Gary and I will be participating authors at the Ohioana Library Book Festival in Columbus, OH on May 10th. Mary Doria Russell, Harvey Pekar, Christopher Barzak, Rosemary Laurey, and Catherynne M. Valente will also be at the festival.

The festival is free. For more info, visit:
http://www.ohioanabookfestival.org/

Overall, Penguicon was a lot of fun. It was a much bigger convention than I was expecting; the online FAQ had implied about 800 people, and I think when all was said and done they had 1500 people or more.

( a few things that could be improved for next year )

What they did have in the green room were a couple of sports medicine volunteers who were giving free chair massages. Holy shit those were awesome, and erased all my crabbiness from the drive and registration. The green room and the consuite both were very well stocked with snacks and good-quality sandwich makings and a variety of drinks, and I give the convention high marks for that.

The other really nice touch was that Penguicon had a volunteer named Jake who regularly took a huge cart of drinks and food through the dealers' area so that the people who were chained to tables could get something to eat. Other cons have done lunch runs for dealers, but Penguicon did this more often and had better stuff than I'd seen before.

Anyhow, Jake, if you're reading this: you rock.

Also on the food front: the Brazilian barbecue Saturday was delicious. I hadn't had the chance to get a ticket for it online, and it seemed like too much trouble at registration, but luckily they opened the 'cue to everyone interested after a while, and for $6 Gary came back to our table with a huge mounded plate of perfectly-cooked steak cubes. So yummy I didn't even feel that little twinge of guilt I usually get when consuming mammal.

I didn't get the chance to try the liquid nitrogen ice cream but I heard it was pretty darn tasty.

I got to (briefly) meet a bunch of people from my friendslist: ckd, marykaykare, cmpriest and her jungle guide earthgoat (who I owe 25 cents!), and several other folks. We didn't get to the con in time to hit the LJ party on Friday, else I expect I would have met many others.

The one recurring downside to the convention was that, because of the open-source nature of many of the offerings, some fans evidently assumed that anything not tied down was free for the taking. And so some people took books from the dealer's room without paying, and someone took several of Catherynne M. Valente's books that had been left boxed on a table near Gary before Gary had time to say, "I don't think those are for you." We rescued the remaining book; Gary later found Cat and she said she'd wondered what had happened to the box and told him to keep it.

Programming

I was on a bunch of panels Saturday; here's my report for each.

• A Surplus of Talent: This was my reading slot with Jeff deLuzio (timeshredder) and John Scalzi. I hadn't had a chance to talk IRL much with Jeff before (we've known each other for a while on E2) and was chatting with him when Scalzi came up and introduced himself. I honestly wouldn't have recognized him otherwise -- he's one of those men who looks utterly different once he grows a goatee and grows his hair out. Scalzi was very pleasant and read a fun story; I met his wife later and she seems like a lovely person. Jeff read an excerpt from a new novel he's working on and I'm looking forward to seeing the rest someday. I read "Your Corporate Network and the Forces of Darkness"; I was a bit nervous and read too quickly, but people laughed and evidently several of them bought Installing Linux on a Dead Badger right after the session was over.
  
  
• Excellence in an Economy of Words--Why Write Short Fiction? This was a lively panel that also featured Elizabeth Bear (matociquala), Jim Hines (jimhines), M. Keaton and Sarah Monette. The consensus of course was that short fiction is good because you can experiment with different kinds of writing and storytelling and also because it helps build your writing chops. We also answered questions from the audience about plotting short vs. long and also about co-writing techniques.
  
  
• National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) I shared this panel with Jim Hines (jimhines), M. Keaton, and Daniel J. Hogan (danieljhogan). Another good panel. I was the only person there who hadn't formally participated in NaNoWriMo, but like the others I feel it's a worthwhile endeavor. I shared Gary's situation of having had to write 40,000 words of one of his recently-published novels in 8 days. Yep, he had to write and edit half a novel in just over a week, and, as I told the audience, if you rise to the level of working pro novelist, this could easily happen to you, too. And if you haven't had to crank out that kind of word count before, you could easily waste precious time freaking out about the crushing deadline instead of getting the work done. We all agreed that NaNoWriMo is excellent for learning how to get writing done and work through blocks -- both extremely valuable skills -- but we cautioned that new writers shouldn't assume that the resulting novel will be publishable and also warned against the vanity presses that prey on the hopes of NaNoWriMo participants.
  
  
• Johnny Can't Read and Nobody Thinks it's a Problem This panel was scheduled for 7pm Saturday, and I made the mistake of lying down in my room for a short nap that became a much longer nap due to a mis-set alarm. So I didn't make this one. When I awoke, bleary, I thought, "Heck, probably everyone was at dinner anyhow. No biggie"
  
  How wrong I was. This turned out to be the One True Panel. timeshredder was on it, and he told me that it was standing-room only, and that they had to open the doors so that people in the hall could listen in. Some members of the audience started a loud fight over homeschooling. Evidently "lively" didn't begin to cover this panel.
  
  And the next day, I was approached by two utter strangers -- not panelists, mind you, nor con organizers, but people from the audience -- who scolded me for not making the panel. In over 10 years of congoing I'd never, ever been scolded for missing a panel before. How odd.
  
  
• Basic Survival Skills for Authors This was at 10pm Saturday, and I did make it. Jim Hines and Elizabeth Bear were on this one as well. Everyone was a bit tired, and the panel meandered a bit, but I think ultimately the audience got some helpful advice. However, we ended up giving them a bit of a Catch-22: "For God's sake don't quit your day job when you sell your first novel, but on the other hand if you do well as a fiction writer you're probably going to be so tired/distracted at work that they're going to fire you eventually."

