Archive for the 'Convention Reports' Category

ICon - celebrating fantasy in a fantastic place

Carol Berg October 16th, 2007

Nothing surprised me more this year - or perhaps in my writing career - than the email I received last May, asking me to be Guest of Honor at ICon, the Israeli Science Fiction Society’s annual Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Role-playing Festival. Only three of my books have been translated into Hebrew - Transformation, Revelation, and Restoration - but they seem to have struck a chord with the Israeli audience. In 2005, Transformation won the Israeli equivalent of the Hugo at this same festival, and Restoration was a finalist this year. Evidently the books have done well there.

I didn’t take long to consider my answer. The chance to travel to a part of the world so wrought with history and consequence doesn’t come every day. I had met my publisher, Rani Graff, and the multiple award-winning translator of Transformation and Revelation, Didi Chanoch, at the Glasgow WorldCon, and when these two great guys and Naomi Wiener, the foreign guest coordinator for ICon, promised to meet me at the plane, take me touring, show me a great time at the con, and send me safely home again, I jumped. (Besides, I’ve never done a GOH gig, and I thought I ought to grab the opportunity.)

I was actually surprised that almost everyone’s first reaction was: Are you really going to go there? Some were worried for my safety. Some have problems with Israeli history or politics.

I would hate the thought of people not visiting our own country because they judged us all by our national government. And no matter what my personal views on Israeli/Palestinian history or politics, I wasn’t going to become wiser or more intelligent about the issues by not going. And I sure didn’t like the thought of refusing because I was scared I’d be blown up.

I read the US State Department site that advised American citizens to stay out of the West Bank and Gaza and avoid places where large numbers of Americans gather. As the convention is conducted mostly in Hebrew (with the exception of the Guest of Honor events and the film festival!) I doubted there would be large numbers of Americans at ICon. Naomi assured me that most of the convention guests would speak excellent English, which was really a good thing as the sum total of my Hebrew comprises shalom, toda, and mazeltov!

Truly the most nerve wracking part of the anticipation was the shoes I had to fill. Last year’s GOH was Neil Gaiman. Ouch. And before him? Tim Powers. 2004, Guy Gavriel Kay. And in 2003, the man who put ICon on the map for North American authors - Orson Scott Card. Holy moly!!!

So how was it?

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Comicon 2008, Wild Cards etc.

Kevin Andrew Murphy July 25th, 2007

I’m off for Comicon 2008. After BayCon (smaller than usual) and Westercon (larger than last year, maybe, but if so, not by much), I expect this to be absolutely huge.

It’s also advance fanfare for the triumphant return of the Wild Cards series. The new volume, Inside Straight, will be out from Tor in 2008.Inside Straight cover Moreover, Tor will have a booth at Comicon, and those there can register for a special convention drawing. Tor will have half a dozen glossy 11 x 17 inch posters of the gorgeous Michael Komarck cover, autographed by George R.R. Martin and five other contributors (Melinda Snodgrass, John Jos. Miller, Daniel Abraham, Ian Tregillis, and Carrie Vaughn), and will be handing out the posters to the winners. Flyers and other information about the new triad will also be available at the Tor booth.

Carrie Vaughn will also be attending the con, and both of us will be answering questions about our characters (mine’s Rosa Loteria) and the stories (I’m not in Inside Straight, but the next volume, Busted Flush, is in the works, and beyond that, I can’t say much, since George has sworn us to secrecy about many crucial details, especially about Busted Flush because that will have details of the ending of Inside Straight, following as it does).

More exact news here:

http://www.georgerrmartin.com/news.html

There’s also a special new Wild Cards forum started at the Captain Comics message board, which will have assorted Wild Cards news and updates:

http://www.captaincomics.us/

Anyway, with Comicon, I’ll try to do updates from the Con, but can promise nothing except to do a large wrap-up when I get back next week. So use this topic for discussion of what’s going on for those who are there and those who are curious about it all.

