Nebula Award nominated Jake Kerr has taken it upon himself to craft an anthology of stories from up and coming authors. The purpose of the anthology is to highlight authors who are eligible for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer.
The award is given out annually to new writers. To be eligible an author had to have sold their first professional story within the past two years. Some past recipients of this award have gone on to have extremely successful careers, such as Orson Scott Card, John Scalzi, and Naomi Novik.
Source: The Verge
Finding new authors at the beginning of their careers can be challenging. Before this year, the publisher Straeon compelled a similar anthology every year known as the Campbellian Anthology. However, they found this year they were not able to take it on. Jake Kerr opted to take it on, feeling the importance of helping gain exposure for new authors. In order to attract submissions, Kerr worked with the online writer’s workshop known as Codex. Codex authors spread the word about the project and within a week the submissions were streaming in.
After receiving all the submissions, Kerr spent a weekend compiling the anthology. He used an ebook creator known as Vellum. Due to the enormity of the collection, along with other constraints, Kerr was forced to make a few short cuts, leaving out the table of contents. At its completion, the anthology titled Event Horizon 2017 spans two volumes, 1200 pages, and 400,000 words. A physical copy has been made available through CreateSpace. On this Kerr commented, “I knew it wouldn’t look like a ‘bookstore’ book, but I also knew it would look nice and something a young author would be proud to have: their first paperback book with their name in it.”
Source: WorldCon
Kerr isn’t making any money from this project. The physical copy is sold at the cost to make, $10 a volume. The ebook version is free until July 15th. July 15th is the date when voting for the John W. Campbell award closes. You can get your free copy here. Or if you prefer reading on real paper, you can get Volume One here, and Volume Two here.
The John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer will be awarded this year at WorldCon 75. The event takes place in Helsinki, Finland, August 9th to the 13th.
So get out there and support new writers!
YouTube Channel: Between Chapters
Featured image via GoodReads
h/t The Verge
