On television there was a series of Showtime made-for-cable movies under the banner “Roger Corman Presents”, which resulted in inferior remakes of The Wasp Woman, Piranha, Not of This Earth and A Bucket of Blood (as Horror Café), along with original productions such as The Alien Within, Hellfire (aka Haunted Symphony), Sawbones and Bram Stoker’s Burial of the Rats. Here Come the Munsters, co-executive produced by John Landis, was an unfunny TV movie that included cameos by the surviving original cast members; The Invaders was a two-part mini-series featuring Scott Bakula and a brief cameo by original star Roy Thinnes; It Came from Outer Space II was a supposedly updated version of Jack Arnold’s 1950s classic; The Omen was a pilot film about a body-hopping entity; Disney produced yet another version of The Canterville Ghost, with Patrick Stewart as the titular phantom; The Haunting of Helen Weber was based on Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw; Susan Dey starred in Deadly Love, adapted from Sherry Gottlieb’s vampire novel Love Bite, and The Langoliers was a laughable three-hour mini-series based on the novel by Stephen King.
The hugely popular The X Files dominated genre TV in 1995, while Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman lost some of its edge and Babylon 5 continued to improve, thanks to its Lovecraftian subplot. Weird Science also improved with its second season, and the second series of the revived Outer Limits came up with some interesting stories. Highlander, Sliders and Forever Knight slogged on with the occasional surprise, and Strange Luck made a promising début thanks to a low-key performance by star D.B. Sweeney. American Gothic, an adult Eerie Indiana meets Twin Peaks, set in the strange southern town of Trinity, was cancelled after just one season, as were Nowhere Man, SeaQuest 2032 and the awful Earth 2. Johnny and the Dead, based on the book by Terry Pratchett, was filmed as both a four-and-a-half hour TV series and a feature movie. Executive producer Sam Raimi’s heroic fantasy series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Xena: Warrior Princess both featured some impressive CGI monsters, while Lars von Trier’s Danish mini-series, The Kingdom (aka Riget) was a bizarre blend of hospital soap-opera and Lovecraftian horror. The Mask became an animated show, but it was easily outclassed by executive producer Steven Spielberg’s wonderful cartoon Pinky and the Brain.
The fifth World Horror Convention was held in Atlanta over May 2nd–5th. Guests included writers John Farris, R.L. Stine, Neil Gaiman and artist Alan M. Clark. Fifth guest Alice Cooper failed to show up. Although Clive Barker won the convention’s official Grand Master Award, Deathrealm magazine also handed out a whole slew of awards, and author Nancy A. Collins inaugurated her own fan prize to recognize “the achievements of those who toil in the Horror/Dark Fantasy vineyard”. Under the somewhat grand title of The International Horror Critics Guild, the inaugural gargoyle statuettes (dubbed “Florentine Watchdogs”) were awarded to Anno Dracula by Kim Newman for Best Novel, Grave Markings by Michael Arnzen for Best First Novel, “Black Sun” by Douglas E. Winter for Best Short Form, “The Safety of Unknown Cities” by Lucy Taylor for Best Short Story, Angels & Visitations by Neil Gaiman for Best Collection, Love in Vein edited by Poppy Z. Brite for Best Anthology, Jonah Hex: Two Gun Mojo written by Joe R. Lansdale and drawn by Timothy Truman for Best Graphic Novel, Alan M. Clark for Best Artist, Interview With the Vampire for Best Film, and Answer Me! edited by Jim and Debbie Goad for Best Publication. Harlan Ellison won the Living Legend Award.
The Son of Famous Monsters of Filmland World Convention was held at the Universal Hotel in Hollywood over May 26th–28th. Although founder and editor Forrest J Ackerman was eclipsed by the money-making exploits of Ray Ferry and his Dynacomm publishing company, monster fans still had the chance to meet the likes of Ray Bradbury, Ray Harryhausen, Adam West, John Landis, John Agar, Davids Skal and Schow, Peter Atkins and numerous other celebrities from the worlds of film and literature.
