Last Saturday, I made my first in-person appearance since the pandemic at Boston’s Boskone convention. It was brief but enjoyable. I moderated a panel on “Hopeful Futures in SF,” which is something I feel we need more of; and I moderated a panel on “Writing and Structuring Long Series,” which is something about which I feel more writers should finish what they start. Ahem. Both panels were lively, with good input from my fellow panelists. I also talked to a fellow writer who told me he’d made extensive use of my online writing guide when teaching writing to high school students. This totally made my day.
Tomorrow I’m off once more to Puerto Rico, because we need to get going again on The Ponce Chronicles, or something like that. Also, I miss my wife and my dog. One of my daughters is already there, and the other one just landed in Ecuador. Doesn’t anyone stay home anymore? I guess not. I’ll be back in touch when there’s something to report in the next episode of the hit webcast, The Ponce Chronicles. (Cue rousing theme by John Williams.)
Today we watched our last panels, at least the ones we could get into (many were full). With Worldcon coming to a close, we turned our attention to another exhibition just down the concourse: Beyond Van Gogh Glasgow. It was an astonishing display, conveying Van Gogh’s masterpieces in an immersive visual experience. Paintings set to motion, images flowing and melding with each other, set to lovely music (I know not what). We were invited to sit on soft benches, or on the floor with beanbag cushions, and soak it in, as long as we liked. I’m going to put a few stills here. I did take some video, which we were invited to do, but I haven’t had a chance to look at any of it yet. It was an extraordinary meditative experience.
I think this, or one like it, showed in Boston a while back, but we missed it. No longer.
Tomorrow we hope to see a bit more of Glasgow, before setting our course to the west, and home.
Yesterday’s highlights were some time spent with Gay and Joe (The Forever War)Haldeman, whom we had not seen in years. They are a delightful couple, and probably the best-traveled people we know, always jaunting around the world, visiting friends. We also had a beer and fine conversation with Stefan Rudnicki—co-owner of Skyboat Media, and also well traveled—who recently narrated six of my audiobooks. Though we worked closely together on the books, we had never actually met in person until this con. He’s a fount of knowledge about the audiobook business and a very generous guy. Stefan’s wife Gabrielle de Cuir, also a topnotch narrator and director, is a delightful lady as well. I hope to be working again with them soon.
Later we watched the Hugo Awards ceremony on my laptop, from the hotel room. The audio level was low, so I had to look at the results online today. Many of the works I voted for actually won! Possibly a first. Congratulations, Hugo winners and nominees!
Here a few visual highlights. First is the SEC (Scottish Exhibition Center), with the “Armadillo” theater center on the left, a delightfully idiosyncratic building on the outside, and bizarrely incomprehensible on the inside. On the right is the Ovo Hydro—or, as we called it, the Flying Saucer (it lights up green at night). That’s a sports center, apparently. That seemingly insignificant, triangular-roofed building between them is the main exhibition hall, where most of the con actually took place.
How about a Batmobile or two?
The SEC campus sits right next to the River Clyde, on the far banks of which sit BBC Scotland, an IMAX theater, and the Glasgow Science Center.
I thought I was going to get away without buying anything at the con except a t-shirt, but the art show mugged me and forced me to buy a print of a photo-art piece I particularly liked. Oops.
That’s Edinboro not Edinburg as the Delta pilot called it. We’re here, and it’s beautiful! We came within a whisker of having to cancel the trip because of a painful blood clot in my leg, but I got cleared by the docs at the last minute, and here we are. So far, we’ve seen the National (Art) Gallery, which had some excellent Impressionist work, as well as halls and halls of older paintings. We arrived, coincidentally, during Fringe Festival, which features a lot of shows by stand-up comics. Lots of enthusiasm in the streets for that. We might or might not get to one, because between my gimpy leg and dragging around a POC (portable O2 concentrator), activities that involve close quarters and sitting a lot are iffy. Still, there’s plenty to see.
Here’s a tall statue at St. Andrew’s Square. Edit: It is not Saint Andrew, as we had guessed. It is a monument to a Henry Dundas, first viscount Melville (1742-1811), who as Secretary of State for War in 1996, was instrumental in delaying the abolition of the British Atlantic slave trade, resulting in the enslavement of half a million Africans.