The Ur Texts — Library for Ziggurat Con

Kevin Andrew Murphy April 21st, 2007

Back during the 1st Gulf War, there was a call for folk to send letters and care packages to soldiers, with a note that letters addressed to “any soldier” were especially appreciated, because it’s particularly awful to be stuck in a war zone with no family or friends who remember you’re there. I packed up a few books I’d enjoyed and sent them off, adding the extra flourish of addressing them to “any soldier who likes science fiction and fantasy,” since that would likely describe someone in any given company and you might as well make sure you send someone a present they’ll enjoy. When my first novel came out, I took a copy and did the same.

Some years later, I got an email thanking me for my first novel — from Bosnia. The last care package had somehow made its way to the next international conflict and the soldiers there were grateful for something to read. I’d made some fans, but more than that, I’d help make the world a little brighter for people in a dark place (ironically with a dark fantasy set in Europe.)
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In the Shadow of the Gorillas: Conjecture & Silicon

Kevin Andrew Murphy October 11th, 2006

The past two weekends I attended Conjecture and Silicon, two of the smaller California SF conventions, the first in San Diego, the second in San Jose.

Attendance was down with both, due to being in the shadow of the three gorillas: Comicon, WorldCon and finally Westercon, though in many respects, the third gorilla was actually smaller than the orangutan twins.  Conjecture and Silicon both had dealers rooms as large if not larger than Westercon, and while the programming tracks were not as lavish, the nightlife was slamming.  And, um, it was almost all fans.  Not publishers parties.  Not bid commitees competing for the honor of hosting the next Westercon or Worldcon.  Just fans.

Okay, I’ll admit that Kevin and Andy’s “League of Evil Geniuses” party was also pimping Costumecon 2008, which they’re hosting here in San Jose, but when you walked in the door, you weren’t immediately badge-stickered and there was nobody with a cash box and a set of membership forms.  Just good munchies and drinks and fun conversations.  Ditto with the Browncoats, the Rocky Horror cast party in San Diego, the Rocky Horror full show (with doorprizes) in San Jose, the BASFA party and so on.

Writers?  Less than any of the big gorillas, of course, but still a fair number, with somewhat more at Conjecture as Silicon is trying to become more of a media con.  But for all that, the number of readers was high, with people excitedly talking about novels and short stories, current as well as classic.

I talked with Nancy Holder and couple of other authors about how, if the two conventions can get themselves synced to being consistently one week apart–as opposed to being the same weekend, which they have been twice before–they’d be particularly useful waystations and caravanserais for authors doing book tours either direction up or down the state, since that would leave four days for travel in between as well as signings in Monterey, Santa Barbara and Los Angeles/Orange County.  Since local SF bookstores (Mysterious Galaxy from San Diego and Other Change of Hobbit from Berkeley) are already at the conventions, it would be a sensible thing to arrange.

Writers’ Conferences and Lightning

Carol Berg September 23rd, 2006

Emerging briefly from under the deadline rock…

A couple of weeks ago, I participated in the Colorado Gold Writers Conference in Denver. I gave a workshop on designing and writing vivid fictional worlds. I did a question-and-answer session addressing all sort of topics, as well as some individual writing issues. I spent a lot of time “fraternizing.â€? Had a great autographing session. The hardest part was the ten-minute “writer-of-the-yearâ€? speech I had to give on opening night…which led me to think about the place of writers’ conferences (aka writers’ workshops).

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WorldCon/LAConIV retrospective

Kevin Andrew Murphy August 30th, 2006

WorldCon 2006 (I forget the proper number)/LAConIV (in Anaheim) is now wrapped and the last of the stragglers have I think now left.  I left my sunglasses in the green room at the Hilton.

In attendance from Deep Genre were myself, Sherwood Smith, David Edelman, Kate Elliot and Madeleine Robins.  Except Sherwood, we ended up meeting at Madeleine’s reading on Sunday and hit Starbucks for coffee afterwards.

As David E. mentioned back during my Comicon post, too many con reports read like exercises in name dropping (which that post avoided), so I’ll try to avoid that here too, except to say that it was fun to put faces to people I’d before only known as names.  For example, David Keck, who I’d before only known as a sometime poster here on the blog, was suddenly there to talk to in person and everything at the Wild Cards reception and then on Sunday, we got to talk more after sharing a panel.

