The secret to life is don't be a jerk

I tweeted this yesterday because so many people are holding Dave Truesdale up as a martyr for free speech and censorship. As if everyone should hijack convention panels they're supposed to moderate and which hundreds of people had chosen to attend.

Other people are taking a slightly different approach, saying that they've seen much worse behavior than Truesdale's at conventions, behavior which didn't result in anyone being kicked out.

I disagree with both of these views.

There was no censorship of Truesdale. He's free to say what he wants on whatever subject he wants, as he is now doing at Tangent Online. He also could have asked Worldcon for a specific panel on the topic he addressed, or raised the topic in the short fiction panel without hijacking an entire discussion he was supposed to moderate. Truesdale did neither of these last two options. Instead of moderating the panel — ie, facilitating the discussion around a specific subject — he took over the panel and forced the other panelists and the audience to engage with his own beliefs.

As for saying that there's been worse behavior at conventions, that's a very wrong way to excuse bad behavior. No wrong behavior at conventions or other places should ever be tolerated merely because worse has been done in the past.

For those defending Truesdale's actions, I ask the following: How would you feel if the panelists and moderators at this year's World Fantasy Convention took over all the panels? If you showed up for a panel about your favorite author and instead learned the panelists were going to discuss a totally different subject?

Think this is a silly example? Well, there are already many complaints about the WFC panel line-up. There's even an alternate #guerrillaWFC list of panels online.

Would the people supporting Truesdale's actions be okay if all the panels at WFC were hijacked? Or if every panel at every convention was subject to extremely going off topic or being changed at the whim of the moderator and panelists?

I'm not advocating the hijacking of the WFC panels (and according to Sarah Pinsker, WFC may be addressing the legitimate concerns raised about their panel choices). But understand that if people support Truesdale's actions in this case, they're opening up many other cases they may not support.

The simple truth is that if Truesdale had raised his issues in the panel in a civil manner without hijacking the panel, people would have discussed them. But he didn't do this. He came prepared to derail the entire panel and force people to deal with him. He was a jerk and behaved like a jerk and people reacted accordingly.

Funny thing about life. If you're not a jerk people will discuss things with you even when they disagree with what you're saying.

Worldcon in a series of scattered thoughts

  • Jason Sizemore is right — the best moment of MidAmericon II was Rachel Swirsky reading her Nebula Award winning short story "If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love." The story is powerful to read. But to hear those beautiful and moving words in Rachel's voice ... Wow. What more can I say?
     
  • At the reading I read "Death Flowers of Never-Forgotten Love," which was inspired by Rachel's story. And the fiction read by Adam-Troy Castro and Kate Kate Elliott was also super awesome and disturbing.
     
  • I have nothing more to say on the Dave Truesdale short fiction fiasco. However, if you want a detailed eye-witness summary of what happened, Dave Creek has written the best account I've read. You'll have to log into Facebook to read it.
     
  • Read Alyssa Wong's thread on what happened to her at Worldcon. This is unacceptable and should never happen to anyone. Take a stand for the good and work to prevent pain like this from reoccurring.
     
  • Lots of great summaries of Worldcon and the Hugo Awards out there. My favorites include ones from Monica Valentinelli, Abigail Nussbaum, and Rich Horton.
     
  • Maurice Broaddus. By this time next year you're going to be like damn man, Maurice Broaddus is everywhere. And he deserves to be because he's one of the best people I know in the genre. You go Maurice!
     
  • I met too many great people to name them all, so I'm not even going to try (but they know who they are). That's what makes Worldcon and the entire SF/F community so great — the people. Never forget that without the people in our genre our genre would be nothing. Always remember to treat people well and with respect even if you disagree with them. But the flip side to that is to also not tolerate wrong behavior merely because someone is well-known in the genre or a friend of yours. Call out the wrongness but keep to the happiness.
     
  • Final thought. This was my first Worldcon and I want to thank everyone who made me feel welcome and came to my panels and took the time to say hello. Again, it's the people who matter.

Year's best SF/F, January to June 2016 edition

I love science fiction and fantasy stories. I love nominating works for the Hugo and Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. But what I don't love is reading tons of works at the end of each year in a desperate bid to fill out my award nominations. After all, cram reading is rarely fun reading.

So this year I promised to get ahead of the curve. Below are my favorite stories and novels from the first half of 2016. I strongly recommend people seek out and read all these stories.

While I feel the list is fairly complete, it's still possible I'll read some works published between January and June 2016 and add them. For example, I'm behind on my reading from Asimov's and Interzone, and may be adding a few stories from those magazines. I'm also fairly certain I'll add a novella or two because I'm just now reading Monstrous Little Voices: New Tales Shakespeare's Fantasy World, which features novellas by five of my favorite fantasy authors (Adrian Tchaikovsky, Emma Newman, Jonathan Barnes, Foz Meadows and Kate Heartfield).

As an FYI, I'm tracking my picks for the year's best SF/F through the SFWA Recommended Reading list. You can access all of my recommended works, including works from the second half of 2016 which I'll add in the coming months, at that link.

