In one of the many pop culture celebrations taking place at the San Diego Comic-Con festivities this last weekend, the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers held their annual awards ceremony, and in addition to the prizes given to contemporary works like Lee Goldberg's Mr. Monk and the Two Assistants and Max Allan Collins's novelization of American Gangster, the IAMTW presented science fiction author Alan Dean Foster with its Grandmaster Award for "extensive and exceptional work in the tie-in field." Readers of a certain generation will perhaps recognize Foster's name from the paperback covers to the Starman, Outland, and Alien Nation novelizations, as well as The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. (He also wrote the Star Wars novel, although that's officially credited to George Lucas.) And, all the while, Foster has been writing his own stories, like the fan-favorite "Pip and Flinx" series—and, every now and then, an occasional tie-in, like last year's Transformers novel.

(photo: IAMTW)