Nicola’s first novel, Ammonite, won the Premio Italia, Lambda, and Tiptree awards. She went on to win the Nebula, Spectrum, World Fantasy Award and  5 more Lambdas before joining the Lambda Literary Foundation Board of Trustees in June of 2009. In addition to writing 5 novels, a memoir, and several shorter works, she also co-edited (with Stephen Pagel) the Bending the Landscape series of LGBTQ science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies. She keeps a blog at http://asknicola.blogspot.com/.

Originally from the UK, Nicola now lives in Seattle with her partner, Kelley Eskridge, with whom she recently started Sterling Editing (an editing, mentoring, and coaching service for writers). Both Nicola and Kelley will be appearing alongside futuristic heavy metal band, BloodHag, on October 24th at Olympia Washington’s first SciFiFest.

You’ve won six Lambda Literary Awards, and now you’re on the Lambda Literary Foundation board. Can you weigh in on the controversy surrounding the new nomination guidelines? How did the board come to the decision to only accept nominations for books by people who identify as LGBT, and why is that a good choice for the Lammies?

I’m a brand new member of the board; I joined in June.  Not long before that, the board adopted a new mission statement.  “The Lambda Literary Foundation seeks to elevate the status of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people throughout society by rewarding and promoting excellence among openly LGBT writers who use their work to explore LGBT lives.”  This influenced the award guidelines.  Our explicit mission is to honour and reward openly LGBT writers.  It’s that simple.

Publishing, though, is changing.  The position of LGBT people in society at large is changing.  I have no doubt that LLF’s mission will also change.

The Nomination window for the Lammies is open right now. Who can nominate, and where should nominators go to submit their favorite LGBT books?

A book may be nominated only by its publisher or author.  The full guidelines are here.

If you have a favourite novel, nag the author and/or publisher to submit.  If they can’t afford the postage and fees (it costs $30 and five copies per title), pass the hat.  That’s what community is for: to support each other.  Sometimes that takes cold, hard cash.

I wish LLF could make the submission process free, but we have to cover our administrative costs.  This year, Richard Labonte is coordinating the awards process. I think he’ll do a knockout job.  We’ll have finalists in all 22 categories early next year.  (The f/sf shortlist is a great way to select titles for your TBR pile–and to persuade your library to order.)  The big gala ceremony will be in New York in May, during BEA.

You met your partner at the Clarion workshop, and have since won the Nebula, World Fantasy, and James Tiptree Jr. awards, so clearly you know your way around speculative fiction. Have you ever found interactions within the genre difficult because of your orientation? Have you got any suggestions about how fandom might become more welcoming to a diverse spectrum of fans?

I haven’t written an sf novel since Slow River (though of course I co-edited the Bending the Landscape series and have written short fiction–the most recent, “It Takes Two,” is due out any day in Eclipse 3, ed. Jonathan Strahan, which has an absolutely knockout lineup).  I have a big old sword-swangin’ fantasy/alternate history all planned out but simply haven’t found the time to work on it.  My focus now is on my novel about Hild of Whitby (set in seventh century England).  I keep a blog about the process here: http://gemaecca.blogspot.com/.

I’ve never had a minute’s problem being a dyke in f/sf world.  I enter a room expecting to be treated at least as well as anyone else, and so I am.  Some people occasionally say clumsy things but generally they mean well.  Conversation over a beer usually clears things up.  I’ve never had a problem, either, in editorial terms–never had a problem selling novels or stories stuffed with dykes to the trade press.  In my experience publishers just don’t care who your characters have sex with, as long as they’re really well written characters.

However I have had problems with an agent (I fired her) and the critical reception of my work.

My first agent was Fran Collin.  After I’d already got an offer for my first novel, Ammonite, from Malcolm Edwards at HarperCollins UK, Fran took me on and got an offer from St. Martin’s and Avon for a US hard/soft deal.  Two slight snags.

One, they wanted me to change the title:

“No one knows what it means!” the editor said.

“Then they should fucking look it up,” I said.

Two, they wanted me to lose 20 percent of the text:

“Which 20 percent?” I said.

“We don’t care,” the editor said.  “But it exceeds the optimum product size for a first novel.”

“You show me where the book sags and I’ll think about it.”

They couldn’t.  I turned down the offer.

Then Fran got an offer from Del Rey.  (For nearly twice the money St. Martin’s/Avon had offered, woo-hoo!)  The book won the Lambda Literary Award and the Tiptree (and got short-listed for a bunch of other things, like the Arthur C. Clarke Award: I smiled a lot).  So when it was time to outline my second novel, my hopes were high.  I wrote an ambitious (my friends called it career-suicidal) proposal (sex! sewage! tense & POV games!) and sent it to Fran.  She phoned me:

“This isn’t a selling outline,” she said.

“What’s wrong with it?”

“Well, okay, look.  I understood why Marghe in Ammonite had sex with a girl–it was a women-only planet, she didn’t have a choice, poor thing–but why does Lore have to have a girlfriend?”

“Because she’s a dyke, Fran.”  And I fired her.  My new agent, Shawna McCarthy, had no trouble selling Slow River, again to Del Rey.  The reviews were stellar.

The reviews for Ammonite had been mixed.  The mainstream press loved it.  But the genre press was a bit puzzled.  Take, for example, the Locus review, which opined that it was all very nice, but, oh, how much powerful it might have been if only Marghe had had a brother we could have identified with…  Also, several of the Grand Old Men of the genre were rather dismissive: Ah, they’d say, yes, not bad–for a minor work from a sad little sub-genre.  To which I replied: Eat my fucking shorts.

