gwynnega | Entries tagged with world fantasy

I had a lovely time at WFC. It was so great getting to hang out with friends and meet new friends. I managed to run into most (but not all!) of the people I wanted to see.

The open poetry reading organized by

rose_lemberg was one of the best, most consistent poetry readings I've ever attended. Among the many participants were Rose,

shweta_narayan,

csecooney (reading her Rhysling-winning "The Sea King's Second Bride"),

samhenderson,

mer_moon,

lnhammer,

upstart_crow, and me.

My panel (When Does Genre Become Literature?) was a lot of fun, and mostly devoid of Genre Fiction Rules and Literary Fiction Sucks! rhetoric.

deliasherman had a book release party (complete with sweet tea and pralines) for The Freedom Maze, which I can't wait to read. At the party,

ellen_kushner happened to introduce me to D. Lynn Smith, a writer who, like me, lives in SoCal--and then I discovered a couple of minutes later that she writes Dark Shadows audio dramas for Big Finish!

Neil Gaiman read a wonderful Sherlock Holmes story (a brand-new one, not "A Study in Emerald"). Among his various appearances at the con, I think my favorite was his conversation with Connie Willis, which was hilarious and inspiring. I also got to hear Peter S. Beagle read a short story ("Olfert Dapper's Day").

One not-so-good thing about the weekend was the hotel. Its sprawling set-up seemed to me inconvenient for a convention of this sort--but I've since found out that it has massive accessibility problems. I hope convention programmers will take this into account in the future.

Current Mood: busy

rose_lemberg was one of the best, most consistent poetry readings I've ever attended. Among the many participants were Rose,

shweta_narayan,

csecooney (reading her Rhysling-winning "The Sea King's Second Bride"),

samhenderson,

mer_moon,

lnhammer,

upstart_crow, and me.

My panel (When Does Genre Become Literature?) was a lot of fun, and mostly devoid of Genre Fiction Rules and Literary Fiction Sucks! rhetoric.

deliasherman had a book release party (complete with sweet tea and pralines) for The Freedom Maze, which I can't wait to read. At the party,

Current Mood: busy

I'm mostly packed for WFC, flying out early tomorrow afternoon. Having my usual pre-travel nerves. Soon I will have a glass of wine and watch REVENGE.

Finished reading THE WILD GIRLS, which I loved a lot.

Looking forward to seeing those of you who will be at WFC!

Current Mood: hyper

I spent much of the weekend working on the Jo book, getting ready for WFC, reading the first half of The Wild Girls by Pat Murphy (loving it), re-watching Dark Shadows (John Karlen as freaked-out Willie Loomis is a joy to behold), and catching up on episodes of Revenge. (While ABC is hell-bent on destroying the last vestiges of their daytime serial dramas, they seem equally committed to fostering their nighttime ones, and Revenge is a very good one.)

This afternoon I went to Skylight Books for Kate Beaton's book signing. I was late to the event because I was endlessly circling, looking for parking, and when I finally got there, the place was way more packed than I'd expected.

beatonna gave a great talk and showed slides (though I couldn't see 'em too well because of the crowd). I did manage to purchase Skylight's last copy of the Hark! A Vagrant book. I didn't try to get it signed, what with the crowd, but I did stop by Skylight's annex and bought Alice Bag's new memoir, Violence Girl.

I only have to go the office two days this week, what with WFC coming up!

Current Mood: good

So I'm scheduled to be on a panel at World Fantasy.

Saturday: 4:00 PM

Pacific 1: Where the Sea Meets the Shore: When Does Genre Become Literature?

An increasing number of big literary names are writing stories that appropriate many genre tropes though some deny it is speculative literature. Magical Realism novels use just the slightest touch of the fantastic as a part of the recipe. Is this just a return to the Weird Fiction of the previous turn of the century? Where does genre transmogrify into literature? Is there an actual distinction?

Steven Erikson, Gwynne Garfinkle, Caren Gussoff, Stephen Potts, Kit Reed (M)

Current Mood: cheerful

Writing: I'm mostly (as usual) working on the Jo book (which I'm feeling good about at the moment), with brief forays into poetry revision.

World Fantasy Convention: Is next week! How did that happen? I look forward to seeing those of you who will be there.

