wshaffer

I'm back from Worldcon. I had a great time - I think I did a better job of managing my social energy than I often do at Worldcons, which means I spent less time at parties but had more fun at the parties I attended. A good trade.

When people ask me, "How is your con going?", I tend to think they mean the one I'm helping to run, rather than the one I'm attending. I had a lot of accidental conversations about FOGcon that way.

As with last year's Worldcon in Reno, I really enjoyed the "Stroll with the Stars" morning walks. I don't often get to chat with the "stars" much, but it's a great low-pressure environment in which to chat to fellow fans, and to get familiar with the area surrounding the convention hotel. (Admittedly, in Reno, the area surrounding the convention hotel was one that I'd have been content to remain unacquainted with. Chicago had a lot more to offer.)

It was a fairly mediocre year for programming, I think. To briefly summarize the panels I attended...
The Good: The SF Squeecast recording was an absolute hoot - I recommend checking it out when it shows up on their podcast feed. I came away from the "F**k Your Knight and the Horse He Rode in On, Part Deux" panel with a long list of book recommendations.

The Bad: "Girl Power in YA SF and Fantasy" was marred by the sole male panelist spending the first half hour talking more than all the female panelists combined. It wasn't intentional, and parity was eventually restored when the women just started interrupting him. "Do We Need Print Books?" was frustrating because people kept bringing up supposed problems with e-books that have either already been technologically solved ("You can't lend an e-book to your friend!" Yes you can!) or will be easily technologically solved once someone brings the right product to market ("E-readers aren't durable enough for small children," or "You can't read an e-book in the bath.") I was annoyed. The three people sitting with me, who are much bigger e-book proponents than I am, were nearly incandescent.

The Meh: "Have Sonic Lipstick, Will Travel" proved to be an hour plus of a roomful of people going, "Yeah, Sarah Jane was awesome. Lis Sladen was awesome." While I can happily spend an hour singing Sarah Jane's praises, I'm not sure a Worldcon panel is the best format to do it in - we'd probably have done better to all go down to the bar and chat. There were brief moments of differing opinion on K-9 and Company and "School Reunion", but the panel didn't really catch fire. (Also, this is nitpicky, but I wish that fandom in general could praise Sarah Jane Smith without (probably unintentionally) belittling prior companions. Sarah Jane was not the "first feminist companion," the "first companion who was a career woman," or "the first companion who stood up to the Doctor," although she was arguably the most effectively-realized character matching those descriptions that the show had had in a while.)

Quibbles about programming aside, it was an excellent con overall.

I feel like I should post something about my World Fantasy Con experience, because I had a really wonderful time. However, I had a wonderful time in a way that doesn't lend itself particularly well to recaps. A typical day went something like: get up, maybe get some exercise, go to the con suite for coffee and chat with interesting people, go to a panel or reading, find a group of people to have lunch with, go back to the con suite and have another cup of coffee and chat with more interesting people, go to another reading, find a group of people to have dinner with, go to the bar and chat with interesting people, realize that my poor introvert brain is going to explode and go back to my room and read a book until I fall asleep.

I have to give serious props to the con suite organizers. Not only did they have sufficient quantities of good coffee to keep me adequately caffeinated the entire weekend, but they had a pretty wide array of food options. I ended up having to rely less on my emergency stash of Larabars and protein powder than I'd anticipated.

( A few highlights )

I expect it will take a few more days before I catch up on my sleep and re-establish my introvert buffers.

A couple of people I know have expressed some curiosity about the 4th Street Fantasy convention, and whether they'd be interested in going. I'd say yes, provided that you a) are a writer, or at least not averse to participating in lots of moderately technical discussion about writing and b) the highlights of your convention experiences are usually the random conversations you end up in at parties or in the consuite.

4th Street is a pretty simple setup. There's a single track of programming; a dealer's room selling books, jewelry by Elise Matthesen, and other necessities of life; and a consuite stocked with snacks and drinks. There's a communal brunch on Sunday morning, and if you stick around until Monday, a vast group expedition for sushi and good ice cream. (I think other cons, especially small ones, ought to consider adopting this idea of arranging more group meals. I find it a great low-stress way to meet people.)

