My new novel, Catfishing on CatNet, is up for a lot of awards this year, which is delightful. The pandemic, unfortunately, means that basically all the award ceremonies are going to be online. For the convenience of family, close friends, and extremely committed fans, I’m collecting here the schedule and links to all the virtual award ceremonies. This post will be updated as I get more information. (Some of these award ceremonies are not happening for months and their information right now is just, “we’re going virtual, more information coming.”)

I just want to say: I feel so incredibly honored by every one of these nominations. Looking at the other books in my category is an absolute delight in every single case, and I need to remember to call one of my local bookstores that’s doing mail order or delivery and order some of the ones I haven’t read yet because they look amazing. 

The Minnesota Book Awards, April 28th, 7 p.m.

Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist in the Young Adult Literature category of the Minnesota Book Awards, which are presented each spring by the Friends of the St. Paul Public Library.

The Minnesota Book Awards will be live-streamed online on April 28th at 7 p.m. More information here. I believe they’ll have a live-stream up on the page; they’ll also be streaming to YouTube and to their Facebook page. Finalists will be called on the phone in order to make acceptance speeches. If you register at the link as attending, you’ll be entered to win a set of all the winning books.

The Minnesota Book Awards did a series of “Meet the Finalists” events on Zoom, which you can watch on YouTube; they’ve set up a playlist. Minnesota has such an amazing array of incredibly talented and interesting writers.

Update: I won!

The Edgar Awards, April 30th, 10 a.m. CDT.

Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist in the Young Adult category for the Edgar Award, which is presented by the Mystery Writers of America to the best mysteries of the year. I was absolutely, totally floored to be nominated for this — although in fact one of the things I most love about YA is how seamlessly it can embrace multiple genres.

MWA is going to announce winners, a category at a time, on Twitter. (The MWA feed is @EdgarAwards.) We were all asked to submit a video of ourselves giving an acceptance speech, and I think the winners’ speeches will be uploaded to YouTube and linked. Anyway, watching the announcements roll out on Twitter tends to be how I watch awards shows I’m not attending in person regardless so I have to say, I love this option.

Update: I won!

The Nebula Awards, May 30th, 7 p.m. CDT.

Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist for the Andre Norton Nebula Award for Middle Grade and Young Adult Fiction. This is a science fiction award, given by SFWA (the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America). There is going to be a whole virtual Nebula Weekend, and the awards will be livestreamed. I don’t know a lot of details beyond the date and time, but as they’re announced I expect they’ll go up on SFWA’s website. (The programming for the virtual weekend is being announced May 15th, I think.)

Editing very quickly to add links:

https://events.sfwa.org/events/55th-annual-nebula-awards/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8fTixQc410o

Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist in the Young Adult category. The Locus Awards will take place at the Virtual Locus Awards Weekend. They’re planning some virtual programming but I don’t have any details yet on exactly how this will work.

Update: there should be a live link on the Locus Awards page sometime today (I think). The ceremony starts at 3 p.m. West Coast time (5 p.m. CDT, 6 p.m. EDT). I think it’s just going to be Connie Willis announcing the nominees and winners by category; they did not ask nominees for an acceptance speech or video, because editing everything together was going to be too much to try to get done when they also had a magazine to get out.

Update: I did not win. The Locus Award went to Dragon Pearl by my friend Yoon Ha Lee.

ITW Thriller Awards, July 11th.

The International Thriller Writers award the Thriller Awards each year, and Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist in the Young Adult category. The ITW is hosting a “Virtual ThrillerFest” on their Facebook page and will be announcing winners on July 11th. (More details to come.)

Update: the Thriller Award went to Tom Ryan for Keep This To Yourself.

The Hugo Awards, August 1st or 2nd.

Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist for the Lodestar Award for Best Young Adult Book, which is given with the Hugo Awards but is technically not a Hugo Award. (The good news for Lodestar Finalists: that means we go first, right after the Astounding Award, I think.) The Hugo Awards along with the Lodestar and the Astounding Award are nominated by the members of the World Science Fiction Society — which is to say, the members of WorldCon. Anyone who wants can buy a supporting membership to ConZealand and vote (and! you generally get a voter’s packet with electronic copies of most of the nominated works.)

ConZealand announced in March that they were moving to a virtual convention. They did a lovely job streaming the Hugo nomination announcements; they are planning a livestream of the awards that sounds similar to how the Nebulas did it, except they are also requesting that all nominees send a just-in-case back-up video in case the technology falls apart. (I can’t find a schedule on their website yet, so I’m not actually sure which day it’ll happen.)

Update: I won!

The Dragon Awards, Labor Day Weekend

Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist for the Dragon Award. This is an award usually given at DragonCon (but everything’s virtual this year.) Anyone at all can register to nominate and vote in the Dragons, and if you’d like to go register to vote for Catfishing on CatNet (or one of the other YA/MG books on the ballot) plus anything else on the longer ballot that you think is worthy of an award this year, you can register here. I am not sure when and how winners will be announced, other than “Labor Day weekend.”

The Anthony Awards, October 17th

The Anthony Awards are a mystery award given by Bouchercon, the World Mystery Convention, which would have been held in Sacramento, California this year but is instead (like everything else) virtual. Catfishing on CatNet is a finalist in the YA category. The awards, and the convention, are named after Anthony Boucher, a mystery, horror, and science fiction writer and editor who died in 1968.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Q. Is it a total bummer not being able to go to the awards ceremonies?
A. I am both very disappointed and also very aware that in the context of a catastrophic global pandemic, there are people with much worse problems than “my trip to Los Angeles to maybe win an award is now cancelled.”

Q. How many of these were you going to go to in person?
A. Well, the Minnesota Book Awards, obviously. (Those would have been in downtown St. Paul. I just about could have walked.) I was also planning to go to New York for the Edgars (and to see my nephews!) and to Los Angeles for the Nebulas (and to see a friend who lives there!) I was probably not going to make it to ConZealand. New Zealand is a very long, expensive trip from Minnesota, and I would love to go to New Zealand sometime but I’d really rather go in February, when it’s summer there and winter here. I know, I know, New Zealand has very mild winters, but August is usually one of the nicest months in Minnesota and February is typically the worst.

ETA: You know something I’m discovering that’s sort of weird. With SF/F, I know a lot of people. Not literally everyone, but most of the people I don’t know, I have a friend who does. With Mystery and Thriller, I hardly know anyone. It feels sort of like being the new student at a very large high school. (I do appreciate the fact that mystery writers joke about murder a lot. This is a form of humor I deeply appreciate.) But it would have been really nice to get to go to the Edgars, ThrillerCon, and BoucherCon, just for the opportunity to meet a bunch of people face-to-face and have a stronger sense of being part of this new community. As it is, I’m connecting with people online a bit but it’s harder.

Q. Are you going to dress up in cocktail attire like the Minnesota Book Awards suggested?
A1. YES, I will be wearing EXTREMELY FANCY CLOTHING and you should most definitely picture me accordingly.
A2. If you’re holding a cocktail, that means you’re in cocktail attire, right?