going on with SFWA, there have been several updates with the organization.
First, on August 26, SFWA interim president Anthony W. Eichenlaub sent an email to members stating that the board of directors had met and made progress on the following issues, including:
Creating a new and limited confidentiality agreement to replace the current NDAs;
Forming a Website Content Audit Taskforce "to locate and fix errors and omissions on the sfwa.org website."
Working on a statement regarding writers in crisis around the world. As Eichenlaub said in the email, "This statement has been stalled too long, and now it's on my desk. It needs some work, but I'm putting it as a top priority next week."
Has decided to use SFWA's Airtable volunteer database to facilitate communication between committees;
Has been working on strategies for replacing staff;
Appointed Michael Capobianco as SFWA's Past President Advisor. As Eichenlaub's email stated, "This is a painfully underutilized position in our Bylaws, and I think it's a critical piece to maintaining institutional knowledge on the Board. He was a fantastic help at our meeting."
All of this sounds good to me. In particular, institutional knowledge is something that SFWA has had trouble retaining so I'm happy to see Capobianco in this new role. For an example of what Capobianco brings to this role, he recently published a history of SFWA on the organization's website. Part one of this history can be read here, and part two here.
Strange Horizons Wins a Hugo!
In my recent Glasgow 2024 Worldcon report, I forgot to include something really big:
Strange Horizons won the Hugo Award for Best Semiprozine!!!
This was the magazine's twelfth nomination in that category but first win. Strange Horizons was also nominated twice in 2002 and 2005 for the now defunct Hugo Award for Best Website. The award was accepted in the name of the Strange Horizons Editorial Collective, a move that highlighted the magazine's unique nonprofit, collaborative effort.
I've been reading Strange Horizons since it was founded in the year 2000. The magazine was a pioneer in the early days of the online magazine movement and has remained relevant ever since, publishing unique and powerful stories you won't find anywhere else. It has sometimes seemed as if the SF/F genre takes Strange Horizons for granted and doesn't acknowledge the hard work hundreds of volunteers have undertaken over the last 24 years to keep this magazine going. So I'm glad they've won their first Hugo.
And don't think the magazine is resting on their laurels. Strange Horizons is currently partnering with Fight for the Future, Compost Magazine, and RightsCon on a cutting-edge submission call about surveillance tech being used to curtail the rights of communities around the world.
Other Worldcon and Hugo News
Nicholas Whyte, who was this year's administrator of the Hugo Awards, has written two posts detailing his experience. The first post is here. In Whyte's second post, he makes this excellent observation: "I think that those who love the Business Meeting need to realise that less is more; that making it a smaller burden and less of a time sink for Worldcon members will improve its popularity. The fact that we successfully got through all of the business in 20 hours should be set against the fact that there was far too much business in the first place. This won't be changed by passing new rules; a cultural shift is needed."
As Yilin Wang wrote, "The Hugo Awards ceremony didn't just have 'mistakes in the Chinese captions.' It literally turned characters in author Baoshu's and Han Song's names into square boxes with a X, and left out Gu Shi's name in Chinese altogether... It also failed to list Baoshu's translator Xueting."
Emily Tesh, who won the Hugo Award for Best Novel for Some Desperate Glory, gave one of the best speeches of the night. Daniel Roman wrote a great overview of the Hugo ceremony and also transcribed the speech. Here's the opening part of Tesh's speech, but I suggest you read the entire speech along with Roman's entire column: "Here is my hope for this book," Tesh said, "I hope this book disappears. I hope it joins the honorable, very honorable ranks of past Hugo winners, which spoke to a particular community at a particular time and not to all of history. And I hope for that disappearance because no one sets out to write a science fiction dystopia wanting to be proved right. And Some Desperate Glory is a book which was inspired by some of the worst of what is happening in the world today.
I mentioned in my Worldcon coverage that Dave McCarty was seen in various Glasgow hotels during Worldcon but not allowed into official convention spaces. Well, here's Ursula Vernon describing a wonderful encounter with McCarty at Worldcon: "Although I of course, was elsewhere at the time, I am told a woman wearing a really great hat encountered Dave McCarty in a hotel lobby and called him everything but a child of God. At quite high volume. Possibly with some profanity. I am also told the woman with the hat had quite a turn of phrase." Vernon added, "Several witnesses corroborate that the phrase 'I hope you step on a Lego every day of your miserable life' was among others uttered with, we are told, the sort of delivery one might expect from someone who gives the occasional heartfelt speech about slime molds, but this is, of course, conjecture."
Finally, there's a beautiful illustration by Lar Desouza of the really great hat encounter.
Awards
In Ascension by Martin MacInnes won the Arthur C. Clarke Award
Clare Winger Harris won the 2024 Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award, intended to bring attention to lesser-known SF and fantasy authors.
The Otherwise Award, formerly named the Tiptree Award, has been on hold for the last few years, with the 2022 and 2023 awards still not announced. However, in a positive move a "new direction" for the award has been announced. As the announcement stated, "We're now returning from the pause with a new streamlined process, and we're moving forward with the award for work published in 2024." As part of this new direction, recommendations of 2024 works are being accepted through mid-November, with the 2024 honor list expected to be announced in March 2025.
