Cometary Tales Blog Friday at BayCon 2013

Friday at BayCon 2013

As exemplified by Thursday evening’s brief exposure to the timesense-warping effects of Triskaidekaphobicon, clearly the theory of attending BayCon is direct and clear, albeit a little boring, while the practice thereof is circuitous and exciting.  Here we will continue our study of these contrasts by once more comparing plans and realities with a half-day experience on Opening Day:

Time Frame What the Plan was What really happened
Friday afternoon Arrive early, go to opening ceremonies, then “Irreproducible Results” panel, then to a reading by Lois McMaster Bujold. Just couldn’t get out the door.  Forgot reading glasses, then key, then left door slightly ajar while trying to find my sunglasses (for driving), then became convinced (older/medical-issues) cat had sneaked out, so searched out front and called out back and looked under furniture.  Finally discovered cat hunkered down behind a chair.Arrived halfway through Irreproducible Results panel, but got a front-row seat & enjoyed panel, from nuts and bolts revelations such as that the staff of JIR are unpaid to the audience teaching JIR’s editor the song “There’s a Hole in My Bucket” and locating for him several online sources for flexible rubber with which to make graph paper.

I took a quick look at the Art Show, where they were nice enough to take care of my bag for me.  Theresa Mather‘s dragons were there.  Which one is it that I bought for Tirion?  I wondered, Should I bid on one of these dragon-butterfly prints?  I decided to come back later and sign up as a bidder.

All of the cat-oriented artwork reminded me that I was worried about my cat (not to bore anyone with a pet’s medical issues, but no-one was home to check on Manta that day), but didn’t want to miss the reading.  So stayed put for that.

Bujold read a piece she doesn’t really plan to publish at present, a work-in-progress that may or may not become part of something, but it’s a “Miles” story, so she knew it would please her fans.  The humor bits got big laughs.  And she was good about doing a little Q&A while waiting for late-comers to arrive. Turns out that one intellectual goal for “Curse of Chalion” was to work out a society in which religion had a basis in physical reality.

By then, it was after five, but decided to drive home to check on the cat –through Memorial-day weekend traffic.  The freeway was a parking lot from San Thomas Expressway to, probably, LA.  So, enjoyed elaborately costumed Fanime fans thronging streets of downtown San Jose on the unfreeway route home.  Made pretty good time, actually.  Oh, yes, and the cat was fine.  Time for a quick freezer-cleanup dinner and half an episode of “Castle” before evening sessions.

Friday evening Find out what a “boffer weapon” is and make one in the new DIY Room.  Then go upstairs and learn some Regency dancing.  Maybe get in to panel on talking to people. Boffer-making was not in the DIY room.  I had to go alllll the way to the “Ballroom” and creep past the big room where they were having the “meet the guests” reception.  Way too scary in there.   In the farthest room, kids were whapping each other with foam objects.  Aha, that’s boffing.

But no one was making weapons.Wandered about. Became “brave” and strolled nonchalantly through the reception.  Darn, there had been food.  Extroverts were  happily chatting each other up.

Wandered back to boffers room to watch the swordplay.  Maybe the “make your weapon” thing is over?  I wondered.  The program said they started at 6 and it was already nearly 8.  Suddenly, someone called out, “Who wants to make a weapon?”  Apparently, I had arrived at exactly the right time.

Two hours later, I was working on the trickiest duct-taping tasks on three swords at once, after two teen sisters frantically realized they must dash off to what they described as “Mom’s Concert” and begged for coverage while they were away.   Another hour later, and they were back in time for adding the blade tape and the final decorations.  Clever girls.

So finally 11:30 rolled around and I had myself a lovely PVC and pipe-insulation and duct-tape sword.  But not prepared to wield it yet–too exhausted.  Parked my sword in the car and wandered about a bit.  Regency dancing was already up to a lesson on the Congress of Vienna waltz, which I can’t do with my broken shoulder yet, and which they use as the final dance.

Oh, well.  Time to go home.  Big plans for tomorrow.

 

There are anime fans at BayCon, too.

There are anime fans at BayCon, too.

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What Didn’t Fit On the PageWhat Didn’t Fit On the Page

I regularly guest-host for the podcast Small Publishing in a Big Universe. It’s great fun!.

This weekend, producer Steven Radecki put up a page featuring all the hosts, including those of us who try to reduce the workload of primary host Lisa Jacob.

How sweeet! But, my goodness, this is all the biographical info he had space for:

Vanessa MacLaren-Wray writes about worlds where people matter. She is the author of All That Was Asked, Shadows of Insurrection, and Flames of Attrition as well as the MG novel The Smugglers, and she also writes short fiction and poetry.

My readers deserve the full story. Here you go:

Vanessa MacLaren-Wray began her audio career by voicing the demands of the Permies, a community of invisible little people residing under her grandmother’s coffee table. She parlayed that skill into a successful childhood, such that Barbie could explain why GI Joe (the 60’s version) was a far better marriage prospect than Ken, all the ponies she knew could provide running commentary on the foibles of humans, and she could anchor segments of Walt Whitman Intermediate School’s famous in-school newscasts. As a semi-adult, she voiced a documentary encouraging other young women to study engineering and obtained four years of acting training through the Little Country Theater at the University of Southern North Dakota at Fargo, gaining lead roles in The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, Thurber Carnival, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, and Miss Reardon Drinks a Little, among others.

