I came back from the convention to be swept immediately into busy days and a visit from family. So here is a rather belated and short Worldcon report. Â I’m usually by myself at Worldcon, but my long-time friend Gisele from Florida (I met her over half my life ago!) and my partner Toni joined me this time.
Special moments:
I got to meet Alliette deBodard. I love her writing in the Aztec world. She is gracious and quiet in person. I also got to meet N.K. Jemisin and see Patty Briggs. Even established writers get their fan girl time at Worldcon.
Speaking of fan girl time, I am now lusting after Kim Stanley Robinson’s next book. I heard him read from it, and it’s going to be gorgeous. I don’t know if it has a pub date or even a name, but he is one of my favorite writers, and his next book is a return to science fiction.
I had a lovely dinner with Greg and Astrid Bear, the three of us (me, Toni, and Gisele), and Louise Marley. Â We got to celebrate Greg’s birthday. Â The Bear’s are some of the most gracious and brilliant people is the SF community, and I always feel blessed when I get to spend time with them. Â I also saw many people from the Starry Heaven/Wellspring writing workshop community.
The Hugos were particularly well-done this year. A shout out to Jay Lake and Ken Scholes for that. Â I know them both, and this was surely not easy for either of them. Â Jay is busy winning his cancer fight and Ken is more shy than he appears. Â They did great.
Special thanks:
The joint book launch for Mayan December and The Brahm’s Deception went incredibly well, and I needn’t have worried about it at all (I did, lots, but I’d never thrown a party at any con, much less a Worldcon). Food and drink were acquired easily and more passed to us from a Nightshade authors party, which we then passed to a George R.R. Martin fan party. People did come, and they even bought books. Mayan December is apparently hard to find in the wild, so I’m glad I had some there, thanks to my hugo-winning publisher, Sean Wallace (the Hugo was for the excellent work he does over at Clarkesworld). I do have to shout out huge thanks to my partner Toni and my friend Gisele who greeted and shlepped and decorated and organized and kept me functioning even though I was tired by then. Also a big thanks to Kay Kenyon for bartending.
The con was really well run. Â The communication was great, the volunteers all fabulous, and the programing excellent.
The only bad thing:
The con was very mixed up with casino people (expected, based on location). Â But twice I saw other casino guests of the young white male variety poking fun at con-goers. Â They didn’t seem to appreciate the beanies of first-fandom very much, nor really much of the costuming in general. Â There were a two times I really wanted a handy nearby Klingon.