Ah, but I’ve written about all this a lot, most recently in “War Machine, Time Machine” and “As We Mean to Go On,” both written with Kelley, both available for free.

If I had to sum up my dyke-in-publishing trajectory I’d say that the farther up the hierarchy I climb–from Del Rey mass market paperback to Nan A. Talese hardcover–the less reviewers mention the fact that my protagonists are always lesbians.

The f/sf community, while good at learning inclusiveness, when pushed, needs to work just a little harder.  The default is still straight and white (and male and able-bodied, etc.).  The genre still has a tendency to Other us queers.  But the Othering game does, to some degree, take two to play.  I refuse the game.  Mostly, it works.  For the other times, we have each other: we can educate and befriend and, when all else fails, name and shame.  Meanwhile, we need to be visible–which The Outer Alliance is doing brilliantly.  We need to ordinary people and extraordinary writers.

Your latest big project is Sterling Editing, which you just started with your partner, Kelley Eskridge. Judging by the sheer number of awards you’ve accumulated, you have serious writing chops. How does that translate into editing, and why did you choose to pursue this route?

Why do I do this? Because I can. Because it gives me joy.

I’ve been teaching since I was four, when I taught my little sister to tie her shoes (and then to make a bow and arrow–but that’s another story).  All through my 20s I was a women’s self-defense teacher.  I gave my first talk about story–what it is, how it works–to a class of nine-year-olds the month my first short story hit the shelves. (I still have some of their thank-you letters.)  I taught my first writing class three months later at the local women’s center, to eight women: one very young, one white-haired, the rest in their 30s and 40s. Three months after that, I was teaching a weekend course for SF writers.  I’ll teach anything to anybody.  I can’t help it.

When I came to Atlanta from the UK (I was 29), I reverted to teaching self-defense for a while.  (An all day date-rape class delivered to 70 Girl Scouts and their mothers was particularly memorable.)  Then, in 1993, just as my first novel was published, I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.  Teaching self-defense became impossible.  Instead, I fell back on giving guest lectures and creative writing workshops (for local arts centers, for local colleges–anyone who asked).

My second novel came out in 1995 and Kelley and I moved to Seattle.   About this time, I began to edit the Bending the Landscape series of original anthologies.

It was a revelation.  I edited first-time authors, giants in the literary field who were trying their hand at writing speculative fiction, and some stalwarts of the f/sf field who were being brave and stepping outside their comfort zone.  I was astounded at how satisfying it was to help a writer lift a sleek 8,000 word story from a 14,000 word swamp.  I swelled with pride when I explained why something should be in first person and the writer said “Oh!” and then rewrote her submission piece into the best story of her life.

Teaching, coaching, and editing, then, are part of who I am.  The beauty of Sterling Editing is that I don’t have to travel.  Writers come to me (by email and phone and occasionally in person): writers who are a joy to work with, whose craft I can improve, whose careers I can nurture.  I’m also discovering the pleasure of working with those who don’t consider themselves writers, people who nonetheless have a story–their own, or another’s–to tell.

Yes, Sterling Editing work does use time and energy which could be spent on my novels–but it helps my writing in the long run. I learn from teaching.  It thrills me to the core of my being.  I like to connect with other artists and pass on my skills.  I need it.

Of course some of us can’t afford to pay for editing services, no matter how much we might want to. Are there any free or cheap writing resources you’d recommend for people who are serious about improving their craft, but sadly short on cash?

The single best way for a writer to learn is to read.  I don’t mean s/he should read books on how to write, but s/he should read novels.  Read everything.  Read poetry and short stories and nineteenth century epics.  Read every twentieth century sf novel you can get your hands on.  Read historical fiction.  Read Booker Prize winners.  (Oh, oops, the gatekeepers are finally admitting they’re the same thing…)  Read ravenously and with joy.

As writers, we are what we read.  It’s the font from which all springs.

Think about your favourite novel, the one you return to time and again, the one you read when you’re ill or tired or stressed out of your mind.  That’s the book that helped form the writer you are today.  So when you get stuck, when you don’t know how to achieve something–write an action scene, switch point of view, convey information without boring your reader rigid–go to your comfort read and find out how your favourite author did it.  It’s free if you use the library–and think of the joy you’ll take in the process.

***

Thanks, Nicola! Join us again next Friday for another Spotlight. In the meantime, why not take a look the editcast videos on the Sterling Editing website, or make sure you favorite LGBT author has been nominated for a Lammie? And if you’re in the Olympia, Washington area, don’t forget to check out SciFiFest!

OA members Nicola Griffith and Kelley Eskridge have just announced the formation of Sterling Editing, an editing, coaching and mentoring service for writers. As Nicola says:

If you want to make your writing better, we can help you.

We’ve both done a lot of teaching (Clarion West, Arts Council of Great Britain, Emory) and have been mentoring and coaching informally with those students and friends, but now it’s time to codify and formalise what we do.

We love to teach.  We love to share.

From the site:

Many people who offer editing services have never had a story, essay or book professionally published. They’ve never worked with an agent or publisher. They may have excellent theoretical knowledge — but we believe there’s no substitute for experience.

We are expert writers with excellent editing, teaching and coaching skills. We can help you both improve your writing and meet the challenges of a writer’s life, whether you’re trying to build a career, make a mid-career transition, carve out time from your busy life to work, or understand how the money works.

Serious congratulations are in order! Best of luck to you both. A truly wonderful resource for writers.