White Wolf’s Steve Pagel was the principal speaker at the Horror Writers Association’s annual Stoker Awards weekend, held in New York City over June 9th–10th. The new HWA administration decided to drop the Other Media award category when it was discovered that it couldn’t be allowed under the current bylaws. Therefore the winners for superior achievement in the horror field were Nancy Holder’s Dead in the Water for Novel, Grave Markings by Michael Arnzen for First Novel, and The Early Fears by Robert Bloch for Collection. Bloch’s “The Scent of Vinegar” (from Dark Destiny) also picked up the Long Fiction award, Holder also won a second Stoker for “Café Endless: Spring Rain” (from Love in Vein), which tied with “The Box” by Jack Ketchum (from Cemetery Dance) in the Short Story category, and Christopher Lee was announced as the winner of the Life Achievement Award.
The theme of the 1995 World Fantasy Convention, held over October 26th–29th in Baltimore, Maryland, was “Celebrating the craft of short fiction in fantasy and horror.” Guest of Honour were writers Terry Bisson, Lucius Shepard and Howard Waldrop, artist Rick Berry, veteran publisher Lloyd Arthur Eshbach, and Edward Bryant as Toastmaster. The winners of the World Fantasy Awards were James Morrow for his novel Towering Jehovah, Elizabeth Hand for her novella “Last Summer at Mars Hill” (from The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction), and Stephen King for his short story, “The Man in the Black Suit”. Ellen Datlow picked up two awards, for her anthology Little Deaths and the Special Award–Professional, for editing. Bradley Denton’s The Calvin Coolidge Home for Dead Comedians and A Conflagration. Artist from Wildside Press was voted Best Collection, Best Artist was Jacek Yerka, and Bryan Cholfin won the Special Award – Non-Professional, for Broken Mirrors Press and Crank! magazine. The Life Achievement Award went to Ursula K. LeGuin. The weekend was marred by the theft from a Federal Express truck of twenty-three original paintings by Don Maitz and Janny Wurts.
Although the British Fantasy Society failed to organize its annual FantasyCon event, the British Fantasy Awards were still presented on October 29th at Welcome to My Nightmare, billed as “A Celebration of Horror Writing” by Swansea’s Festival of Literature in Wales. Guest of Honour Jonathan Carroll helped MC Graham Joyce announce the awards for Best Novel (Michael Marshall Smith for Only Forward), Best Collection (Joel Lane for The Earthwire), Best Short Story (“The Temptation of Dr. Stein” by Paul McAuley [from The Mammoth Book of Frankenstein]), Best Small Press (Necrofile edited by Dziemianowicz, Joshi and Morrison), Best Artist (Martin McKenna) and Best Newcomer (Maggie Furey). A Special Award was also presented to editor John Jarrold of Legend/Little, Brown.
California book dealer Barry R. Levin presented his 8th annual Collectors Award for Most Collectable Author of the Year to Lois McMaster Bujold and the special Lifetime Collectors Award to Everett F. Bleiler. There was no Most Collectable Book of the Year award announced in 1995.
Finally, Stephen King won the 1994 O. Henry Award for Best American Short Story for “The Man in the Black Suit” from The New Yorker.
So how important are awards? I’ve been lucky enough to win more than my fair share over the years, and The Best New Horror was recently the recipient of another one – The International Horror Critics Guild Award for Outstanding Achievement, presented at the 1996 World Horror Convention in Eugene, Oregon.
I’m proud to say that I have never actively solicited for any award, and those that I have received have been voted for by my peers or by the people who actually read the books (in the case of the IHCG awards, everyone nominating has to pay $5.00 to offset the cost of producing the statuettes – so they must really like the books they are voting for!). In fact, more often than not, I usually abstain from filling out nomination ballots myself because I’m so closely involved with the field. However, there are some out there who are not so restrained.
It has long been accepted in Hollywood that when the awards season comes around – especially at Oscar time – there is nothing wrong in soliciting votes from members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences by sending them videos or taking “reminder” advertisements in the trade papers.
To a lesser extent this has also been an accepted practice in our
field as well, with publishers taking advertisements in programme books and newszines to “congratulate” their award nominees.
