Nebulous

February 10

It's a happy day in the PrattShaw household. Heather's first pro sale, "Famishing", is up at SH. Go read it! It's great!

And, for my news...

Last night I dreamed, very vividly, that I'd been nominated for a Nebula. In my dream, I opened a copy of Locus, and looked at the feature page, and there were the nominees, and there was my name. I woke and told Heather about the dream, and remarked that I knew it was not a prophetic dream; I do not have prophetic dreams. I made coffee, and I showered. I thought of going upstairs and checking the private SFWA newsgroups to see if the final ballot had been posted, but I didn't, because I wanted to prolong the fantasy, I wanted to be able to imagine for the rest of the morning that I could, possibly, have my name appear on the Nebula ballot; me, a near-total unknown, only 26 years old, with more toes than pro sales. It seemed spectacularly unlikely, and I didn't want to spoil the fantasy. I knew I'd find out when I got to work, since the magazine I work for helps out SFWA by vetting the Nebula ballot for errors in spelling, publication dates, etc.

So I bid Heather farewell, and headed out of the house, and got into my car, and started toward work. Then I remembered that I'd forgotten a book, and turned back to get it. When I came into the house, Heather came running out of her bedroom (she was, rather fetchingly, still naked from her shower), and told me she'd just gotten e-mail from our friend Vera Nazarian. She'd sent the final ballot... and my story, "Little Gods", from that Notorious Style Monkey mag Strange Horizons, was there, in the short story category.

My name. On a Nebula final ballot. This is something I've dreamed of for years, something I didn't expect to happen to me for decades. (I mean: this is the first appearance on the Nebula final ballot for Gregory Frost, and for Carol Emswhiller, who've been producing great fiction since I was a wee thing, or even yet-unborn; the first appearance for honest-to-god stars like China Miéville and Charles Stross. What am I doing there? The only person on the ballot I feel roughly contemporaneous with is Charles Coleman Finlay, who I hear is a very nice guy, and who is certainly talented, but with whom I've never even exchanged an e-mail pleasantry. I feel, quite literally, out of my league; and, like someone called up from the minors to play in the Show, I feel immensely fortunate. And I must be a bit dazed, still, if I'm using a baseball metaphor.)

So, Heather told me, and I fell over into a pile of laundry. I didn't intend it to be dramatic; I just went "thump." Of course, I was woozed-out on cough medicine, since I have a vicious cold, so that probably contributed to my unsteadiness. I'll tell you, though -- nothing makes you forget a stuffed-up nose and body aches like the adrenaline rush of getting a spot on a major awards ballot for the first time. For me, anyway. Your mileage may naturally vary.

I won't win, so I won't get to make a speech, so: Thanks to Heather, for being so supportive when I began writing this story at Wiscon in 2001, though it was our first weekend together as lovers, and there were certainly other things we could have been doing. Thanks to Meg, for inspiring the story in so many ways. Thanks to Jed, Susan, and the mysterious Chris for deciding to publish it. And thanks to everyone who read it, to the ones who nominated it, and especially to the members of the Nebula award jury, who plucked me from obscurity and put my work in a position to be read by a great many more people than would have done so otherwise.

I'll always be a Nebula-nominated author. For the rest of my career. My footnote in the history of the small, lovely world of SF is assured. Maybe it'll be pathetic, if I'm 60 and I've never accomplished anything else ("Don't talk to me like that, posthuman whippersnapper! I'm a Nebula-nominated author!"), but for now, for a while yet, it's marvelous, remarkable, good, good, good.

And for your perusal, the Final Nebula Ballot is up at Locus Online.

Work was hard, because I was distracted by giddiness, and when that wore off, I felt like ass because of my cold, and I had a pile of work on my desk about three inches deep. But the day passed (having a lot to do makes things go quickly), and I came home, and my dear Heather and the lovely Susan Marie and I went out for celebratory sushi. Triple celebration; my nomination, Heather's story going online, Susan's magazine publishing a story that got a Nebula nomination (the only story on the ballot from an online source, it should be mentioned). Good sushi, good talk, much going "Whoo." And now I'm in my room, and my breathtakingly beautiful and talented love is sitting in the nice chair in the corner reading Transmetropolitan, and... and... and I was nominated for a Nebula. This is a nice day.

So. Guess I should see about getting time off to go to the awards banquet in Philly, huh? And get tickets, and etc. This is the sort of thing credit cards are made for...

***

There are other things to write about -- Heather's birthday party, Scott & Lynne bringing wine and fine chili, Atari games, and other things. But this Nebula thing sort of overshadows all that. I'll get to it. This is enough, for now.

Words written since February 1, 2003: 3,600

Words written since last entry:
0. But that's okay.

Stories written this month:

• "Living with the Harpy"
• The Train Story (tentatively "Helljack"), with Mike Jasper