The shortlist for the 2024 British Fantasy Award was announced on August 15, with people immediately noticing an interesting fact: David Green, the secretary of the British Fantasy Society, which runs the award, received five nominations in four different categories. File770 explores the reaction to this and the overall controversy.
Other News and Info
House of Gamut, a publisher and nonprofit community founded in 2023 by R.B Wood and Richard Thomas that focuses on dark speculative fiction, announced that Gamut Magazine will end publication with the December issue. However, in good news Gamut Publishing will be spun off into a new company called Ruadan Books, with all anthology and novel contracts honored. They announcement adds that all current publication dates will also be met.
The Chinese Science Fiction Database (CSFDB) has launched the non-profit Xanadu Project, which aims to bring Chinese speculative works to a global audience. According to the project's About Us page, there are approximately 35,184 SFF works written in Chinese languages but only 823 (2.3%) of those have been translated into another language and 494 (1.4%) into English. File770 published a press release that gives more details about the project.
Recently on TikTok there was a viral video about how some people hate third person stories. As Portia of Queen of Books wrote, "booktok has rotted y'all's brains cause what do you mean you can't read a book in third person?" Elizabeth Sandifer responded by saying "I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that we should salute the YA publishing industry for proving, contrary to all previous theories of education, that reading can actually decrease literacy." This comment was pushed back on, with one person noting that "i personally like both first and third person books but having preferences like that is fine" while another pointed out "This is so interesting because fanfic readers seem to prefer 3rd person… are booktok and fandom diverging?" Finally, Skibidi Duelist said "Not to nitpick but the video in the original post is clearly about smut, which is what dominates 'booktok'. Idk why this post is honing in on YA cause the YA books that immediately come to my mind are third-person." And it should also be pointed out that Bookblooom, who posted the original TikTok video about not liking third person, created a more detailed video explaining their reasoning.
Brandon Sanderson's Cosmere RPG Kickstarter raised nearly 15 million dollars, well above the original $250,000 goal.
Three-Lobed Burning Eye is running a Kickstarter to keep their magazine going, which has been publishing dark SF/F/H fiction for 25 years.
As reported by Ersatz Culture on File770, Science Fiction World has announced several changes to the magazine's senior management, with Hugo Award finalist Yao Haijun "now ultimately responsible for all SFW editorial output."
Late last year, Victoria Strauss wrote about how to spot fake literary agencies on Writer Beware. Now Strauss is back with a new post examining the latest crop of fake agencies and what to watch out for.
Strauss also raises questions about the Literary Reporter (TLR) website, which has been emailing writers offering "placement for their books on the TLR website, plus promotion to 'supported book groups' (none named) and a listing in the TLR newsletter, which claims a subscribership of 25,000."
Maurice Broaddus worked to reopen the Paul Laurence Dunbar Library, Indianapolis' first library for Black residents, more than a century after it originally opened to the public.
In Ethiopia, paleoanthropologists have discovered fossils and stone points dating back 74,000 years ago, proving people back then were making bows and arrows.
Fans and writers of historical fiction will likely be fascinated by these 18th century illustrations of arms and armour from Awadh (Oudh) in Northern India.
This new Tom Gauld cartoon showcases the life cycle of writers going from optimism to pessimism and back again while working on a story.
The winners of the Bulwer-Lytton Awards for Worst Opening Paragraph have been announced. Lawrence Person won the grand prize with "She had a body that reached out and slapped my face like a five-pound ham-hock tossed from a speeding truck." Diana Murtaugh won the award in the Fantasy & Horror category for "Sir Arthur Pendragon, High King of the Britons, son of King Uther Pendragon, nephew of King Aurelius Ambrosius, who was in turn the son of a long list of people who weren't kings and thus don't matter, only slept with his sister once, but boy did it come back to bite him in the ass."
Opportunities
The Watermelon Grant offers $2000 to an emerging Palestinian creator in the field of speculative arts and will open for submissions from September 17 to December 6, 2024. The grant is funded by L. D. Lewis and administered by Dream Foundry's Incubator Program. Details>> In addition, anyone wishing to donate to the project can do so here.
Strange Horizons has partnered with Fight for the Future, Compost Magazine, and RightsCon in a submission call for stories that "interrogate the ways surveillance tech is being used to curtail the rights of communities around the world." Five stories will be purchased for publication in a special issue of Strange Horizons. In addition, one author will be invited to participate in an expenses-paid trip to the 13th RightsCon, the world's leading summit on human rights in the digital age, in Taipei, Taiwan from February 24-27, 2025. Details>>
Small Wonders is currently open for original and reprint flash fiction along with reprint art. Details>>
Clarion West announced their instructors for their 2025 workshop, who are Maurice Broaddus, Malka Older, Diana Pho, and Martha Wells. Applications will open this December and scholarships will be available. Details>>
You forgot a social media spot: Tumblr. While Tumblr has it's issues, there's still a lot of authors who are over there and doing their thing.