2018 HUGOS: Jemisin Completes Historic Trifecta With 3rd Consecutive Best Novel Win

She did it! N.K. Jemisin won her third consecutive Hugo award for Best Novel, science fiction's most prestigious honor, for The Stone Sky, the third book in the Broken Earth trilogy. Jemisin became the first African-American woman to win the Hugo award for best novel in 2016 for The Fifth Season and after she repeated this feat in 2017 with The Obelisk Gate there was great suspense as to whether the Broken Earth trilogy would become the first science fiction trilogy where every entry won the Hugo award when nominations were announced earlier this year. Orson Scott Card (Ender's Game, Speaker for the Dead) and Vernor Vinge (A Deepness in the Sky, A Fire upon the Deep) each have won 2 Hugos for the first two entries in a series and Connie Willis and Lois McMaster Bujold have each won 3 Hugos for books in a series.

Here is her incredible acceptance speech


Amazing news!

Ender's Game Movie Unlikely To Make Profit

The movie adaptation of Ender's Game, based on the book by notorious homophobic science-fiction author Orson Scott Card has basically completed its box-office run with a gross of just over $60 million domestically ($85 million worldwide) and it appears as if it will not make back its production budget of $110 million.

Ender's Game is a classic of science fiction, one of the rare books to win both top prizes in the genre, the Nebula and the Hugo. For that reason, I was interested in seeing the film, but ended up not doing so, primarily because the reviews indicated it simply was not good, not because of the gay geek-led boycott intended to punish Card for his virulent homophobia. However, many reports indicated that Card would not make any movie regardless of how successful it was. So in my view the boycott was ill-advised.

However, Card is making money on the sale of the book, which has been at the top of the New York Times paperback list.

If you want to punish Card, don't buy the book. However, at least the failure of the film makes it clear that there will not be any sequels, for which Card might have been able to negotiate more profit participation and also sell more books.

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God

Queer Quote: Homophobic Author Surrenders To Marriage Equality Reality

The reverberations from Gaytterdämmerung continue! Orson Scott Card, is a virulently homophobic board member of the National Organization for Marriage, but more well-known as a best-selling science fiction author, especially the classic series that includes Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead.  Card issued a statement to Entertainment Weekly that marriage equality is no longer "in dispute" thanks to the recent Supreme Court ruling striking down DOMA in the Windsor case.

Card's statement is today's Queer Quote:

Ender’s Game is set more than a century in the future and has nothing to do with political issues that did not exist when the book was written in 1984.

With the recent Supreme Court ruling, the gay marriage issue becomes moot.  The Full Faith and Credit clause of the Constitution will, sooner or later, give legal force in every state to any marriage contract recognized by any other state.

Now it will be interesting to see whether the victorious proponents of gay marriage will show tolerance toward those who disagreed with them when the issue was still in dispute.

The reason why Card is talking to EW now is that a big-budget film adaptation of Ender's Game is being released worldwide on November 1. Many people, including yours truly, have been looking forward to seeing the movie Ender's Game but are horrified at the thought that any of our money would go to a raving homophobe. Some gay comic books fans organized as Geeks Out have called for a boycott of Ender's Game (the movie) and it is believed that this potential boycott may have spurred Card to make the statement that is today's Queer Quote. It should be noted that it is far from clear that attendance or non-attendance of Ender's Game when it comes out will have any dramatic financial impact on Card. Most authors make their money when they sell the adaptation rights and have no financial participation in the film version of their books, but they can reap benefits if the book spurs more sales. Ender's Game has already sold millions of copies, so it is doubtful that the success or failure of the movie will have a significant impact on future sales of Card's books.

The first interesting aspect of Card's statement I notice is that he is basically agreeing with LGBT activists that the fight over marriage equality is over and the supporters of equality have won. As a virulently homophobic person and board member of the lead organization in the country fighting marriage equality this is a key surrender and a huge blow to the bad guys. We should acknowledge that fact and savor the victory.

The second point to note is that Card is calling for tolerance from people that he had previously declared his "mortal enemy" and that the organization whose board he serves on has fought vigorously to defame, discourage and discriminate against. This raises other issues.

Prominent LGBT blogger Joe.My.God rejects Card's call for tolerance but I disagree. I think there's no reason for the good guys fighting for marriage equality to be "sore winners." However, let me be very clear that I am not lettig Cardoff the hook. Just because Card now realizes that the fight over marriage equality is "moot" does not absolve him of responsibility for his previous statements calling for the overthrow of the U.S. government if marriage equality is legalized and his bitter denunciations of homosexuality. It will be interesting to see how Card's fellow luminaries at NOM respond to their colleague's capitulation in the marriage equality front of the Kulturkampf

In order to give fair-minded people a reason to not think twice when considering buying his books and/or going to see a movie based on his books, Card will need to make clear that he believes LGBT people deserve full civil rights and rebuke his previous discriminatory statements. I do not care if Card thinks homosexuals are going to hell or can never go to heaven, I just care about what he thinks public policy towards LGBT people should be. (As far as I am concerned heaven and hell are just as fictional as the aliens Card writes so eloquently about in Speaker for the Dead.) Of course, everyone is entitled to their own opinion and to express it publicly. But if you reveal that you do not believe in the full humanity of your fellow citizens, you should not be surprised that people will want to express their displeasure by withholding their pocketbooks, and possibly expressing their opposition to your beliefs in other more vocal ways.

Hat/tip to Joe.My.God