While pondering a reply to Robin’s comment on the previous post, I thought it would be useful to compile a list of the Nebula award winners for novel, novella, novelette and short story from 2000 on and note the sex of the writers:
2000
Octavia E. Butler: Parable of the Talents; Ted Chiang: “Story of Your Life”; Mary A. Turzillo: “Mars Is No Place for Children”; Leslie What: “The Cost of Doing Business”
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2001
Greg Bear: Darwin’s Radio; Linda Nagata: “Goddesses”; Walter Jon Williams: “Daddy’s World”; Terry Bisson: “Macs”
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2002
Catherine Asaro: The Quantum Rose; Jack Williamson: “The Ultimate Earth”; Kelly Link: “Louise’s Ghost”; Severna Park: “The Cure for Everything”
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2003
Neil Gaiman: American Gods; Richard Chwedyk: “Bronte’s Egg”; Ted Chiang: “Hell Is the Absence of God”; Carol Emshwiller: “Creature”
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2004
Elizabeth Moon: The Speed of Dark; Neil Gaiman: “Coraline”; Jeffrey Ford: “The Empire of Ice Cream”; Karen Joy Fowler: “What I Didn’t See”
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2005
Lois McMaster Bujold: Paladin of Souls; Walter Jon Williams: “The Green Leopard Plague”; Ellen Klages: “Basement Magic”; Eileen Gunn: “Coming to Terms”
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2006
Joe Haldeman: Camouflage; Kelly Link: “Magic for Beginners”; Kelly Link: “The Faery Handbag”; Carol Emshwiller: “I Live With You”
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2007
Jack McDevitt: Seeker; James Patrick Kelly: “Burn”; Peter S. Beagle: “Two Hearts”; Elizabeth Hand: “Echo”
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2008
Michael Chabon: The Yiddish Policemen’s Union; Nancy Kress: “Fountain of Age”; Ted Chiang: “The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate”; Karen Joy Fowler: “Always”
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2009
Ursula K. Le Guin: Powers; Catherine Asaro: “The Spacetime Pool”; John Kessel: “Pride and Prometheus”; Nina Kiriki Hoffman: “Trophy Wives”
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2010
Paolo Bacigalupi: The Windup Girl; Kage Baker: “The Women of Nell Gwynne’s”; Eugie Foster: “Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast”; Kij Johnson: “Spar”
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2011
Connie Willis: Blackout/All Clear; Rachel Swirsky: “The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers beneath the Queen’s Window”; Eric James Stone: “That Leviathan, Whom Thou Hast Made”; Harlan Ellison: “How Interesting: A Tiny Man” and Kij Johnson: “Ponies”
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2012
Jo Walton: Among Others; Kij Johnson: “The Man Who Bridged the Mist”; Geoff Ryman: “What We Found”; Ken Liu: “The Paper Menagerie”
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2013
Kim Stanley Robinson: 2312; Nancy Kress: “After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall”; Andy Duncan: “Close Encounters”; Aliette de Bodard: “Immersion”
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2014
Ann Leckie: Ancillary Justice; Vylar Kaftan: “The Weight of the Sunrise”; Aliette de Bodard: “The Waiting Stars”; Rachel Swirsky: “If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love”
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2015
Jeff VanderMeer: Annihilation; Nancy Kress: “Yesterday’s Kin”; Alaya Dawn Johnson: “A Guide to the Fruits of Hawai’i”; Ursula Vernon: “Jackalope Wives”
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2016
Naomi Novik: Uprooted; Nnedi Okorafor: “Binti”; Sarah Pinsker: “Our Lady of the Open Road”; Alyssa Wong: “Hungry Daughters of Starving Mothers”
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*****
A few observations:
• Until 2013, the awards were roughly split evenly between male and female writers. If three of the four winners one year were female, as in 2000, 2002 or 2006, usually the following year three of the four would be male, as in 2001, 2003 or 2007.
• Of the twelve winning stories from 2014 through 2016, eleven were by women. It’s possible that these were really the best stories of their years — the only writer listed there I’ve read is Nancy Kress, and she is pretty good — but I think it’s unlikely.
• 2014, if I have my dates right, is the year that puppy-related sadness first became a topic of discussion in certain obscure corners of popular culture.
• 2014 was the first time this century that female writers shut out males in the four Nebula award categories under consideration. It happened again in 2016.
I wonder if we’ll reach a point where male authors adopt female-sounding pen names in order to increase their chances of getting published, and getting awards?
At which point, the aggrieved will demand proof of chromosomes before voting. And we will have come full circle, as we will have feminists shouting “show us your t**s!” at men.
Seriously. Don’t any of you guys have daughters, sisters, wives, mothers, or girlfriends in the work force? I’m 56 years old, and over the course of my life I’ve been refused interviews and other opportunities because I was a woman. I’ve been paid less than men in the same fields. My mother, a businessowner in a male-dominated field, had it worse. We “aggrieved feminists” don’t want to see men subjected to the same bias we’ve had over the past umpteen generations. We just want all of us to have a fair shot. Reducing that desire to a cartoon sense of vengeance just perpetuates the assumption that we girls don’t know our place or that we want to emasculate you guys. C’mon. I’ve read your posts and comments here over the years. You are better than this.
The SJW’s have already converted the Ghost Busters into women. They are demanding that Disney give Elsa a girlfriend. They want to make James Bond a woman. They want Captain America to have a boyfriend.
…you were saying?
Good thing I’m not an SJW. In fact, I’m a MJW.
Hmm, should have been “an MJW.” Or maybe “a SJW.”