And speaking of the day job, it's time for me to hit the shower.

Despite our best effort, we hit Detroit at rush hour. No fun there. We got to the con hotel around 6pm. Nice room, no soap (fixed that). Registration was a bit chaotic, but free chair massages in the green room more than made up for that. Watched the Singing Tesla Coils tonight; those are really cool.

More later!

Gary and I will be at Penguicon 6.0 this weekend in Troy, MI. I'll be one of their "nifty" guests, and Gary's pretty much a civilian for a change ;-)

All my panels are currently scheduled to be on Saturday; in addition to a reading slot with Jeff "Timeshredder" deLuzio and John Scalzi, I'll be on:

• "Basic Survival Skills for Authors"
  
• "Excellence in an Economy of Words--Why Write Short Fiction?"
  
• "NaNoWriMo: Good idea or waste of time?"
  
• "Johnny Can't Read and Nobody Thinks it's a Problem"

Aaand I just realized that in my frenzy to get packed, I've completely failed to pick anything out for my reading. *Puts it on the list*

I hope I'll see some of you there!

Hey, is anybody in the Columbus area -- or who might be traveling through Columbus to get to Michigan -- going to Penguicon in April? I'm scheduled to attend as a Nifty guest, and Gary's coming with me. We'd be interested in splitting a ride with someone.

I appear to be over the virus that, for about 8 hours Friday, made me wonder what I'd done to offend God.

Last night, Gary and I discovered that we will in fact be able to attend World Horror in SLC next month. In addition to getting to see people we haven't seen in a while, I'll have the chance to have a sit-down with my agent.

So, a good finish to a not-so-good weekend :)

At Context 19, (taking place October 6-8, 2006, here in Columbus, OH) we're going to have expanded writing workshop programming.

( Workshop instructors will be Diana Dru Botsford, Tobias Buckell, Paul Melko, Gary A. Braunbeck, Charles Coleman Finlay, Rosemary Laurey, and Tim Waggoner )

So why am I telling you about something that's 6 months off?

Because in addition to the writing workshop sessions, the science symposium, and the regular sorts of con programming, the convention will feature Saturday luncheons with author Maureen McHugh and editor Ellen Datlow.

There are only 7 spots open in each luncheon, so if you'd like to have lunch with either guest of honor, you might want to register very soon.

You can sign up using our online registration form.

There's also an LJ community for Context over at contextsf; right now we've got a call for programming ideas as well as a place to post room/ride offers.

Okay, so I've been helping organize the writers workshops and related programming for our local next-October SF convention, Context (also, contextsf for updates and/or if you want to put your 2 cents in on programming. No, seriously, you could totally bend us to your will over there!).

Check out what we've got so far:

Editor Guest of Honor: Ellen Datlow
Guest of Honor: Maureen McHugh
Horror Guest of Honor: Tim Waggoner
Special Guest: Gary A. Braunbeck
Special Guest: Kay Kenyon
Special Guest: Louise Marley
Special Guest: Mike Resnick

Participating Authors: Diana Botsford, Charles Coleman Finlay, Tobias Buckell, Rosemary Laurey, Paul Melko, and me

Charles Coleman Finlay, Tobias Buckell, and Paul Melko, who directed last year's much-praised workshop, are back on board to lead the Mega Writing Workshop. Up to 24 participants will be able to submit short manuscripts for professional critique and participate in this workshop, which will run 6-8 hours total over two days. Please note that the workshop requires internet access, as manucripts will be submitted and initial discussions will be held online. The actual, in-person workshop will ensure that every member has a small-group (3-4 person) session with one of the pros.

There will also be shorter Mini Writing Workshops offered on specific subjects. These workshops require no advance preparation on the part of participants and will run 1.5 to 2 hours each:

• Gary A. Braunbeck: Creating Character and Dialog
• Diana Botsford: Screenwriting
• Rosemary Laurey: Writing Specfic-Flavored Romance/Erotica
• Tim Waggoner: Writing Media Tie-Ins

We don't have workshop rates nailed down yet, nor do we have an online membership form yet. Soon!

I'm gonna try to organize a multi-publisher room party, if possible.

I set up contextsf for announcements/discussion of the Context SF convention here in Columbus. Not much there yet, but if you attended in the past and liked it, or think you might attend in the future, please consider joining. Context, if you're not familiar with it, is aimed at people who are fans of written SF/fantasy/horror, as opposed to people who are mainly costuming, gaming, or media fans. The convention did have a new movie/anime track this past weekend that's likely to be expanded in the future. The convention also hosts a writers' workshop that was very well-attended this year (22 people with a waiting list) and it's possible that might be expanded as well.

The Stokers went pretty well, I think. It was a nice laid-back convention for me. I got to hang out with some cool people and enjoyed the nice weather. Didn't get to do much sightseeing, but I wasn't expecting to. The redeye flight back early Monday morning was hot and sticky and smelly and cramped, but I pretty much expected that and it was bearable.

The Saturday signing at Dark Delicacies was way too crowded for my tastes, but I'm glad it apparently generated a lot of good business for the store. Store owners Sue and Del Howison were very good hosts and gave us a lot of freebies when we went back to browse the next day.

I've heard some grumblings about the lack of catering and afterparty, but I thought the con went very well. IMO HWA treasurer Lisa Morton did an excellent job on fairly short notice; as an added bonus, she did it for $9,000 less than last year's convention.

( Stoker Weekend photos of Karen Taylor, Gary Braunbeck, Jonathan Reitan, Chuck Palahniuk, and Del Howison -- may take some time to load )