An Odyssey of Dreams

Readercon was great, though much less with the panels and much more with the social this year. Bought many, many books just the same.

Gave Friday-morning brunch ride to an overcrowded car, including maureenmcq and her lovely husband only to return in time for her kaffeklatch. Stayed after for blackholly's, had a fabulous time and also met Laura Anne Gilman. Saw mroctober, who reminded me that I do need to write up my thoughts on Vintage and So Fey (and, for that matter, Megan Whalen Turner and the love I bear for her). Also sdn who, upon learning of my love for MWT told me "Here's Elizabeth Weir. Megan loves Elizabeth's writing. You should read." (I totally will.) Caught matociquala in the lobby, and she told me of the hotel's hot tub and a fabulous Korean BBQ place two miles away from the hotel, then caught her kaffeklatch. Went to fabulous Korean BBQ place with my "con family" of grailquestion, lunaratu, rosefox, sinboy, and yuki_onna, along with megmccarron and a lovely person named Liz whose LJ I do not know.

Somewhere in there was also dessert at Finale for my birthday, drinking beer on Saturday night while falling asleep to yuki_onna's rather strong opinions on Neil Gaiman, a girly shopping trip to the mall with grailquestion and lunaratu, and seeing fuyu_no_fuhei, though too briefly.

I went to more readings than I did panels, and I am now searching somewhat desprately for the anthology from which Theodora Goss read her story despite acquiring ridiculous (and I mean ridiculous) quantities of anthologies this weekend. Caught a bit of the Interfictions readings - everything Interfictions was scheduled opposite something else I was also interested in. The reading was Sunday "morning" (noon, actually) when I'd gotten so burned out on con I just drove in late.

Despite it all, I did miss ellen_kushner and her guitar. yuki_onna's commentary on that was great: "And I now know all the lyrics to 'Beeswing,' too!" There's always next year, I hope.

Now I'm at work, desperately trying to remember how I do that. I hope I shall be able to overcome my desire to flee editing my book and post more this week.

Vacation started, and It Is Good.

This arriving the night before a con thing is turning out to be awesome. We hung out with yuki_onna, justbeast, grailquestion, rosefox, and sinboy last night after getting in, reading bad fiction and giggling maniacally. Now we're settling in to a hotel room of our own, and everything is lovely and relaxed.

I am very much enjoying myself.

Congratulations to yuki_onna on winning the Tiptree for The Orphans Tales Vol. 1: In the Night Garden!!! I played s00j's "For the Girl in the Garden" on my way to work to celebrate. There is yet another reason to go to Wiscon.

Also, in more personal squee, Doyle has asked to be upgraded from "boyfriend" to "fiancé" with an eye on "husband" in a year or so. I've agreed to allow for this modification in status.

( Fantasy & Fables: Fantasy in Graphic Novel Form )

I was going to write up George R. R. Martin's reading, but someone else did it better right here.

( The Fantastic and the Mundane: A Look at Urban Fantasy )

Next up, Sunday!

Small Sci-Fi/Fantasy cons are extremely lonely to attend on one's own, particularly if they're very sparce on programming they offer. As a result of these observations, though I enjoyed meeting Sharyn November (sdn) and Guy Gavriel Kay, I'm extremely doubtful as to my attendance of Vericon should it coincide with the Fetish Fair Fleamarket and more people want to go to that.

Dreadfully lonely. It will be nice to go to Boskone with yuki_onna, my friend N, and others.

That's not to say I had a bad time. I'm extremely pleased to have met Guy Kay and to have had the chance to warble at him about how The Lions of Al-Rassan is one of my favorite books ever. (We also discussed my RL name. His mother's family, apparently, is originally from Ukraine, round about Kiev.) And the advance purchase of Ysabel, awesome.

Sharyn, too, was an absolute dream. She was so pleased to hear about how Firebirds is the book that made me love the short story, and we spoke for a bit about deliasherman's next Neef book (I mentioned that "Cotillion" was my favorite Delia short story).

I also attended the panel on action (and missed the one on culture due to the Guy Kay signing and blueness that was only abated by a hot chocolate from Finale - buymeaclue, nihilistic_kid, see what you've done?), where people spoke very intelligently about motion and scene and choreography, and a bit about the Ramayana. There was a good discussion of how action has become very cinematographic (is that a word?) in writing due to fild and television. Also, video games. There was a great deal of fatalism about all the POV shifts and quick cuts, but people also intelligently discussed the way a fight (or sex) scene has to pull its weight in the story by advancing the narrative or the characters or both. The example used was out of The Princess Bride; Inigo Montoya's fight with the Dread Pirate Roberts atop the Cliffs of Despair.

