Views from Medina Road

Here's a curiosity. Most literary prizes--the National Book Award, the NBCC, etc.--ignore genre fiction candidates, let alone offer separate categories for genre fiction. That's probably due to the usual literary snobbishness about genre fiction, though one could easily argue that genre fiction (especially SF/F/H!) has plenty awards of its own.

But not the Los Angeles Times Book Awards, whose finalists have just been announced. They have an entire *category* for "mystery/thriller".

A year can pass between reviews in the LA Times of books even remotely resembling SFFH. And then they're by Michael Crichton or Ray Bradbury.