Mythopoeic Society Awards

[alanajoli]

Most of what I've been reading in the past two months are books on the Mythopoeic Society Fantasy Awards longlists. We can't talk about the selections, and from the conversations via e-mail with the other judges, I think I may place more value on fun novels (or, novels that are both worthwhile and enjoyable, rather than worthwhile but wearing to read, or enjoyable but fluffy) than some of the rest of the committee. But, as Twostripe says, diversity in judges is important, and if I shift us slightly away from valuing style above many other qualities, I'm all right with that. I've remembered that I really enjoy reading what I think Shanna Swendson (shanna_s) calls a transparent writing style -- writing that you don't notice for itself, because you're so into the story being told.

At any rate, I've just turned in my votes for the final five in the children's category. I turned in my adult votes on Friday. I am very eager to see what comes out on the finalist list! I'll probably talk a bit about them here when the list is announced.

In the meantime, I need to get some writing done. Twostripe has promised me an hour or three tomorrow to focus on writing while he watches Bug; this should allow me to get caught up with Blood and Tumult and possibly get some work done on the autobio project, making the final corrections before I start the typesetting process. But outside of that time, we're planning to spend most of the day at the beach! We had a cookout with the Mythic Greece gamers, niliphim, and the bananapants/bananaplants family. Gaming and a cookout at the beach? Can't be beat!