Reading: Among other things, I'm reading Like Sands Through the Hourglass, a dual memoir by Bill Hayes and Susan Seaforth Hayes, who met and fell in love on the set of Days of Our Lives in the early 1970s. It's a ridiculously charming book. (Earlier this year, when I visited my agent Diana Fox at the Romantic Times Convention in downtown LA, I was waiting for the valets to find my car in the garage afterwards--when I discovered that so were Bill and Susan Seaforth Hayes, to my surprised delight. I managed not to blurt out "You're Doug and Julie!")

Weather: We are currently having actual autumn in Los Angeles (though it's supposed to get warm again this weekend). Boot-and-scarf weather makes me very happy.

Current Mood: cheerful

This was my first World Fantasy, and I think it was the first con I've ever attended where I actually met up with everyone I'd planned to see. It was a weekend of great conversations.

I had a lot of fun moderating the speculative poetry reading that

samhenderson (who wasn't at the con) organized. Tina Connolly, Camille Alexa, Shweta Narayan, Joseph McDermott, Phyllis Holiday, David Lunde, and Larry Hammer read, and it was a great mix of different poetic styles.

I'm not going to write up all the panels and readings I attended. A couple of highlights: Ellen Klages read her chilling YA story "Singing on a Star." N.K. Jemisin read from her upcoming novel The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms and ended at such a suspenseful point, I wanted to yell, "But what happens next?" I guess I'll have to wait until February to find out.

On Saturday I took a little break from the con for lunch and Ryan's Hope conversation with

willowgreen. Saturday night I read poems at the Broad Universe Rapid-fire Reading, which was well-attended and very enjoyable. On Sunday, after the awards banquet, I went to Barnes and Noble for a reading for the brand-new Interfictions 2 anthology (thanks to Ellen Kushner, who organized car rides for me and various participants and audience members!).

The food at the hotel was rather jawdroppingly overpriced, but I did enjoy having sushi room service!

Current Mood: contemplative

I had a lovely time at WFC, and (so far) have no con crud. Soon I will post a con report (tomorrow, probably), but first I'm gonna unpack and catch up on email and soaps.

The Garage Kitty greeted me with hungry meows and forgot to give me the cold shoulder for leaving town.

I've been offline since Thursday (as the hotel charged a fortune for use of their business center), so let me know if I missed anything!

Current Mood: good

Off to WFC. The shuttle's supposed to pick me up in 45 minutes. I probably won't be online much until Monday.

( so I will post about today's Ryan's Hope... )

Current Mood: hyper

I'm packing for World Fantasy. Delighted that for once I don't have to get up at the crack of dawn for my flight. Not delighted that the trip to the airport will take longer than my actual flight. Ah well. I'd like to work on chapter 19 today, but I'm in that weird preoccupied pre-travel state. Maybe after dinner.

The other day I was writing a scene in which my protagonist Jo is watching late-night TV, and I couldn't find any info on the web about the kinds of late-night TV prevalent in NYC in 1976. Next thing I knew, I'd ordered a copy of the NYC TV Guide from December 1976 on eBay! It arrived today, and it is very entertaining. It has Valerie Harper as Rhoda on the cover.

( today's Ryan's Hope )

Current Mood: good

Thursday
9:00 PM Club Regent: With Me, Poetry Has Not Been a Purpose, but a Passion

With works like "The Bells," "The Raven," and "Annabel Lee" Poe applied his dark romantic sensibilities to the art of "beauty in words." Today, according to former SFPA president (and Nebula nominee) Mike Allen "science fiction poetry, fantastic poetry, speculative poetry, whatever you wish to call it, forms the core of a lively, thriving scene that coexists with genre fiction in many venues." Join us for readings by poets active in the vibrant speculative poetry genre, and bring your "dark romantic," fantastical, horrifying or science fiction poetry to read.
Gwynne Garfinkle (moderator)

Saturday
10:00 PM Crystal Room: Broad Universe Rapid Fire Reading

Broad Universe is an international organization with the primary goal of promoting science fiction, fantasy, and horror written by women. The Rapid Fire Reading is a chance to hear several of BU's authors present selections from their recent and upcoming works.