Later, me, in our basement hotel/apt suite with my new favorite beer, Wingman session IPA from Scotland’s Brewdog Brewery.
It’s been two years since I’ve attended a live, in-the-flesh convention. This weekend I’ll be at Boskone, at Boston’s Westin Seaport District hotel, down on the waterfront. Covid rates have fallen dramatically in the area, thankfully. Still, the con requires proof of vaccination, plus masking up indoors, and I am totally onboard with that.
I’ll be moderating two panels on Friday, plus doing a joint reading with two other authors. On Saturday, I’ll be autographing, plus taking part in two more panels.
Here’s my schedule:
First Contact Scenarios (moderating) — 18 Feb 2022, Friday 4 p.m., Burroughs
Group Reading with Suzanne Palmer, Nathan Toronto, and moi — Friday 6 p.m., Griffin
Bridging the Great Divide: Indie and Trad Publishing (moderating) — Friday 8 p.m., Burroughs
Autographing — Saturday 2 p.m., Galleria
What’s At Stake? — Saturday 4 p.m., Marina I
The Future of Astronomy — Saturday 5 p.m., Marina I
If you’re attending Boskone, please stop and say hello!
If you happen to be in the vicinity of West Lebanon, New Hampshire this Saturday, come visit the Upper Valley Comic Expo between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m. You’ll find me there as one of the featured authors, along with some of my colleagues, including V.S. Holmes and Jennifer Anne Gordon, fellow members of the Creative Edge publicity group. Also featured is actress Gigi Edgley, of Farscape fame (she played the mischievous Chiana).
This is more of a book/author/artist/actor fair than a con like the ones I usually go to. (No panels, for example.) It might actually be a better opportunity to meet and chat with authors; I think it will be very relaxing and low key. Also, it’s only $5 admission, and it’s a benefit for Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth-Hitchcock. Brought to you by Sci-fi Saturday Night! Come say hi, and pick up some autographed books while you’re there!
Dragon Con Virtual is underway this weekend! As a scheduled program participant for the torpedoed-by-pandemic real-life con, I was asked to shoot a two-minute video greeting about why I love science fiction and Dragon Con. It’s probably up on their site somewhere, but blast if I know where, so I’m posting it here.
In the course of shooting the video, an imp appeared in the corner of my screen during one take. Where’d she come from?? It wasn’t my best take, but the imp was too charming not to keep. So here’s the Outtake—with Imp:
I’m typing this on an Amtrak train jittering its way northward from Atlanta (we’ve just passed Philadelphia). What happened to the nice, smooth track we were running over a while ago? Oh well, I should be home in not too many hours—although the vibrations might take a while to settle down. I decided to take Amtrak’s Crescent train home for decompression, a change of pace, and because I like trains. Also, I’m sick of airports. Like Dragon Con itself, this choice is a mixed bag. It’s an overnight train to New York, and I haven’t gotten much sleep, despite the generous legroom and seating space in coach. But the staff is friendly, the Café car sells a very nice IPA, and I’ve had interesting conversations with fellow passengers. Breakfast in the dining car is the kind of thing that makes train travel fun! (On the NYC-Boston train, the Café car barkeep tells me I should cherish that dining car on the Crescent, because Amtrak management is trying to get rid of them. Boo, management!)
Here’s the Crescent, the train that took me as far as New York. They’re changing from diesel locomotives to electric. I think this was in D.C.
But this is supposed to be about Dragon Con.
Dragon Con is basically a world’s fair for geeks. I think one’s first visit has to be regarded as a learning experience. (Assuming one returns for more.) I have, after the fact, learned about many things I could have, should have gone to. I have learned something of how one might make better use of the time, as an attending pro. (Starting with, start planning in October for the following Labor Day weekend. I have trouble planning next week!)
Some closing observations:
It’s a very friendly community!
It needs more places to sit. I tired of choosing between sitting on the floor or standing, while biding time between events.
It has more than enough bars. Every hotel has multiple mini-bars set up all over the place. If you have to ask where one can get a drink in this place, you aren’t looking very hard.
Lots of great programming! But prepare for lines. Long lines.
Don’t expect to just run into your friends. With 85,000 or more people here, you probably won’t. You’ll learn afterward that they were there.
