“Treasure your time at the workshop,” Ken Liu says when I ask how he would advise a new prizewinner going to the Writers of the Future workshop, “but don’t make too much of it.” This is Ken Liu in a nutshell. He’s a well-spoken man who puts conflicting ideas side by side and then makes you think about what they mean.

“Looking back,” Jim C. Hines said, “my Writers of the Future story was the first one I’d written where I felt like I’d found my own voice.” He’s referring to “Blade of the Bunny,” his prizewinning story from volume XV of the annual anthology ...

Stephen Lawson has a way of looking at the world. It’s a slanted thing. Analytical. Questioning. You feel like he’s watching and assessing everything. It makes him seem quiet at first. Sometimes you’re not sure what’s happening inside his mind, but then ...