I've attended the Writers & Illustrators of the Future Awards several times now. In fact, Episode 22 of this podcast was covering the 2017 ceremony. Attending this awards ceremony is always fun, and this year was no different. This was the 35th annual awards ceremony, and the them was Retro Robotics. 

The keynote was a 'Science Fiction 101' by journalist Ed Hulse. Illustrator Bob Eggleton was honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award, who is also the artist of this year's anthology. 

Andrew Dykstal took home the Grand Prize Writer Award, and Aliya Chen took home the Grand Prize Illustrator Award. Meanwhile, Alice Wang, who won the fourth quarter illustrator award, became the youngest winner to enter and win. Finally, one of the winners, Preston Dennett, submitted 47 times prior to winning this year, earning 12 honorable mentions over the years. 

While as with all red carpets my interviews here are brief, I did manage to snag contact information for a couple of the people I talked to in the hopes of getting longer interviews with them, as I did with Kevin J. Anderson and Nancy Kress last year. I also have some excerpts from the ceremony itself. 

For complete show notes, go to my website.