Belatedly, WisCon 33

WisCon 33, held over Memorial Day weekend in Madison, WI, was a somewhat skewed experience for me since I was simultaneously moving (as in U-Hauls and second-hand boxes) from one Madison suburb to another. This meant I wasn't around for much of the social scene. But I did attend several panels, both as panelist and audience.

I missed opening ceremonies on Thursday and arrived Friday around noon. First I attended a YA reading by Aiden Beaverson, Patricia Cumbie and Deborah Lynn Jacobs. Then I had a late lunch with the amazing Ekaterina Sedia (The Alchemy of Stone) and Genevieve Valentine of Tor.com. That was pretty much all I accomplished, except for packing my car full of stuff at the old house and carrying it to the new one.

Saturday morning was my first panel, at 8:30 A.M. Since I have a 16-month-old who gets me up at 5, this was not early for me. The topic: "Where is the Goddess These Days?" i.e., where is the goddess figure in contemporary speculative fiction? Other panelists were artist Catherine Anne Crowe, writer Melodie Bolt and moderator Rhianna Moore. The nice thing about these first-thing-in-the-morning panels is that the folks who attend, if they're willing to get up that early, are usually fully engaged in the subject.

I had lunch with the lovely folks from Tor, and made it back just in time for my one o'clock reading with Mark Rich, Forrest Aguirre and Robert F. Wexler. Since, as Mark put it, I was presenting "sex, gore and violence," I closed the show, reading from Blood Groove, as well as the upcoming Burn Me Deadly. Thanks to everyone who came out to listen.

Saturday night featured a dinner gang that included SF legend Jack McDevitt, Richard Desk, Monica Valentinelli, and alternate-history author Steven Silver. Alas, once again I was forced to abandon the festivities early to move another carload of belongings, and so missed the Tiptree Auction and all the cool parties.

Sunday morning, again at 8:30, I was on the panel "Is Regionalism Dead?" along with David J. Schwartz, Catherine Cheek and Rich Novotny. Once more the crowd made up in energy what it lacked in numbers. Lunch was spent with a contingent of Tennessee folks, including Shira Lipkin and SJ Tucker.

At 1:00 was "The Care and Feeding of your Vampire," a panel organized and moderated by Fred Schepartz, author of Vampire Cabbie. Besides Fred and I, panelists were Suzy McKee Charnas (The Vampire Tapestry), Jordan Castillo Price (Channeling Morpheus for Scary Mary) and Alaya Dawn Johnson. As always with vampire panels, the sheer breadth of the topic made for some fascinating digressions into what the vampire means to society then and now.

Finally on Monday came the Sign Out, when all the authors congregated in one room to sign copies of their books for the fans. I shared a table with Kelly McCullough and John Joseph Adams, who received a zombie-themed Valentine from a fan. I met Delia Sherman, whose next book trailer is being done by Lisa Stock, the filmmaker behind the Blood Groove promo film. I also reconnected with Lynne Thomas, curator of the SFWA archives at Northern Illinois University (where my own papers are housed).

WisCon is always fun for serious-minded writers and fans, where the craft of writing gets as much attention as the fannish aspects. It's got one of the higher writer-to-fan ratios, and the people who attend are ones who take their writing seriously. I look forward to next year, when hopefully I won't have any major life-changing events scheduled for the same weekend.

My WisCon schedule

If you're attending WisCon 33 in Madison, WI this coming Memorial Day weekend, you can find me at the following:

SATURDAY

Panel: Where is the Goddess These Days? Sat 8:30 - 9:45AM in the Capitol A room.
Rhianna Moore, Melodie Bolt, Catherine Anne Crowe and me.
Description: Previous WisCons had many program items about Goddesses and Goddess spirituality. These have been rather lacking the last few years. Is the Goddess passé, or is She so accepted there is no reason to talk about her any more? Is there any new Goddess–oriented fantasy and science fiction we might be interested in discussing?

Reading: Boll Weevils Advance From The South, Eating Everything That Tries To Stop Them Sat 1:00 - 2:15PM in Conference 2 room.
Forrest John Aguirre, Mark D. Rich, Robert F. Wexler and me.
I'll be reading from Blood Groove and The Sword-Edged Blonde; if time permits, I might squeeze in something from the next Eddie LaCrosse novel, Burn Me Deadly.

SUNDAY

Panel: Is Regionalism Dead? Sun 8:30 - 9:45AM in the Senate A room.
David J. Schwartz, Catherine Cheek, Rich Novotney and me.
Description: Modern publishing technology (e.g., the Internet, desktop publishing) seems to have created a global village and shrunk the distances between major cultural centers and the far–flung places where some writers live. Yet some Canadian writers who submit to U.S. markets are regularly warned not to focus too much (if at all) on Canada, and rural writers in any country are given similar warnings about writing about their actual milieux, yet reader appetites for fiction set in New York, New Orleans, Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, Tokyo or thinly–disguised versions of these cities are presumed to be unlimited. Let's discuss whether reality matches this perception.

Panel: The Care and Feeding of Your Vampire Sun 1:00 - 2:15PM in the Caucus room.
Fred Schepartz, Suzy Charnas, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Jordan Castillo Price and me.
Description: How do our favorite undead heroes come to life? Vampire writers reveal their dark secrets and give a blood to fangs description of how they create unforgettable vampires.

MONDAY

The SignOut Mon 11:30AM - 12:45PM in the Capitol/Wisconsin room.
I'll be available to sign books and chat about pretty much anything. Even if you don't have a book for me to sign, stop by and say hello.

Hope to see many of you there next weekend!