Vanessa is the author of science fiction and fantasy works that imagine worlds where people matter. Shadows of Insurrection, Flames of Attrition, The Smugglers, and All That Was Asked are available from Water Dragon Publishing and everywhere books are sold. Her short fiction has appeared with Dragon Gems and Fault Zone: Reverse, and her poetry has appeared in Fault Zone: Detachment, Hadrosaur Tales, and The Magazine of Speculative Poetry. She reads classics (Austen, Clemens), mysteries (Reichs, James), manga and light novels (Nagabe, Kazuki),  SFF  and poetry (of course), and street signs. She loves to chat with authors and publishing professionals about their struggles and joys in bringing art, poetry, and stories to readers. Heads-up: if you talk to her at any books-related event, she might put you on her “gotta interview them” list.

Do remember to stop over at SPBU, listen to the grand backlog of episodes (Lisa keeps ’em short and sweet), and subscribe so you don’t miss any. Meet all the hosts here.

Thursday at BayCon 2013Thursday at BayCon 2013

 

There’s a theory about attending a science fiction convention.  It starts with studying the program, noting who the guests are, and planning out a strategy to participate every day and not get too worn out.

Then there’s the practice of being immersed in a con.

There is some similarity.  One can see the relationship between theory and practice.  But they are by no means the same.

What is important to remember is that this is just fine.

Take, for example, BayCon 2013, the San Francisco Bay Area annual convention.  This year is dubbed Triskaidekaphobicon.  Largely because this event houses the highest concentration of people who already know what that means.

For an eager preregistered participant, the event began the day before, on Thursday night.  Last Thursday night, to be precise.  So, for starters, consider plan and execution for this simple task.

Time Frame What the Plan was What really happened
Thursday night Go to Hyatt on the way home from softball, at around 8:30,  and pick up badge A phone call delayed departure for my weekly session of cheering for the NASA Ames softball teams.  By the time Great America Parkway was my next freeway interchange, it was just about 6 o’clock.  So took a detour & stopped off at the Hyatt, which is sort of on the way to softball.  Was the TENTH person to pick up my badge.  Cool.  They planned to put the first thirteen in the newsletter, and asked if that would be OK.  “Of course,” I said.  Double-cool.  Asked if they needed “gofers” still, but the pick-up team didn’t know & couldn’t locate the Head Gofer person.  (Hint about future:  never did get signed up, and that was all for the best for Baycon and for the family Wray.)

 

BayCon participants embellished the welcome sign profusely.

BayCon participants embellished the welcome sign profusely.

Review: Memory and Metaphor, by Andrea MonticueReview: Memory and Metaphor, by Andrea Monticue

Sharon Manders is having a very bad day. She’s been drop-kicked into the distant future–a thousand years out of time–and has no memory whatsoever of making any plans to go anywhen. She’s an archaeologist with a thriving career in good old 21-century Earth. And here she is in the 31st century, where everyone’s calling her by some other name that she doesn’t recognize. And she’s accused of treason, sabotage, terrorist acts. She has a lot on her plate, and she’s going to have to move fast while trying to figure out just what happened.

And you’ll be reading along, trying to figure that out, too. When she finally solves the last layer of that puzzle, you’ll lean back and say, “Oh, yeah, why on Earth didn’t I think of that?” But you won’t have thought of it. Andrea Monticue leads you quite a merry chase. I really can’t roll in too much detail without spoiling the whole thing for you.

Let’s just say a woman from our time finds herself plunged into a high-tech future with AI, biological engineering, and dangerous politics. Just when you think you have everything figured out, Monticue rotates the horizon by 37 degrees and you’re floating in space again, looking for answers. The book has to end (which you will not want it to do) and she ties all those twists and tangles together in one stunner of a unique conceptual shift.

Engaging characters, complex political situations that nonetheless remind you of the mistakes humans make right here on Earth in the “distant past”, and a plot that moves ever faster–all that will keep you glued to the page/e-reader.

At the very least, if all you take from this story is the tech (and there’s way more to it than tech), you will not think about artificial intelligence the same way, not ever again.

I got my copy directly from the publisher, at last year’s Bay Area Science Fiction Convention (BayCon), and was lucky to meet the author, who has the experience and technical background to make this story come alive.

So . . . my copy is autographed. You can get a signed first edition, too, direct from the publisher, at Paper Angel Press. Or you can choose your favorite digital medium or snag the trade paperback from Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Full disclosure: at this point, I’ve also had a book published by Paper Angel Press. I was impressed by Monticue’s book and her publisher, enough so that I submitted my own book, hoping to follow in her footsteps. Rest assured there are way, way more explosions (literal and metaphorical) in Memory and Metaphor!

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