Rather than go for the gossip columnist approach, which is tacky when you’re one of the ones going to the parties and dinners, I’ll simply describe it as a novelist: There were swanky parties and simple parties, both on and off site.  There were fabulous dinners worthy of hobbit salivation and there were dinners that made me feel like I was stuck in a not terribly original comedy sketch.  (How many times can the Hilton’s kitchen’s screw up a burger?)  Terribly famous people were revealed as nice folks you hang out with in the bar.

In short, it was a con.  Panels went well from what I saw, and I saw a lot of it because I was on a lot of panels.  Apart from the usual scheduling snafus, bad mics, a spilled water pitcher and occasional overenthusiasm, things appeared to go to plan.  Name tags were ready and waiting on every panel.  Room temperatures were perfect, water was ready.  A few authors brought enough books to use for a gamemaster’s screen, but given the trouble with psuedonyms and publishing logjams, I’ll look less askance at that than I might.  Ideally you should pimp only one book at a time, but publishing doesn’t always cooperate.

The Dealers Room floor was pretty amazing even for a WorldCon, and with panels and parties, I did not manage to see all of it, but I did see a lot.  The Masquerade was also nice, with the standout being costumes for “Dancing with the Intergalactic Stars.”  I don’t know if they won, but I expect they did, since I did the same as many and left for the parties after the last entrant but before the judging.

What else should be said of the parties?  Well, I have to admit I really liked the Wild Cards reception, not because it was swanky (though that was still incredibly cool), but because it let everyone have fun and talk in a nice relaxed atmosphere and let me meet folk I haven’t seen for years or have only talked to on the phone.  Other parties?  Well, of the author’s parties, some you pretty much needed a shoehorn to get people in the door.

The fan and bid parties were vastly entertaining as well, and not as insanely crowded.  Kansas City had a “ribs tasting” which ended up being a case of too much sauce and not enough ribs, since I got to the part in time to see a table covered with bowls of various barbecue sauces.  However, that meant that the next day at their fan table, they were selling the excess bottles of barbecue sauce for $2 each.  So I grabbed four so I can do my own ribs tasting at home.

I missed the Hugo awards, but was told they went well with Connie Willis doing a great job as presenter.  The buzz about the Hugo slate was also good, with the phrase I heard more than once being “remarkably sane,” meaning that the nominees and the winners were all there as a matter of popular choice of good art, as opposed to something being pumped by media frenzy rather than quality.

Small disappointment in that WorldCon did not apparently have any swag bags of books or even cloth souvenir totes.  Maybe for sale at the T-shirt booth, but no “Welcome to the con, this if for you” like you get at World Horror, World Fantasy or some past WorldCons (including LAConIII).  However, it’s not mandatory, and my bag from WorldHorror is still sitting on my floor (though emptied of books).

And that was WorldCon, or at least what I’m conscious enought talk about after driving back last night.

Mission Eternity Sarcophagus, latest etoy project

Kevin Andrew Murphy August 14th, 2006

Mission Eternity Sarcaphagous Interior with etoy docent

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, I managed to catch this just before it left San Jose.  What is it, you may ask?  Well, it’s the latest project from etoy, the Zurich-based artists who’ve done various avante-garde tech-savvy art projects over the years, including the ToyWar some years back, where I signed on as one of their “toy soldiers” to help drive the internet toy company “Etoys” (no relation) bankrupt for having sued them because it wanted their domain name.

Anyway, their latest project came to my home town and I managed to catch it before they packed up and left.

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Comicon International 2006 — The Movie Star, the Professor and the rest of the crew

Kevin Andrew Murphy July 27th, 2006

Last year, just in time for Comicon, my sister scheduled her wedding opposite the Masquerade, which I consequently missed.  This year?  Well, I missed the Masquerade again, but only because of other complications.

Where to start?  Where to end?  Egads, I’ve been going to this thing for twenty years now, saw it when it was small, saw it when it was dying, then saw it when it moved to the new convention center and doubled in size every year, even as they continued to enlarge the convention center.  I remember a couple years ago when I made the mistake of being on the main floor when the crowd capacity overtaxed the air conditioning and I nearly fainted on top of Guillermo Del Toro as he was slipping out the back of the Marvel booth and under my arm as I supported myself on a pillar.

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Alas, Westercon!

