Awards = Awareness

[Love Is Murder Conference]

In last week's issue of the Love is Murder e-news, there was discussion of the Loveys. If you've been to LIM, you know that these awards are voted on by attendees and the winners are announced on Saturday night at the wonderful dinner, which over 300 people attended. Someone wrote in Crimespree that they questioned the purpose of the Loveys, and the LIM Board responded. See below.

Librarians - and publishers love awards. Do they guarantee that a book will sell thousands of copies immediately? Of course not, unless it is the children's Newbery and the winner is on the Today show. The National Book Award likely also impacts sales. But what they do is introduce readers to books and authors they may not otherwise know about. One of the things a group of librarians did at our panel at LIM last year was hand out recent awards lists of all kinds and finalists so people can find meet and learn to love these authors. I should mention the room was packed, and I don 't flatter myself that it was just my speaking skills, though I do like to tell jokes. The panel was "Books You Should Be Reading, But Aren't." I discovered some wonderful authors on the adult awards lists, including the Loveys, and then mentioned them to patrons, bought some as gifts and so on. Also, I passed along some names of authors I thought would make good interviews to the Book Report Network, which garners 150,000 hits a month. One popular LIM author was recently featured on there, too.

What author can afford to dismiss awards of any kind? Is there such a thing as bad publicity? The only cases I can think of are bad performances at the VMAs and possibly if you disparage an award in a popular magazine...

Here's the copy from the e-news, if you didn't see it. Tell us what you think:

The many of you who subscribe to Crimespree Magazine may have noticed in the July/August issue that Robert Randisi dissed Love is Murder in his Rants and
Raves column. For those of you who have not read it, here are the specific
offending comments verbatim:

I just read that the Love is Murder mystery convention in Chicago has
renamed their awards the "Lovies." Also, it seems you must be in attendance
to win. I wonder how this works? Do they ask an author if they're coming
before they nominate? What are they giving this award for? Attendance?
This is almost as silly as an organization that says an author must be a
member in order to be nominated. Isn't an award simply for the best work???
Sounds to me like somebody should have a rethink.

We understand that a column called Rants and Raves has to come up with
something to serially complain about, and Mr. Randisi admits that for him it
is "more fun to rant than rave" (Crimespree Sept/Oct 2006) but we felt that
a response was warranted. Jon Jordan graciously offered us space to do so in
the September/October 2007 issue. The following is the response letter that
the LIM board submitted.


In response to Robert J. Randidi's rant about the Love is Murder Lovey Award


We were perplexed by the derisiveness of Mr. Randisi's comments regarding
the Love is Murder Conference's Lovey Award, (Rants and Raves, July/August
2007). Once we got past the surprise of his unprovoked attack, we realized
that Mr. Randisi has never attended the Love Is Murder Conference in
Chicago. Perhaps if we enlighten him about what Love is Murder is, how we
create the ballots, and how we vote on the nominees, he won't be quite as
critical.

First, the underlying mandate of the Love is Murder conference is to be of
service and benefit to the community of readers and writers of dark fiction.
Since this is such a huge constituency, we have found that we can have the
greatest beneficial impact if we focus our attentions on those readers and
writers in our immediate community, but there are no restrictions about who
can be a part of the community, and in fact we are more inclusive than any
other conference around vis a vis the writers who may attend, participate
and be nominated. Our Lovey Awards reflect this very egalitarianism, both in
regards to who qualifies for awards and who votes. The ballots are made up
after the deadline for author panelist registration has passed. We do not
believe that we need a committee to tell us what books are worthy of our
consideration.

The Loveys are fan-voted awards given to authors attending LIM who have
published a book in the year previous to the current LIM conference. They
are meant to honor the work of the attending authors. We on the LIM board
believe that the readers who attend LIM are smart enough to choose wisely
when voting on an award. This is especially true since the voting attendees
are much more likely to have actually read the more limited numbers of
authors who they will meet at the conference regardless of whether they vote
or not. Past Lovey Award winners are testament to this good judgment. This
list includes authors Barbara D'Amato, Anne Perry, David Morrell, Harriette
Robinet, Joe Konrath, Barry Eisler, Michael Dymmoch, Libby Fischer Hellmann,
Kathy Reichs, William Kent Krueger, Charlaine Harris, Nancy Pickard, David
Walker, Robert Walker, Ken Bruen, and Raymond Benson among others -- not to
mention the late Hugh Holton, one of Chicago's most innovative mystery
writers. Certainly no one would impugn the taste and incisiveness of voters
who choose works by writers such as these. Others who have received LIM
awards may not be that well known outside the Midwest -- at least, not yet!
-- but their work matters to readers who attend the conference, and this is
the community who we serve.

Yes, some will call this a popularity contest, but then aren't all fan-voted
awards (the Agathas, the Anthonys, etc.) to some extent popularity contests?
Don't we often vote as much for the author as for the book itself? To a
degree, it is only human nature to do so, just as it seems to be human
nature to find fault with any awards process regardless of the
scrupulousness of those involved. To our knowledge, every recipient of a
Lovey has been very pleased by the honor.

We think that maybe Mr. Randisi should come to Love is Murder one of these
years and put himself in the running. After he meets the other authors and
attendees we feel sure that he will be less dismissive of his competition
and more respectful of the readers who, after all, are whose judgment really
matters most.

[Julie Hyzy]

Great post, Amy!