Jackson and Nebula Award nominations

It’s been a few months since I last updated here. Since “Jamie Marks is Dead” debuted at in the Sundance Film Festival competition in January, a lot of other really wonderful things have occurred.

First, I was nominated for a Nebula Award in the category of Best Novelette for my story, “Paranormal Romance”!

This is the fourth time I’ve been nominated for a Nebula Award. The first time was in 2007 for my novelette, “The Language of Moths”, and the second time was in 2010 for my novel-in-stories, The Love We Share Without Knowing. The third time was in 2011, for my novelette, “Map of Seventeen”. Clearly the novelette is my category!

I’m always honored to be named a front runner for the Nebula Award, and this time is no different.

Secondly, my collection of short stories, Before and Afterlives, has been nominated for the Shirley Jackson Award, in the category of Best Single-Author Collection. I’m ecstatic to be nominated for this award. I started out as a short story writer, and it remains the form I feel most affection for, regardless of my becoming a novelist too. For Before and Afterlives to be nominated in the Best Collection category is the proverbial dream come true for me, both because the book collects many of the short stories I wrote over my first ten years as a writer, but also because Shirley Jackson has been a huge influence on me as writer for years and years. I constantly go back to her strange and eerie stories from the 1950s and 60s and the still hold immense power for me as a reader (and as a writer). For my stories to be recognized as a body of work for this award is really affirming for me.

The semester at Youngstown State University, where I teach fiction writing, has finally ended, and I’m looking forward to a productive summer of writing. More news when I have any to share. Until then, I hope everyone reading this has a great summer.

And good luck to all of those nominated for the above awards.