Diversicon Write-up, Part the First

 

So I spent last weekend doing my first gig as a “headlining guest” (as in name goes out in publicity as opposed to “also attending”) at a science fiction convention. Diversicon is a small convention that takes place in the Twin Cities, usually St. Paul, every year for the past 21 years.  As the name implies, this is a convention built around the notion of “diversity” in science fiction, fantasy and horror.  Former guests have included Melissa Scott, S.P. Somtow, Pam Keesey, Tananarive Due, Steven Barnes and a host of others. In short, not bad company to be keeping. J

Jack McDevitt, Roy C. Booth (and Cynthia Booth) and I kicked things off with readings at DreamHaven Books on Thursday night. We got an audience of 15-20 attendees, which is pretty good for a weeknight reading. Roy and Cynthia had survived a harrowing drive down from northern MN, and arrived after I got started, but still with plenty of time to do a fun reading. Jack McDevitt was an excellent reader and quite pleasant and the attendees asked lots of good questions, so it was a fun experience all around. We retired to Merlin’s Rest, which proved somewhat unfortunate as it was “overly amplified live band in a small space night.” But the food was good.

My Friday kicked off by landing at the hotel mid-afternoon with bags of auction items and copies of my books. I checked into my nice hotel room, dropped stuff off and chatted with various friends. I capped things off with a brisk dinner with author Rachel Gold, con pro liason extraordinaire Anton Petersen and my friend Matt, before returning for Opening Ceremonies. These were quite efficient: after greeting the attendees, Roy and I stepped out to make room for Jack McDevitt’s interview.

Shortly thereafter, I was back up to moderate “Can’t Rip a Chainmail Bodice: Science Fiction, Fantasy, and/or Feminist Romance.” To be honest, I don’t think this panel ever really jelled. Individually, I think we all said interesting things about the topic but we never quite got a discussion to take off. Just one of those Friday night things, I think. I do remember plugs for Michael Merriam’s work, Rachel Gold’s new SFR (written as Rachel Calish), my Silver Moon, the works of Tamora Pierce, Holly Black, Lois McMaster Bujold, Pat Wrede and Caroline Stevermer, Emma Bull and others, plus some general points about sexism in romance and the extent to which nonheterosexual romance does or does not play into those formulas.

After that, it was lounging about in the nice big open space and chatting with the Merriams and other friends, and hence to bed.

Part 2 coming soon!

Diversicon, Part the Second

Annnddd…I forgot to mention author Ka Vang’s reading from her new children’s book, Shoua and the Northern Lights Dragon, on Friday night. The book sounds wonderful and I need a copy forthwith.

Day 2 dawned bright and early in the sense of me waking up at my usual time. I enjoyed a quiet breakfast in the lobby, met up with friends and did a bit of prep for my 10AM “Depictions of Aging in SF/F” panel. By the time it started, I realized I was getting a migraine and had cleverly forgotten my pills at home (this will be entertaining later), but we soldiered on, talking about our various likes (realistic portrayals of older characters,) and dislikes (magical fixes, body swaps), whether female writers in genre tend to do more realistic portrayals of aging than male writers (general impression was yes, and most recommendations were by female authors, but we agreed that we didn’t have a representative sample) and sundry recommendations. The basic reading list is here, with some additions.

By the time we got to my noon reading I had inhaled a nice lunch which Rebecca Marjesdatter was kind enough to pick up for me and my migraine was getting interesting. I read from Blood Moon (the Silver Moon sequel in progress), a prequel short piece for the novel proposal book I’m working on, a flash horror piece and an excerpt from my steampunk ghost story from Ghosts in Gaslight, Monsters in Steam to an appreciative audience which included GOH Jack McDevitt (who is, incidentally, a fine GOH. I recommend him!).

When I emerged, Anton asked what he could get me and went in quest of the only pills that work on my headaches. His success enabled me to a. shed my migraine and b. accept pills from his hands with a loud cry of “Oh look! There’s Anton with my drugs!” to the great amusement of onlookers.

After that, Kim Long-Ewing and I talked about Broad Universe, the Carl Brandon Society and the Outer Alliance in the “Unheard Voices of SF/F/H” panel. Check them all out and sign up. It’s for the good of FANDOM. Dammit.

Then we autographed things and it was fun.

This was followed by a pleasant group dinner at Little Szechuan, then back to Vanna and buy stuff at the auction. Speaking of which, if you bought one of my books and would like it personalized, let me know. If we can’t meet up, I have book plates I can sign and send.

More chatting. Fall down, go boom after parties.

Day 3 was a wee bit shorter, though quite entertaining in that it opened with Breakfast for Professionals Who are Not Morning People, with Roy and Cynthia Booth and me grunting politely at each other over coffee and misc. breakfast items. I caught part of Jack McDevitt's excellent reading after running a short errand. Then there was more hanging about with friends until "LGBTQ SF/F You Should be Reading." In theory, I was moderating but we went for a more free form discussion based on room set up and Rachel Gold brought wonderful questions and other people asked other questions, and I ranted a fair amount about the marginalization of queer sf/f by LGBTQ writers and how difficult it is to find since most of the bigger houses don't publish it, and many of the larger review sites don't review it. We did make some recommendations for new and recent works: Scheherazade's Facade, edited by Michael C. Jones, Geoff Ryman's Paradise Tales, Tenea D. Johnson's Smoketown, Rachael Ack's steampunk series, Amanda Downum's series that kicks off with The Drowned City, and a number of other books that I'm forgetting. Lively discussion then spilled out into the lobby area for more discussion so good panel all around.

I finished things off with "By the Light of the Moon: Reading, Writing, and Watching Werewolves." Silver Moon may have been mentioned a time or two, but we also talked about various werewolf films including Ginger Snaps and In the Company of Wolves, Angela Carter, Hannah Kate's anthology Wolf Girls, some of Roy C. Booth's short stories, The Howling, Wolfen, HowlCon and the She-Wolf blog, plus sundry other things I have spaced out by now.
Good, free-ranging discussion on the topic - I look forward to other write ups.

Diveriscon was an all around awesome con experience. I met new folks, had great discussions, brought in some new readers and learned about work I need to be reading and watching. Yay for the Diversicon con com and volunteers! Great job, folks! :-)

Check out next year's con, when the guests will be Laura Ives Gilman and fabulous local sfnal poet Terry Garey