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I am now officially a Nebula Award winner!

So, a couple of weeks ago the official SFWA Twitter account posted this:

My immediate reaction was a snarky grin and I prepared to tweet a gentle correction. Everyone knows that the Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy is not a Nebula. It said so in the Nebula Rules at the time I won the award (“14.a. The Andre Norton Award for Outstanding Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy Book, established in 2006, is awarded in tandem with the Nebula Awards. This award is not a Nebula, but shall follow all Nebula rules and procedures except as follows.”) Except that I am a pedant, and I wanted to check my sources before tweeting.

So I checked the current Nebula Rules. And that phrase is no longer there. (“15.1. The Andre Norton Award for Outstanding Young Adult Science Fiction or Fantasy Book, established in 2006, is awarded in tandem with the Nebula Awards. This award shall follow all Nebula rules and procedures except as follows.”) However, other phrases in the rules, such as “The winners of the Nebula Awards, Bradbury Award, and Andre Norton Award shall be announced at an annual Nebula Awards ceremony” implied that the distinction still exists.

Suddenly I was Schroedinger’s Award Winner. Was I a Nebula winner or not? That depended on whether the change was deliberate and whether it applied retroactively. Not that it really mattered, of course. The award trophy is the same, and it means exactly as much or as little as it did before. But, for me, it would be huge if I could call myself a Hugo- and Nebula-winning writer. I always wanted to, and I had been disappointed to discover after winning the Norton that I couldn’t. But now I could. Or could I?

So I wrote to the Nebula Award Commissioner for an official ruling. It took a week, but here it is:

From: Nebula Award Commissioner <nac@sfwa.org>
Date: Sun, Apr 7, 2019 at 1:50 PM
Subject: Congratulation
To: David D. Levine <david@daviddlevine.com>

David,
Just got confirmation back from the higher ups at SFWA.
Congratulations, you ARE a Nebula Award winning author.

Jim Hosek
Nebula Award Commissioner
Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America

There it is, in black and white. (On my screen, anyway.) I am now a Nebula Award Winning Author! And so are Sam J. Miller, Fran Wilde, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Nalo Hopkinson, E.C. Myers, Delia Sherman, Terry Pratchett, Cat Valente, Ysabeau S. Wilce, J. K. Rowling, Justine Larbalestier, and Holly Black. Congratulations to them!

David’s Index for 2018

Novel words written: 19,905
Short fiction words written: 34,859
Notes, outline, and synopsis words written: 29,064
Blog words written: 3,145
Total words written: 86,973

New stories written: 1

Short fiction submissions sent: 1
Responses received: 1
Rejections: 0
Acceptances: 1 (pro)
Other sales: 3 (1 reprint, 1 translation, 1 media)

Short stories published: 2 (reprint)

Award nominations: 0

Novels completed: 0
Novel submissions: 0
Novels published: 1

Happy new year!

What I published in 2018

I published one thing this year: Arabella the Traitor Of Mars, the conclusion of the Adventures of Arabella Ashby trilogy. It hasn’t gotten a lot of critical attention, but many people have told me they think it’s the best of the three.

And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that the “Adventures of Arabella Ashby” series is eligible for the Best Series Hugo.

Well, I had surgery after all.

We were hoping that wouldn’t be necessary, but it turned out that it was. We waited for four days for the blockage to clear by itself, but on Monday it became obvious that the tentative positive signs we had seen on Sunday were in fact only tentative. So I went right into surgery at 9:30am Monday.

I do not remember the procedure at all. The last thing I remember was the anesthesiologist telling me he was going to give me something to calm me down. In the recovery room they told me the blockage was caused by a single band of scar tissue, so it was about as uncomplicated as could be. There’s no explanation where that scar tissue came from, though. And my guts were pretty angry from the blockage, so it’ll be at least several days until I can eat.

Right now my pain is pretty well managed at a level 4-5 on a scale of 10. We have to wait for my intestines to start working again before I can go home, but I hope to start walking around today and that should help that happen. I’m still in room 833 at Providence Portland Medical Center on NE Glisan.

Thank you all for your kind words and good wishes. Orycon is iffy but we’ll see.

Why you aren’t seeing me at that event

I had a lot of events planned this week and next — Scares & Squares, Charm City Spec, World Fantasy Con. Instead I am in the hospital.

It started last Thursday night, with severe abdominal pain. I took myself to the emergency room about midnight and they admitted me in short order.

