The final ballot for the 2017 Dragon Awards has been released! I’m honored to announce that my highly praised space opera novel The Secret Kings has been nominated for Best Science Fiction Novel.
Because the Dragon Awards do not yet have a Best Editor category, I promised to share the honor with my amazing editor L. Jagi Lamplighter were SK to win a nomination. Now that you, the readers, have voiced your will, I give the well-earned credit to Jagi.
In all honesty, Jagi is a major reason why my Soul Cycle books have consistently punched above their weight in the cutthroat world of genre publishing. Therefore I’m going one step further and declaring that, should The Secret Kings win the 2017 Dragon Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, I will gladly cede the award to Jagi. She earned it on last year’s Best Horror Novel Souldancer, and she’s definitely earned it here.
Congratulations are also due since Rachel and the Many Splendored Dreamland, which Jagi authored, has received a Best YA Novel nomination. Many readers are torn over whether to vote for Jagi or her illustrious husband John C. Wright, who is also nominated in the same category.
Hopefully, these voters will consider The Secret Kings as a way to resolve their dilemma. Sincere thanks for your support!
I also extend hearty congratulations to all of this year’s nominees. There are some intriguing names on that list, including–but not limited to–Jon Del Arroz, Vox Day, Kai Wai Cheah, Daniel Humphreys, and Declan Finn.
But one nominee sticks out from the others like a blue lipstick-smudged thumb:
After getting blown out last year, the SF SJWs who beclowned the Hugo Awards have bestirred themselves in an effort to converge the Dragons. 2016 showed them that they need to bring their A game.
Unfortunately for them, the best they could muster turned out to be Scalzi. This is the Tor author whose “blockbuster novel” was getting outsold so badly by a hastily written parody that an SJW at Amazon had to intervene to stop the CogDis.
The CHORFs think they have a ringer in Scalzi. After all, he’s got a rep for racking up award wins. Unlike me, he’s historically done it through logrolling in tradpub-dominated contests where a small clique composed of his Tor benefactors run the table.
Not so with the Dragons. Look at that list again. There are some prominent tradpub names, but the ballot is brimming with indies, including heavy hitters like B.V. Larson, David Van Dyke, and Richard Fox.
If you want an accurate cross-section of the current state of the industry, you could do much worse than the 2017 Dragon ballot.
It’s thanks to dedicated readers like you that we made it so far in such a relatively short time.
But we can’t rest on our laurels. The Dragons are an open contest, and that openness brings with it the risk of dirty tricks–like the CHORFs pulled when they shelled out tens of thousands of dollars to stuff the ballot box at the Hugos under the guise of “scholarships”.
That’s why we have to stay focused and present a united front to keep the entryists from gaining a foothold. As indies, our greatest advantage is also our greatest drawback. It’s nigh impossible to get a small group of us to agree on pizza toppings, never mind which books to support.
But the SF SJWs are a fun-destroying monolith, and they’ve declared their intention to overrun the Dragon Awards. We who prize fun science fiction over nagging civics lectures must hang together or hang separately.
Happily, the relative quality of the nominated works makes our job easy.
I also have advantages as an indie that simply aren’t available to tradpub authors mired in the analog mindset. That’s how I beat a number of trad authors to become the first indie Dragon winner last year, and that’s what gives me an edge over Scalzi now. But as always, Jagi and I can’t win without your help!
Get The Secret Kings–now free through Kindle Unlimited here!
Register to receive your free 2017 Dragon Award ballot here!
//But the SF SJWs are a fun-destroying monolith, and they've declared their intention to overrun the Dragon Awards.//
First I've heard about this Brian. I'm pretty sure I count as a SF SJW and I've certainly written a fair chunk of stuff about the Dragon Awards.
The only intention I have towards the Dragon Awards is eating more popcorn.
"…I've certainly written a fair chunk of stuff about the Dragon Awards."
I did not know that.
First Law applies here, Brian.
SJW isn't a position on the left right spectrum, it's a personality defect. There are outright Communists who are not SJWs. You might as well declare " well I am a borderline sociopath ".
On the hand, Camel is saying no sjw antics are planned (because he'd have gotten a memo I guess). On the other, he's making popcorn for an expected show. Interesting.
They revealed their plan in The Verge.
1) Get out in front of the story and spin the Dragon Awards according to the CHORF narrative.
2) Arbitrarily make # of Goodreads reviews the sole criterion for award-worthiness.
3) Rally the troops and advance.
Lucky for us, the SJW playbook still relies on their legacy media allies pushing a CHORF-sympathetic frame. GG, SP, and RP taught us how to get in the middle of their narrative-building and take control of it.
I don't really care what stupid games they want to play. The voting process is really simple and the math required to count the votes doesn't require a master's degree to understand. If Scalzi can convince more of his fans to vote for his shit than anyone else, more power to him. There will be no noah awards or wooden assholes.
I find it interesting though, that the sjw's are so into an award that they say doesn't mean anything. After all, they have the real awards. Yeah, SJW's do lie.
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Yep. Rally the fans.
Frankly, I hope they can convince all the envy-twisted scolds that the Dragon Awards are meaningless because only hoi polloi vote in them for stuff they like.
But I doubt it. Whenever a CHORF like camel-whosis finds folk innocently enjoying something, he has to put on his Grinch suit and piss on their parade.
Sad.
(N.B. Lordy, I hate AutoCorrect)
@Chris
That's why we need to out-mobilize them.
"I find it interesting though, that the sjw's are so into an award that they say doesn't mean anything."
Law 1 in action, like Man of the Atom said. Remember how their tune constantly changed during Sad Puppies?
"The Hugos aren't a popularity contest among our clique! They recognize the best works in the field. Anyone can compete. You guys just suck."
That changed to: "The Hugos aren't for any Tom, Dick, or Harry off the street! They belong to us TruFans! Get your own award."
Which became: "OK. The Hugos are a closed race to crown the favorite authors of our dwindling sub-subset of fandom. How dare you make your own award! Move aside, we're taking over!"
The other interesting thing is how the CHORFs never say, "Let's make it a fair fight, and may the best man win."
@Hobbit
Someone's been paying attention 🙂