January - June 2016 Novels

  • All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders (Tor)
  • City of Blades by Robert Jackson Bennett (Broadway Books)
  • Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones (William Morrow)
  • The Fireman by Joe Hill (William Morrow)
  • The Race by Nina Allan (Titan Books. Note: This novel was originally published in the U.K. in 2014 but was released in the U.S. this year in a revised edition, making it eligible for this year's awards.)
  • The Winged Histories by Sofia Samatar (Small Beer Press)

January to June 2016 Novellas

  • Forest of Memory by Mary Robinette Kowal (Tor.com)
  • The Coward's Option by Adam-Troy Castro (Analog)
  • The Liar by John P. Murphy (F&SF)
  • Under the Stone by Karoline Georges (Anvil Press. Note: See my review of this excellent novella.)

Janurary to June 2016 Novelettes

  • Empty Planets by Rahul Kanakia (Interzone)
  • Fifty Shades of Grays by Steven Barnes (Lightspeed)
  • Motherboard (A Tale from Somewhere) by Jeffrey Thomas (Interzone)
  • Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea by Sarah Pinsker (Lightspeed)
  • The Shores of Being by Dave Creek (Analog)
  • The Stone War by Ted Kosmatka (F&SF)
  • We Will Wake among the Gods, among the Stars by Caroline Yoachim & Tina Connolly (Analog)
  • You'll Surely Drown Here If You Stay by Alyssa Wong (Uncanny Magazine)

January to June 2016 Short Stories

  • Between Dragons and Their Wrath by An Owomoyela & Rachel Swirsky (Clarkesworld)
  • Laws of Night and Silk by Seth Dickinson (Beneath Ceaseless Skies)
  • Life in Stone, Glass, and Plastic by José Pablo Iriarte (Strange Horizons)
  • Lullaby for a Lost World by Aliette de Bodard (Tor.com)
  • Michael Doesn’t Hate His Mother by Marie Vibbert (Lightspeed)
  • No Matter Which Way We Turned by Brian Evenson (People Holding ...)
  • Sic Semper, Sic Semper, Sic Semper by Douglas F. Warrick (Tor.com)
  • Sweet Marrow by Vajra Chandrasekera (Strange Horizons)
  • The Red Thread by Sofia Samatar (Lightspeed)
  • The Right Sort of Monsters by Kelly Sandoval (Strange Horizons)
  • The Secret Mirror of Moriyama House by Yukimi Ogawa (F&SF)
  • The Silver Strands of Alpha Crucis-d by N. J. Schrock (F&SF)
  • The Unmistakable Smell of Wood Violets by Angélica Gorodischer, translated by Marian Womack (The Big Book of Science Fiction. Note: This story was first published in English this year, making it eligible for 2016 awards.)
  • Things With Beards by Sam J. Miller (Clarkesworld)
  • Three Points Masculine by An Owomoyela (Lightspeed Magazine)
  • Two Small Birds by Han Song, translated by John Chu (The Big Book of Science Fiction. Note: This story was first published in English this year, making it eligible for 2016 awards.)
  • Unreeled by Mercurio D. Rivera (Asimov's Science Fiction)
  • Welcome to the Medical Clinic at the Interplanetary Relay Station | Hours Since the Last Patient Death: 0 by Caroline M. Yoachim (Lightspeed)
  • White Dust by Nathan Hillstrom (Asimov's)

Review of Under the Stone by Karoline Georges

One of the most exciting novellas I’ve read this year is Under the Stone by Quebec author Karoline Georges. The story focuses on a child born in cell number 804 on the 5969th level of a massive building containing all remaining humans in the world.

The child grows up both mentally and physically trapped by this cell while also learning to survive an abusive father and fearful mother, who are as trapped as the child and take their anger and disgust out on their offspring. The child's only escape — the possible movement of the incalculable amounts of concrete surrounding the cell and a crack which may bring about the ultimate transformation in the child.

This psychological and philosophical novella is beautifully written and reads like a modern-day version of George Orwell's 1984, presenting a claustrophobic view of life where society reduces humans to our most basic instincts and needs.

Originally published in French as Sous Beton in 2010, the novella was released in English a few months ago by Anvil Press, an independent publisher from Vancouver. I highly recommend people check it out. Under the Stone will definitely be on my shortlist of novellas for the major SF awards.

As a side note, I purchased the novella from Bakka Phoenix Books on a recent visit to Toronto. There was a misprint in my book and the staff at Bakka went above and beyond in making sure I received a new copy so I could finish reading the story. Many thanks to them. Be sure to check out their excellent SF/F bookstore if you're in the area.

Stop the Goodreads bullies ... stopped?

Who could have predicted that authors attacking readers would not end well?

It appears Stop the Goodreads Bullies (STGRB), a group of authors including Anne Rice who campaigned to punish readers who post multiple "bad" reviews on Goodreads and other sites, has shut down. Their website is now defunct, pulling up only a generic placeholder site by the domain hosting company.

For more on the inane history of this group, check out my post on STGRB from two years ago. I also suggest reading Foz Meadows' analysis or this Dear Author post. 

The circumstances of the STGRB site disappearing also suggest behind the scenes drama in the group. According to the Wayback Machine, the last post on the site was in December 2015. The site also experienced intermittent outages this year. 

But it now appears the site is down for good. Internic is reporting the STGRB site has a "ClientTransferProhibited" hold on their url, while the STGRB hosting company (see screengrab) says "The domain [stopthegrbullies.com] has been banned from being used on FastDomain."

What does all that mean? Did someone merely forget to renew the url when it expired or were more serious actions taken against STGRB? I have no idea, but either way it appears Stop the Goodread Bullies has been stopped. Much to the enjoyment of readers everywhere.