I have had a bunch of obnoxious tests and the diagnosis is Small Bowel Obstruction. They put a tube in my nose and down to my stomach (the single most horrible experience of my life) to try to drain the fluid above the obstruction in hopes that when the pressure is relieved it will unkink itself. If that doesn’t work I’ll have to have surgery. :-(

I’m at Providence hospital on NE Glisan, room 833. I’m not very good company — I haven’t eaten or drunk anything in three days. I sleep a lot. But if you’d like to come by for a visit you’d be welcome.

In September, I am inescapable

Puny humans! Quake in fear, for in the month of September you will not be able to avoid me!

On Sep 4, 2018 in Portland, Oregon I will join Wendy Wagner in conversation at the Willamette Writers meeting.

On Sep 6, 2018 in Chicago, Illinois I will appear at the Deep Dish reading series along with Mary Robinette Kowal, Mary Anne Mohanraj, Chris Bauer, Cathy Crocco, Steve Silver, Allison Manley, and host Niala Boodhoo.

On Sep 8-9, 2018 I return to Portland, Oregon (what, did you believe that old saw about David never striking twice in the same place?) for Rose City Comic Con, at which I will be cosplaying as The Rocketeer and appearing on the panel Science Does Not Work That Way, Good Night, Volume 2!.

On Sep 16, 2018 I’ll appear in San Francisco, California at the SF in SF reading series, along with Sheila Finch and possibly one other reader.

And then, even if your city has escaped my personal devastation, on Sep 30, 2018 I will be doing a Read for Pixels Google Hangout online, which means everywhere!

But even if you hide in the cellar, cut off your Internet, and move to the East Coast, you still won’t be safe! In October and November I will be coming to Montréal, Baltimore, and more Baltimore before returning to Portland.

None shall escape! Bwah hah hah hah hah!

My Worldcon 76 program

I’ll be heading to San Jose this week for the World Science Fiction Convention. Here’s where you can find me:

History of Online Fandom
17 Aug 2018, Friday 13:00 – 14:00, room 230
David D. Levine (M), R-Laurraine Tutihasi, Mike Willmoth, Ruhan Zhao
Online interaction is the simple fact of Fannish activity today. It wasn’t always so. Some fans were early adopters of the Internet and its early alternatives. Some had to be dragged in. How did online fan activity get to be the way it is today?

Autographs
17 Aug 2018, Friday 16:00 – 17:00, Autographing
David D. Levine, SB Divya, William Ledbetter, Stephen W. Potts, Mariana Palova, John Kessel, Alasdair Stuart

Tor: Wild Cards Signing
18 Aug 2018, Saturday 10:00 – 14:00 PM, Autographing
George R. R. Martin, Kevin Andrew Murphy, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Mary Anne Mohanraj, Marko Kloos, Caroline Spector, Saladin Ahmed
The long awaited reprint of Wild Cards VIII: One Eyed Jacks is August 28th. But you have an opportunity to get a copy while at Worldcon and to get autographs from many of the authors. This is a special group signing. Copies of the trade paperback will be available from Borderlands Books, in the Dealer’s area. The authors will ONLY be signing Wild Cards books.

Wild Cards: An Ongoing Shared Universe
18 Aug 2018, Saturday 12:00 – 13:00 PM, room 210G
Kevin Andrew Murphy (M), George R. R. Martin, Marko Kloos, Melinda M. Snodgrass, Mary Anne Mohanraj
Who knew when Wild Cards was released in 1987 that it would grow to over 2 dozen books and still be going strong over 30 years later. The latest installments are Texas Hold ‘Em and Knaves Over Queens. The eighth book, One-Eyed Jacks, is being reprinted and released during the convention. Join the creators and authors for this discussion about how it all started, and where it’s going to be going.

Kaffeeklatsch: David D. Levine
19 Aug 2018, Sunday 10:00 – 11:00, room 211B

Surviving The Review: A Guide
19 Aug 2018, Sunday 15:00 – 16:00, room 210C
Charles Payseur, K.M. Szpara, David D. Levine, Carrie Patel, Derek McCaw
Your work is out there, and here come the reviews! What should writers know about reviews and how to handle them? Does the high of validation or the anxiety of public criticism ever go away? Let’s hear from a range of perspectives on how to deal with these feels.

Reading: David D. Levine
20 Aug 2018, Monday 11:00 – 11:30, room 210G

Hope to see you there!