Kevin Andrew Murphy July 6th, 2006

Well, Westercon has come and gone and a good time was had by all who actually showed up. What am I saying here? Politely that Conzilla, Westercon 59 in San Diego, was a “relaxicon.” More on the money that it was underattended relative to other Westercons past due to a number of factors, the main ones being that Comicon is coming up in a couple weeks in the same city, and at the end of next month, WorldCon will be in Anaheim (even if it is titled LAConIV).

Why do I mention this? Because twenty years ago, I attended Westercon 39 in the same city, a twenty-year-old bright-eyed aspiring pro, and I carved watermelon boats for the SFWA suite instead of going to the masquerade because I wanted to stay, talk with editors, agents and other authors, make connections and whatnot, and watermelon-boat-carving was the price of admission for non-members from the party hostess.

Twenty years later, there was no SFWA suite, nor even a SFWA business meeting. No publishers’ parties, not even the Scientologists. The toastmaster, Kevin J. Anderson, and the author guest of honor, Walter Jon Williams, did host parties and gave out free copies of their novels, but book editors? Magazine editors? Agents? Closest thing was BenBella having a publisher’s table in dealer’s room, but staffed by their distributor from LA. The publisher, Glenn, will himself be in town in a couple weeks for the Comicon.

Yes, there was some anthology chatter, but you find that wherever authors are found. But when I met a new young author who’d come to the con to try to sell his first novel–and had flown in all the way from Minnesota–I wasn’t able to tell him anything more useful than go to WorldCon next month because the only thing left was bid parties. Bid parties right, left and center for the honor of hosting the next Westercon and Worldcon, and endless amounts of SMOFing. The most important news from SMOFdom came from Michael Siladi, chair of next year’s Westercon, which would have been in San Jose except that at the 11th hour, the Doubletree decided to restaff itself with greedy crackmonkeys, at least for key managerial positions, and the upshot is that Westercon 60 will now be held slightly northwards in San Mateo: http://spfii.org/westercon60/

Were the panels useful and entertaining? Without expection, yes. San Diego in particular has a talent for making highly informative and innovative panel discussions. But….

Well, I remember hearing tales of the Texas Westercon that was killed because the San Diego Comicon moved to the same weekend after being bumped by the Republican National Convention and consequently everyone who had to do the Comicon simply skipped Westercon.

What am I saying here? Well, I think that the Westercon rules should be changed such that, the same as Worldcon not being able to be placed within five hundred miles of another Worldcon, you shouldn’t place a Westercon in the same radius as a Worldcon. Likewise you should not have a Westercon the same weekend as a major regional convention.

Admittedly I also just rejoined SFWA after a long hiatus, but it’s kind of sad to not have a SFWA suite, or even a SFWA meeting. Yes, I didn’t volunteer to bell that cat myself, and there wouldn’t have been much of a point anyway since there wasn’t anything that really needed getting away from. And it’s not as if this is the first Westercon to lack both SFWA suite and publisher’s parties. But still….

On the plus side, I bought a particularly cool cane to wave at people.

P.S. I hereby retract my gripe about lack of magazine editors: Marti McKenna was there, who I know from long back, but who I only had a chance to wave to in the halls as I was rushing off to panels. My bad for not catching up, but Marti just remedied this with an email announcement, the important bit below:

Seventh Issue for Æon SF

Æon Seven is now available at ebook retailers. With a delightful cover by award-winning illustrator Alan M. Clark, the seventh issue of Æon Speculative Fiction features fiction by Elizabeth Bear and Sarah Monette, Stephen Couch, Jay Lake, Rita Oakes, Bruce McAllister, Joe Murphy, and Ken Rand, as well as nonfiction by Michael Lohr and Dr. Rob Furey, and the seventh installment in a continuing series of columns by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. A preview is online at http://www.aeonmagazine.com/aeonseven.html.

Edited by Marti McKenna and Bridget McKenna, Æon Speculative Fiction is a quarterly e-magazine from Scorpius Digital Publishing. Æon publishes “speculative” stories (science fiction, fantasy, dark fantasy, magic realism, etc.) and features fiction and nonfiction by veterans, award-winners, and rising talents.

Æon Seven is currently available for download from http://www.electricstory.com and http://www.fictionwise.com.

Praise for Æon

“Æon continues to publish excellent work.”