HOLLYWOOD— Kyle Kirrin of Creede was honored April 5 at the 35th Annual L. Ron Hubbard Achievement Awards Event at the prestigious Taglyan Cultural Complex in Hollywood, Calif. as one of 12 winners in the Writers of the Future contest. The capacity crowd of 400 attendees celebrated the winners of both the Writers and Illustrators of the Future contests and the release of the anthology, L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume 35, where the winning stories and art are published.
The Taglyan provided an elegant backdrop to the festive L. Ron Hubbard Achievement Awards Event which hosted celebrities and judges as well as speakers, winners and their families and guests.
The annual event included a presentation by keynote speaker, Ed Hulse, author and renowned pop-culture historian, who talked about the Golden Age of Science Fiction and post World War II era being a veritable explosion in pulp magazines. Hulse said, “The Golden Age of Science Fiction isn’t a relic of the past. It has seeped into our popular culture in myriad ways. The Galactic Empires of Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series were foremost in the mind of George Lucas when he conceived Star Wars, and Doc Smith’s Lensmen were among the influences of his Jedi knights. In the first film’s famous bar scene, he even lifted a sequence from L. Ron Hubbard’s story The Kingslayer virtually word for word. Van Vogt’s mutant Slans were forerunners of Marvel’s X-Men. Countless popular motion pictures and television shows have adapted classic Golden Age pulp yarns, officially and unofficially.”
The highlight of the ceremony was the announcement of the year’s two grand prize winners who each received $5,000 with the Illustrators of the Future Grand Prize and The Golden Brush Award trophy going to Ms. Aliya Chen of Fair Oaks, Calif. and the Writers of the Future Grand Prize and The Golden Pen Award trophy awarded to Mr. Andrew Dykstal of Arlington, Va. Quarterly winners also receive cash prizes from $1,000 to $500. Their winning stories and illustrations are published in the annual anthology L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers and Illustrators of the Future Volume 35 (Galaxy Press, April 2019).
Kirrin works on a ranch 9,000 feet above sea level in Creede, where he tends to the needs of two Irish Wolfhounds, three Icelandic sheep, two geriatric horses, four chickens, a miniature donkey, and a very loud cat. He’s spent the last seven winters writing on the side while resort-hopping as a snowboard instructor and guide, most recently based out of Big Sky, Mont. During the summer, he climbed trees professionally as an arborist, hosted wine tastings in northern Virginia, and done fine woodworking in North Carolina. He’s a first reader for Apex Magazine and this is his second professional sale.
Throughout the contests’ 35-year history, over 750 writers and illustrators have been recognized as winners. “What’s amazing to me is that a good 60 to 70 percent of winners go on to successful careers,” says New York Times’ best-selling author Anderson. “You could call it ‘The American Idol’ for writers—long before there ever was such a show.”
The Writers of the Future writing contest (www.writersofthefuture.com) was initiated by L. Ron Hubbard in 1983 to provide “a means for new and budding writers to have a chance for their creative efforts to be seen and acknowledged.” Based on its success, its sister contest, Illustrators of the Future was created five years later to provide that same opportunity for the aspiring artist.
The 346 past winners of the Illustrating Contest have produced over 6,000 illustrations, 360 comic books, graced 624 books and albums with their art and visually contributed to 68 TV shows and 40 major movies.
For more information and to see the awards ceremony online, go to www.writersofthefuture.com