Celebrate the Authors Hall of Fame Attitudes at Altitudes newsletter--latest news

Attitudes at Altitude celebrates the outstanding authors inducted into the Colorado Authors’ Hall of Fame. It’s the first in the United States that exclusively honors published authors.

Individual Inductees will be featured each month.

Past Inductees will offer their sage advice on "how they do it."

You will be the first to hear about Hall Events when planned.

You will discover how to enter your name and work for the Aspiring Author Scholarships that open each March for consideration.

Welcome to the first edition of Attitudes at Altitude, the Colorado Authors’ Hall of Fame voice. Two years ago, we celebrated our first Induction of 22 amazing Colorado-connected authors to the Hall. What a night. Last year saw 16 new additions. Plus, there are two Lifetime Achievement acknowledgments to Joyce Meskis and Sue Lubeck, breakthrough booksellers.

Dive into celebrating the outstanding authors inducted into the Colorado Authors’ Hall of Fame. On the Hall’s website, watch the short videos (one minute) of each of the 2021 Inductees. In each edition, you will hear from one of our Inductees in a column that they pen just for you; you will get updated news on happenings, such as the upcoming and new Colorado Authors' Hall of Fame Aspiring Author Scholarships. Of course, encouragement to let others know about the Hall … the first in the United States exclusively honoring the legacy of published authors.

You will be introduced to individual Inductees each month and encouraged to read their books. Connie Willis (2019 Inductee) and Manuel Ramos (2021 Inductee) are featured this month.
You will discover their storytelling imaginations and their sage advice. This month YA sci-fi-fantasy author Connie Willis reveals her secret sauce of surviving the pandemic.
You will be the first to hear about events when planned. In March, the parameters for the Aspiring Author Scholarships will be rolled out and applications can be submitted. This is not for "academia" … this is for supporting time-off to write, to polish a manuscript, for learning the craft, and, for getting help. Scholarship recipients (there will be several) will be revealed in September at a celebration luncheon event—the date to be determined.

I’m thrilled with the rollout of the Aspiring Author Scholarships opportunity. Back in 1981 when I published my first book, having something like this behind me as financial support and encouragement would have been wonderful—a wind under the author’s wings.

Connie Willis creates science fiction and fantasy that is out of this world from her Colorado home. She has won eleven Hugo Awards and seven Nebula Awards and most recently the "Best Novel" Hugo and Nebula Awards for her book, Blackout/All Clear. In addition, she was inducted by the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2009 and the Science Fiction Writers of America named her its 28th SFWA Grand Master in 2011.

Some have said that it’s like getting Billy Crystal back as host of the Oscars when she is an emcee. She is known for writing "romantic ‘screwball’ comedy in the manner of 1940s Hollywood movies.

Willis' new novella, All About Emily, combines an intergenerational collaboration between a mentor (who fears for her declining career) and a passionate mentee. Think about Betty Davis in All About Eve ... It's got ambition peppered with film and theater insights. It's fun and has some heart.

Books of note: Doomsday Book and To Say Nothing About the Dog

Connie was inducted into the Hall in 2019.

Colorado native Manuel Ramos was among the first Latinos to publish in the mystery genre. He was given the title "the Godfather of Chicano Noir" by the esteemed writer Luis Alberto Urrea. His books are set in the community in which he lives – Denver’s Northside, aka Highlands – and in rural Colorado. As the Los Angeles Times observed: "He is known as a crime writer, but that doesn’t quite capture what he does. His books are love stories, political dramas, mordant cautionary tales [with] characters who are Latino, black and white, artists, professionals, and laborers … described in staccato chapters like a catchy corrido." Manuel is the author of eleven novels and one short story collection.

His writing has received numerous awards and recognition including the Colorado Book Award (twice) and the Chicano/Latino Literary Prize from the University of California at Irvine. Manuel has been a finalist for the prestigious Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America and the Shamus Award from the Private Eye Writers of America.

Books of note: My Bad: A Mile High Noir and Angels in the Wind

Manuel was inducted into the Hall in 2021.

View his introduction video below:

But what I didn’t predict was just how annoying living through a pandemic would be. In the movie, While You Were Sleeping, Sondra Bullock says, "I’ve had a really lousy Christmas. You’ve just managed to kill my New Year’s. If you come back on Easter, you can burn down my apartment." This pretty much sums up how I feel about having lived through two and a half years of this pandemic, with no end in sight.

As a writer, I absolutely hate living in a pandemic. And I know, I know, writers have it a lot easier than doctors and nurses and all the other front-line workers who risk life and limb daily trying to keep us alive, not to mention all the grocery clerks and Amazon delivery people and Starbucks baristas who risk their lives trying to keep things going. Writers have had it easy compared to them.

But they’ve still had to contend with shut-down publishing offices, canceled book tours, and book signings and events. Writing conferences and conventions have had to be postponed or go virtual, and everybody’s suffering from having to work under less than optimum conditions. Most people think writers can work anywhere, but that’s not strictly true, and even though the events of the last couple of years have given writers lots of interesting material, to say the least, it’s still been tough.

