Quick Sips 09/30/2022

For those who hadn’t seen it yet, We’re Here 2021 is now released and out in the world! It is super pretty thanks to cover artwork by Paul Kellam, who did a fabulous and colorful cover for Fiyah and whose Insta is incredibly gay and thirsty so obviously it was a fabulous fit for the second year of We’re Here. I do recommend people check out snag a print copy as soon as possible, because they tend to go fast. But it’s exciting launching year two now that the inaugural volume is a Locus and Ignyte award winner. Onward!

Quick Sips 09/23/2022

It turns out We’re Here 2020 won an Ignyte Award! Which means that I, as one of its editors, gets a shiny gold medal! Fucking right! I am incredibly honored by this, and incredibly proud to have had the opportunity to work with C.L. Clark and all the authors featured in the anthology. I was a bit too shocked and fuddled during the ceremony to make a great speech (in part because I think I was booted from the stage before I could and then wasn’t sure what was happening so I panicked to some extent), but basically what I was trying to say is that I’m incredibly grateful that I can do something that I love, that is all about reading great stories and sharing them. The hard work, that of the authors who wrote and got the works published previously, is arguably the more difficult, but I’m really happy all the same to be a part of it, and am floored that the We’re Here 2020 went undefeated for the awards it was up for. Thanks to everyone who voted for it!!!

Quick Sips 09/16/2022

So I’m back to being behind on things…kind of. I mean, I did catch up on Sip of the Week posts (and hope to have another one out today for patrons, but I also just feel behind in general. Most of that is purely personal—for whatever reason there’s a lot going on. Some of it’s good, some of it’s not so good, and all of it is taking something of a toll. So the struggle bus continues to roll its way.

Quick Sips 09/09/2022

Well, I didn’t win a Hugo Award. Indeed, Quick Sip Reviews ended up tied for fifth place with the estimable The Full Lid. Which is about as high as I’ve ever placed in the Hugo Awards. So it’s humbling in many ways—in that I’m humbled to be honored as a Hugo finalist, and in that I’m faced once more that I’ll probably never reach that particular brass ring, or at least not as a dedicated short fiction reviewer. Which…fair. As I’ve said before, what I do is rather niche, and it’s hard to be particularly angry that it means that it’s always going to be a far stretch to compete with projects/blogs/writers who cover a wider (and arguably more popular) field.

Quick Sips 09/02/2022

So it’s WorldCon week and alas I am not going to be there in person. It’s my fifth year as a hugo finalist, and I’ve only been able to attend in person once, though for the past three years that has been at least in part pandemic related. The rest has been down to not being able to afford to go. Indeed, the only way I attended in San Jose was because there was such an effort to get finalists there who couldn’t otherwise afford. It was incredibly appreciated, and definitely a highlight in my time as a finalist. I had hoped, what with Chicago so close, that this year was going to be a sure thing, but some complications, including a lingering pandemic, have made it impossible. Boo.