I know, I know, I have been a total stranger. Mostly it’s because I’ve been working super long hours on the Wild Cards TV shows, and on the weekends I have to run errands, do laundry and most importantly go see and ride the horses (though the California rains have made that tough). Anyway, I have a brief window where I can breath and put up a post. A few weeks ago I was honored to receive the Skylark Award from NESFA during their Boston convention Boskone. (Great convention folks should check it out.) My web manager posted a picture of the award and my speech, but I thought people might miss the link so I thought I would put up my acceptant speech here. So for your reading pleasure… and you get to miss me sniffling my way through it. I really didn’t mean to cry.
I want to thank NESFA and the fans for this incredible honor. I’m enormously grateful, but truthfully I feel that I share it with all of you because finding this community has immeasurably improved my life.
My love of science fiction is embedded in one of my earliest memories of my father reading aloud 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. He left out all the boring fish stuff and focussed on the adventure and the exploration of an alien world. Then when I was seven year old I read A Princess of Mars and I was lost to wonder.
Our local library had a very tall, very narrow shelf that house all the science fiction books. It was in the adult section so my mother (with an eye roll) acceded to mot demands and checked out the books for me. I began with A and read all the way to Z.
I was always the dreamy, nerdy kid who got good grades and never figured out how to be popular. During those early miserable teenage years I dreamed of being transported to Barsoom to fight alongside Tan Hadron of Hastor. (I always liked him better than John Carter even though Tan was rather clueless.)
Life went on with me reading met science fiction and trying answer the inevitable and always rude question of why I liked all that ray guns and spaceship crap. Then my late friend Victor Milan told me about science fiction conventions. I attended my first convention and realized I had found my family. Nobody there was asking me why I read this crap. They shared my love of the field, wanted to talk about books and Star Trek and Star Wars.
I began writing in secret with Vic mentoring me — I have been fortunate in my mentors, it was George who helped me get my start in Hollywood. But it all began with fandom. Realizing I was not alone. That other people dreamed of the stars, wanted to help Frodo get the One Ring to Mount Doom,. Cried when the Mother Thing froze to death on Pluto (which will always be a planet, damn it!).
So to all my brothers and sisters, cousins, aunts and uncles and grandparents — thank you for welcoming me into your world and letting me weave some stories as a small repayment for all you have given to me.
Skylark Memorial Award 2019
A late reply I know. I, too, have been absent from reading your blog. Still, congratulations on your award Melinda! Well deserved!
Thanks Raymond. I appreciate it,. I was thrilled to be selected.
It’s wonderful to see one of our locals receiving some well-deserved honor. You and George and some of your writing partners really put the New Mexico writing and literature scene on the map. That’s been a constant and comforting inspiration for those of us, like you, who start writing in secret – your publications and recognition keep us fueled. Congratulations, you should be proud, and we’re proud of you.
Thanks so much, Mac, and just so you know — I started writing in secret too when I was in the law office. Vic Milan mentored me. We’d meet at the Vip’s Big Boy on Fourth street and he would give me notes on my work. For some reason we always met late at night. I couldn’t tell you why.