Probably the most though-provoking panel I attended was "Fantasy vs. Progress", featuring Sarah Monette, Marissa Lingen, Adam Stemple, and Patrick Nielsen Hayden. It kind of went all over the place, because I think there were several related-but-distinct questions being addressed at various times, including: Why do so many fantasy writers choose to write in worlds in which technological, social, and historical progress seem not to happen? Why are many fantasy writers reluctant to think through or explore the consequences of the technological level they've chosen for their society? Why do so many fantasy writers choose to write books set in a quasi-medieval world of swords and castles instead of writing about cool stuff like steam trains? Why do so many fantasy novels seem to be determined to treat technological, political, or social progress as if it's a bad thing (with a digression into exactly how anti-technological Tolkien really was)? But if a good panel is defined as "a panel that keeps you talking and thinking about the issues it raised long after the panel is over", it was a really good panel.

Also fun were "Point of View: How not to suck" (Jo Walton, Steve Brust, Sarah Monette) and "The new cliches" (Teresa Nielsen-Hayden and Tom Whitmore).

If all goes well, I'll see if I can pull together some more organized post from my panel notes, or at least post some good quotes. But since I only have about a 50% success rate at creating detailed con reports even when I haven't just moved house, I thought I should at least post some preliminary thoughts while they're still fresh.

So, there you have it. 4th Street. A most congenial little con, and I commend it to your attention.

Magical Realism: Threat or Menace?

There are great stories being written under the heading of Magical Realism lately. Is it a legitimate subgenre of fantasy, or something else entirely? Does Magical Realism actually exist as a distinct entity, or is it simply a way for academics to study a few select authors that they view as worthy, while keeping the rest of the fantasy genre outside the ivory tower?

Panelists: Delia Sherman (M), Catherynne M. Valente, Theodora Goss, Jeremy Lassen

( In the garden of forking panels... )

I remember remarking to someone at WisCon that despite there being some panels on some pretty controversial topics, WisCon was remarkably drama free. "Of course," I added, "the drama won't really start until people get home and start blogging about it."

I never anticipated this particular version of drama. The Angry Black Woman has a good summary. Alas, A Blog also has a good post. The short version: A woman with...issues...went to WisCon, and then posted a bunch of photos of people (with identities poorly concealed) over on Something Awful, with accompanying commentary mocking these people for daring to be fat, disabled, transgendered, or for not meeting her preconceived notions of what Native Americans should look like.

The original post on Something Awful was quickly deleted, but not before Something Awful Sycophant Squad (SASS), a message board for those deemed too offensive for Something Awful (pause for a moment to consider the implications of that), got ahold of the content of the post. These guys started posting other WisCon pictures gleaned from flickr, and heaping a bunch of misogynistic, homophobic, racist, and generally bigoted crap on the people depicted.

Against my better judgement, I went and looked at the SASS thread. Be warned, if you venture over there, that there are some disturbing and definitely not-safe-for-work images posted in the thread, in addition to all the verbal bile. I should note that these disturbing images do not include those of the WisCon attendees, who mostly look like a bunch of people having a really good time.

And although I'm really angry on behalf of all the friends and members of my community who had really hateful things said about them, I do think that this is the point: We went to WisCon and had a really good time. These people over at SASS have nothing better to do than spend hours mocking pictures of us having a good time. They might as well be wearing T-shirts reading, "This is what a sad loser looks like."

I also particularly like badgerbag's response here.

Greetings from sunny Madison, Wisconsin! (Actually, it is a bit overcast at the moment. But it's been sunny most of the weekend.) I've been having a good time, and been enjoying the amenities of Madison (like coffee houses with lots of good coffee and free internet access).

I've mysteriously managed not to spend lots of money in the dealer's room - not so much 'cos I'm being restrained but because I've been too busy chatting with people. I do have vague plans to go trawling through used clothing stores on State Street later today with a friend - if I come back from this con having bought more clothes than books, that will be a definite first.

Anyway, I'm off to a panel in a bit.

One of the highlights of this year's Gallifrey convention was the Blake's 7 panel, featuring Andrew Cartmel (Doctor Who script editor), Derek Riddell (who plays Roj Blake in the audios), Simon Guerrier (writer of a forthcoming Blake's 7 audio), and Andrew Mark Sewell (producer and cofounder of B7 Media).

( News on audios and potential TV series )