But in recent years, certain authors, artists and editors have begun launching concerted campaigns to get their own works nominated, often bombarding eligible voters with privately printed proofs or blatantly encouraging people to vote for them through the mail or over the Internet. There have always been problems with “block” votes – where a group of friends or people from the same community vote for each other’s work (and most award committees are aware of the practice and attempt to discourage it) – but this new style of high-pressure lobbying appears more insidious to some people, and there have been recent complaints about the practice, involving both the Bram Stoker Awards and the Nebula Awards.
Of course there is nothing wrong with trumpeting your own work and getting it distributed to the widest possible audience. But if this is done solely to win an award, just how much is that award worth to the recipient? Then again, do they really care so long as they win?
I think it is about time that we as a field decided to take a stand – one way or the other – on the petitioning of votes for awards. It has never been proved that winning an award in the horror, fantasy or science fiction genre helps sell even one extra copy of a book, and if publishers did decide to actively solicit votes, the chances are that they would only promote their bestselling titles anyway. So can there ever be a level playing field where any award process is concerned?
Personally, I don’t think so. You simply have to accept the validity of each award structure on its own merits – whether it’s presented by a handful of judges or voted for by thousands of fans. Each has its own integrity, and perhaps in the end that is what we are talking about here. Integrity. Anyone can win awards, but I am sure that they are all the more prized if they are genuinely acquired.
A very successful horror writer once told me that “there are two kinds of books – those that make a lot of money and those that win awards.” I’m not sure that is always true (although there is far too much dross published in our field which seems to sell in huge quantities), and it is a complaint I’ve heard from several other authors whose books are always on the bestseller list but never seem to get nominated. In an ideal world, it would be nice to believe that you can achieve both but, as I’ve said before, the fact that a book is a bestseller doesn’t always necessarily reflect its quality.
In the end the decision has to be up to the individual. All I know is that I will continue to be delighted when a work of mine is nominated for an award, and equally disappointed when it fails to win. But if I do happen to win another award, then it will be accepted with all the respect that those presenting it are due, and I will be grateful to add it to those that already grace my shelves.
Recognition should always be earned, not solicited.
The Editor
May, 1996
IAN R. MacLEOD
Tirkiluk
“I’M REALLY GOING to have to stop saying that I don’t regard myself as a horror writer,” admits Ian R. MacLeod, “especially as I’m currently writing a Cthulhu Mythos novella.”
After working for ten years in the Civil Service, MacLeod quit his job to become a full-time writer. The first story he sold, “1/72nd Scale”, was nominated for a Nebula Award in 1990, and recent stories have appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction, Interzone, Pulphouse, Weird Tales, Amazing and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, while Arkham House is preparing a collection of his short fiction.
“At the end of the day, though, I have little regard for genre boundaries,” continues MacLeod, “especially within the field of what I’d much rather regard as “fantastic fiction” or somesuch. It’s okay to call things horror or fantasy or SF – or magical realist or splatterpunk – if that helps the reader to make a specific purchasing decision, but I think that any writer (or reader) who pays these labels too much attention is likely to end up limited and stifled – although probably successful too, such are the sorry workings of this world.”
Michael Swanwick has called MacLeod “the first important new writer of the 90s”, and the author reveals that “Tirkiluk” came into being after he read Anthony Cave Brown’s Body of Lies, which deals with Allied deception and intelligence operations in World War II.
“I think,” explains MacLeod, “that the best of my own work, such as ‘Tirkiluk’, illustrates my point, in that it blends several elements, for all that it remains essentially a ‘horror’ tale. There is also plenty of potential horror to be found in traditional fantasy and science fiction too, and not just in the prose. The difference is that writers often lack the internal honesty to visualize the full impact of their ideas upon real people and believable situations. If horror often goes too far in the opposite direction, at least it’s wrestling with the stuff of life. But to my mind, the few truly great and significant ‘genre’ writers such as Ballard, Dick, Wolfe, Lovercraft, M.R. James – and Silverberg, Vonnegut, King and Le Guin at their best – have always, in their own special manner, embraced the lot.”
