Saturday night, the Science Fiction Writers of America held their annual Nebula Awards banquet at the Marriott Financial Center. When the ceremony got over just before midnight, the winners lined up outside the ballroom: Grand Master James Gunn, Fantasy & Science Fiction editor Gordon Van Gelder (accepting for best short story on behalf of Elizabeth Hand), Peter S. Beagle (best novelette), James Patrick Kelly (best novella), and Jack McDevitt (best novel). (Justine Larbalestier, winner of the Andre Norton Award for YA fiction, was not present at the banquet, being in Australia this time of year.)
I’ve got plenty more photos from the evening at my Flickr photostream.
James Patrick Kelly offered us a closer look at his Nebula after the show, while Hard Case Crime publisher Charles Ardai (bottom left corner) told me that he’d “couldn’t be more tickled” to see that he and his wife, fantasy writer Naomi Novik, had been included in a brief list of literary couples mentioned on this site last week. As we started discussing the post, we realized they weren’t the only literary twosome at the banquet: Gavin Grant and Kelly Link were just one table away, and I believe that Delia Sherman and Ellen Kushner may be the first couple to have been nominated in separate categories on the same Nebula ballot.
In addition to the awards previously mentioned, and the long stream of accolades given to James Gunn in honor of his elevation to Grand Master status, Tor publisher Tom Doherty received a special citation for donating thousands of books to disaster-stricken schools and libraries, as well as to U.S. soldiers fighting overseas (and, later this month, to those whose sacrifices have brought them to Walter Reed to recuperate), while D.G. Compton was recognized as an “Author Emeritus,” which prompted him to recollect some advice legendary editor Donald Wollheim gave him years ago. “You won’t sell very many books,” Wollheim counseled, “but all the best people will come to your funeral.” Which, he acknowledged, was still a ways off, “but here you all are!”