The Guest of Honor speech cheered me immensely, though. Kay offered a "partial defense of fantasy as a mode of fiction." He pointed out that all good fiction is escapism, it's a function of the act of storytelling. He added that his primary goal was always to keep a reader up to 3AM. And that beach reading serves a purpose - it's difficult to read challenging fiction in 15 minute instalments (which I will agree with - Ursula Le Guin and my trips to and from work shouldn't have mixed). He asserts, and I agree, that fantasy fiction has the capacity to be as important, moving, and thought-provoking as the finest stuff you're going to find out there. Moreso, even, as it can tap into myth and legend and bring universal truth home the way historical fiction won't necessarily because it's easy for people to assume you're writing about that one time in that one place. In other words, fantasy allows for the universality of a story and lets the timeless themes shine through.

It helps that he was incredibly funny (and punny). When he didn't wish to engage in discussion of a theme right then, he offered that after the speech whoever did could take him out to the bar and "take his best shot while [Kay] took [his] best shot." There are apparently plans in the works to bring The Last Light of the Sun to a movie theatre near you, and there's a third project for high-end television he can't talk about yet.

All in all? Good stuff. Needs better timing. And more people.

Man, I so don't want to be doing work right now. It's getting done in spite of me, somehow.

( More Arisia )

The con was absolutely wonderful - both for seeing people like ellen_kushner and Delia, yuki_onna and her posse, matociquala, who dropped by for Saturday with ashacat and hung out at the bar introducing people to each other and discussing Marlowe literary porn, both good and bad - and for the knowledge and experience that people could share and offer.

Overall, the panels were hit or miss (though the beginnings and endings one was brilliant, not in the least because it had an incredibly persuasive China Mieville, and an insightful Delia Sherman), I wound up taking notes, but lethargy is still preventing me from typing them up. The readings and kaffeclatches were wonderful, though, and the smaller presentations were very insightful.

This being my first full Readercon, I was completely unintiated into such mysteries as the Meet the Pros party and the Kirk Poland Bad Prose Competition. I was a bit wary of the former, for it had all the opportunity to turn into one of those events I go to when I go to a bio conference where you get your two glasses of complementary wine and get out while the getting's good or you'll be dragged into conversation that is all small-talk and nothing useful. Thankfully, this was not the case - we collected first lines, some of them readily identifiable (yuki_onna's was really impossible to mistake :), and then hung around talking about Shakespeare with Delia and trying to fix Ellen's laptop (which continued to vex her for most of the con).

The latter was extremely funny, and led into ellen_kushner taking out her guitar in the Green Room and enchanting everyone with the sound of her voice. Which proceeded to lure other people in, and pretty soon people were passing the guitar around and doing a cappella and it was wonderful. A whole lot of Richard Thompson, some sea chanties, and as has been remarked elsewhere, a beautiful rendition of "Wild Mountain Thyme." Then lareinenoire and fuyu_no_fuhei managed to recall "Queen of Argyle" and it's still stuck in my head! Ended the night on the Beatles, which is really the best way to end.

Sunday was a bit frantic because I was running A/V for three sessions, one of which was the first thing in the morning, and had to check out of the hotel, pack up stuff, buy books that were being held for me (the hotel's ATM was on the fritz and most dealers only took cash), and all that jazz. Plus, you might remember there was a World Cup final on?

Still, it all turned out alright in the end, and after we came home and chilled for a bit, we caught a late showing of PotC:DMC. I found it quite nicely paralleling Empire Strikes Back in story structure, which makes a whole lot of sense.

Oh, and ( Hah! I found them! 'Beeswing' lyrics below. )

Perhaps the most relevant panel I attended at Boskone was titled "Out of the Slush Pile (Endlessly Orbiting?)." The panelists, most of whom had decades of experience in publishing, spent a good hour talking about what made a strong submission and how to get your work noticed.

Though none of what they said as far as story construction was in any way new - in fact, my undergrad professors stressed the very points they hammered - it was a refreshing reminder that not everything you're told in college is a lie. In addition, there was a lot of discussion as to places to submit, how to make your manuscript look good, and all the other things that make you stand out in a heap of things the editor really doesn't care to read.

( And beneath this cut I shall reveal all I learned... )

Any questions?

Three days of con + one day of detox = one happy Del. Sadly, I suffered a setback last night that could only be assuaged with lots of tea, chocolate, and figure skating. This morning I felt a bit better, and this evening all was well as I got to see Pink Martini live. It was my Hanukkah present from The Boy. We ended the evening with yummy Tibetan curry.

So, without further ado, ( Boskone 43 Notes and Errata )

( Space & Sensibility Notes )

( Fantasy Ballads: Storytelling in Song )

From those two, I snuck a quick lunch break and went on to see ( Genius Loci )

I think this entry is ridiculously long, so I shall save the George R. R. Martin stuff and the panel on getting your work out of the slush pile for later.