In the first place, writers are creatures of habit—they must write with a certain kind of pen and notebook and perform the same rituals. Changing those rituals and patterns can produce writer’s block and worse.

Samuel R. Delaney can’t work without a certain kind of yellow legal pad

Joe Haldeman uses a particular kind of fountain pen and ink.

Ernest Hemingway sharpened 37 pencils every day before beginning to write—using a typewriter!

In the second place, contrary to what you may have read about writers starving in garrets and creativity thriving in adversity, writers (and everybody else) work best when they’re secure, happy, and unstressed. The pandemic made everybody worried, tense, and fearful, with no idea what was going to happen next and a sneaking feeling that whatever it is, it’s going to be even worse than what we’ve seen already.

In the third place, even though most writers are introverts (sort of), they can go stir-crazy from being cooped up too much, even during non-pandemic times. The writers I know take long walks, go to coffee shops, or get together regularly with other writers to keep the isolation and cabin fever at bay.

My own personal writing rituals were going to Starbucks, buying a venti iced chai and a bacon gouda sandwich, reading the New York Times as I ate, and then writing at the long communal table for the rest of the morning. I went there partly to be away from phone calls and other distractions (the cat, the dog, my husband constantly asking me where things were) and partly to be out of my husband’s way so he could work on projects of his own and to be around other people. Friends would drop in to say hi and talk for a few minutes, and the baristas would ask me how things were going.

COVID-19 brought all that crashing down. I had to change all my writing habits and start working at home, which I wasn’t sure I could do, my husband and I had to figure out a way to navigate the same space without driving each other crazy, and I had to come up with all-new rituals and writing patterns. Luckily, I didn’t have to completely give up Starbucks. Except for a couple of weeks there when my local Starbucks was shut down due to a COVID outbreak among the staff, I was able to use their drive-up window—masked, of course.

My husband, the dog, and I all managed to adjust. The cat hasn’t—she walks across the computer keyboard and chews on the edges of my manuscripts—but despite her, I’ve gotten a fair amount of work done. In these last two years, I’ve finished writing a comic novel about alien abduction, The Road to Roswell, and edited the Library of America volume of American Christmas Stories, a collection spanning the 1850s to the present, with stories from every genre and every corner of the U.S. Right now, I’m starting a new Oxford-historian time-travel novel, The Spanner in the Works.

But it’s been a struggle, and to all you writers out there, I sympathize with what you’re going through, and can only offer the words of Winston Churchill as advice during the Blitz: "When you’re going through hell, keep going."

Write as much as you can and as often as you can.

And stay connected. Talking to other writers, even if it’s only on the phone or through Zoom, can be a godsend. And don’t give up. We’ll get through this, just like Europe managed to do with the Black Death and England managed to do with the Blitz. And till then, as the people in the Blitz did, "Keep Calm and Continue."

And for God’s sake, GET VACCINATED AND BOOSTED so we can finish off this stupid Pandemic and get back to writing at Starbucks!

Constance Willis has won, among other accolades, ten HUGO Awards and six NEBULA Awards for her writing. She was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2009; the Science Fiction Writers of America named her its 28th SFWA Grand Master in 2011; she was inducted into the Colorado Authors’ Hall of Fame in 2019. Outside of Starbucks, she lives in Greeley, Colorado.

I learned during a long career in journalism that being "famous" and actually being deserving of fame are two very different things. Some wonderful authors deserve much more recognition for their books than they will ever receive. I joined the Board of the Colorado Authors Hall of Fame to make sure authors from all backgrounds and ethnicities are honored for their work.

Yes, there are some famous authors who have been honored by the Hall, including Stephen King, James Michener, and Robert Heinlein. The important work we do is to recognize those authors who also deserve praise for the quality and impact of their words like Dom Testa, Sandra Dallas, and John Dunning. And, for their service to readers everywhere. A great example is the late Sue Lubeck of "The Bookies" bookstore in Denver who was recognized with the Lifetime Achievement Award. So many toddlers had stories read to them there. So many teachers used the valuable Bookies resources.

Author and Narrator Neil Gaiman wrote,

I suspect that most authors don’t really want criticism, not even constructive criticism. They want straight-out, unabashed, unashamed, fulsome, informed, naked praise, arriving by the shipload every fifteen minutes or so.

The Colorado Authors Hall of Fame does not have a ship, but we can provide the recognition and praise so many authors deserve who are not instantly recognized by the masses.

Support the Hall

The Colorado Authors' Hall of Fame celebrates the accomplishments of living and deceased authors who have been connected to Colorado—their words, wisdom, accomplishments, and the life-changing impact their works create. The result: their legacy lives on

The Hall is an all-volunteer-run 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that honors and celebrates authors connected with Colorado by birth, residence, temporary residency for writing encouragement and support, writing about elements within Colorado, or placing storylines in or about Colorado.

Authors’ words have immense power and impact on changing others’ lives. They solve problems, bring awareness to a topic, and provide hours of pleasurable reading. It’s the power of their words.

Your financial assistance through donations and participation at events supports the bi-annual Induction Gala in odd-numbered years, the Aspiring Author Scholarships, and the general operation to bring these events to the public.

Please support the Hall for this year going forward.