With “Tirkiluk”, MacLeod also expertly embraces a number of diverse themes in a genuinely chilling variation on a classic horror concept
RADIO TRANSMISSION FROM Queen of Erin via Lerwick to Meteorological Intelligence, Godalming: Confirm Science Officer Seymour disembarked Logos II Weatherbase Tuiak Bay 28 July. Science Officer Cayman boarded in adequate health. No enemy activity sighted. Visibility good. Wind force 4 east veering north. Clear sea. Returning.
* * *
Noon, 29 July 1942
Stood watching on the shingle as the Queen of Erin lifted anchor and steamed south. I really don’t feel alone. The gulls were screaming and wheeling, the seabirds were crowding the rocks and just as the Queen finally vanished around the headland, the huge grey gleaming back of a whale broke from the water barely 200 yards from the shore, crashing in billows of spray and steam. I take it as a sign of welcome.
Evening, 2 August
Have been giving the main and backup generators a thorough overhaul. Warm enough to work outside the hut in shirtsleeves – but you only have to look around to see what winter will bring. The mountains north of this valley look as though they’ve been here for ever, and the glacier nosing between down from the icefields is just too big to believe. It’s twenty miles off, and I can barely span it with my outstretched hand. Feel very small.
Noon, 3 August
Spent a dreadful night on the bunk as the blackfly and mosquito bites began to swell and itch. The itching has gone now, but I’m covered in scabs and weeping sores. Hope that nothing gets infected.
Evening, 6 August
Wish I’d had more of a chance to talk with Frank Cayman before we exchanged, but there were all the technical details to go over, and the supplies to unload. He did tell me he was part of a Cambridge expedition to Patagonia in 1935, which, like my own brief pre-war experience with the solar eclipse over South Orkneys, was seen as proof of aptitude for maintaining an Arctic weather station. He’s a geologist – but then the pre-war specializations of the Science Officers I met at Godalming made no sense, either. Odd to think that many of us are scattered across the Arctic in solitary huts now, or freezing and rocking through the storms on some tiny converted trawler. Of the two – and after my experience of the Queen of Erin, and the all-pervading reek of rancid herring – I think I’m glad I was posted on dry ground.
Frank Cayman looked healthy enough, anyway, apart from that frostbitten nose. But he was so very quiet. Not subdued, but just drawn in on himself. Was impressed at the start with how neat he’s left everything here, but now I can see that there is no other option. You have to be organized.
Evening 9 August
My call-sign response from Godalming is Capella, that bright G-type sister of the sun. It means, as I expected, that Kay Alexander is my Monitoring Officer. Funny to think of her, sitting there with her headphones in that draughty hut by the disused tennis courts, noting dow
n these bleeps I send out on the cypher grid. An odd kind of intimacy: without speech transmissions, and with usually just a curt coded reply of Message Received (no point in crowding the airwaves). Find that I’m re-reading the two requests I’ve received for more specific cloud data, as though Kay would do anything more than encode and relay them, chewing her pencil and pushing back strands of red hair.
Too late for regrets now. And at the moment I miss the stars more than the people, to be honest. Even at midnight, the sky is still so pearly bright that I can barely make out the major constellations. But that will change.
Evening, 12 August
A great bull seal came up onto the beach this morning as I was laying out my washing on the rocks to dry. Whiskered, with huge battle-scarred tusks, he really did look like something out of Lewis Carroll. Think we both saw each other at the about same time. He looked at me, and I looked at him. I stumbled back towards the hut, and he turned at speed and lumbered back into the waves. I’m not sure which of us was more frightened.
Evening, 30 August
Really must record what I get up to each day.
I’m usually awake at 7:30, and prime the stove and breakfast at eight. Slop out afterwards, then read from my already dwindling supply of unread books until nine. After that, I have to go out and read the instruments. 12-hour wind speed, direction, min and max temperature, air pressure, precipitation, cloud height and formation, visibility, sea conditions, frequency and size of any sighted icebergs – have to do this here at the hut, and then halfway up the valley at the poetically named Point B.
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