There are many celebrities in attendance! If you hope to see one, see previous item about lines. I coulda’ seen David Tennant!
It’s great fun, interleaved with sensory overload.
If you take the train home, many of your fellow passengers will also be from Dragon Con.
If you have time to kill before your train/place, go to the Atlanta Botanical Garden! It’s wonderful!
Don’t make any life-changing decisions in the first couple of days after. Get some sleep instead.
Here are some highlights from the Botanical Garden:
And now… back home at the Star Rigger Ranch, and quiet….
Today’s the panel on Dragons of Science, Dragons of Fantasy. I arrive early and sit, worrying about something else. What am I going to do with my heavy suitcases tomorrow, after I’ve checked out of the apartment but hours before my train leaves Atlanta? The hotel won’t check them, and I’m sure not going to drag them around all day. (Eventually I learn that they’ll check them for me at the train station.) That worry is supplanted by even greater concern about the approaching Hurricane Dorian. I don’t think it will affect my escape by rail, but who knows? This is a hurricane, and they don’t give much quarter.
Someone stops and asks me if I am cosplaying that guy from Jurassic Park.
The Dragons panel is loads of fun, with good people, ably moderated by Jody Lyn Nye. A big audience, and also an audience with lots of good questions for us. Afterward, a fellow comes up and tells me it was the best panel he’s seen at the con; and if that sort of compliment doesn’t warm your heart, what will? Trouper/Cousin Kitty shares some pictures:
L-R, Jody Lynn Nye, Mark H. Wandry, Robert E. Hampson, Jeffrey A. Carver, Patricia Briggs, Steve Saffel…
Here’s me impersonating someone who knows what he’s talking about…
I unwind by walking through the art show. It feels very different from the art shows at the smaller SF/F cons. The work here is 99% fantasy, almost no science fiction, and half of that is dragons in one form or another. Some of it is excellent! But it starts to feel like much of one theme after a while. At the smaller cons, art shows tend to be gallery-style, sometimes with the artists present and sometimes not. Here, it’s much more of a dealer format, with each artist displaying and selling at a table. The artists probably make more money this way, and I enjoy several conversations with them. Still, I miss the more contemplative experience of art hanging for viewing pleasure, and less blatantly for sale.
There seems to be very little overlap between the artists I find here and those who show at the SF/F cons (where a lot of the work tends to be actual book cover paintings).
After saying good-bye to Kitty, I head out to go “home” and try to do some writing. A nice lady stops me and asks if she can take my picture. Sure, I say; but why? “Because you’re cosplaying Dr. Hammond from Jurassic Park, of course!”
If you like rubbing shoulders with 85,000 of your closest friends, then Dragon Con is the place for you! That’s the estimate of the number of attendees, all engaged in Brownian motion in the multi-hotel complex. They are all remarkably polite and well behaved. At least half are in costume, many of them very good costumes. Stormtroopers, wizards, orcs, Princess Leias, mermaids, warriors male and female, Star Trek officers (mostly from Next Gen and Discovery, though I did see a remarkable Scotty, dressed in the uniform of the Star Trek movies).
This place is a madhouse! Total sensory overload. On day three, my first order of business is to get into the vendors’ area, because I want to talk to the head of a big bookselling operation called Bard’s Tower, apparently the only sizable bookseller here. One little problem: The line to get into the building goes downhill for a couple of blocks, and then wraps around the bottom block, and eventually reverses and comes back up. Mostly in the hot sun. If you’ve ever been to Cedar Point in Ohio, or I suppose any of the big theme parks, you know what I’m talking about. Eventually I make it in, and talk to a fellow whose handle is “Rabid Fanboy,” about perhaps joining his bookselling juggernaut the next time I come to one of these mega-conventions. If I come to another mega-convention. I amuse myself by snapping pictures of witty t-shirts, sharing them with the family on Whatsapp, and buying a couple to take home.
My cousin (and Starstream Trouper) Kitty is appearing on a panel on Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey, and I go to listen. It’s a good panel! It’s Kitty’s first time doing something like this at a big con, and she does a great job. Well done!
I move on to catch the shuttle bus to Dragon Con Night at the Georgia Aquarium, something I’ve been looking forward to. The very large tour bus is being driven by a little old lady. Well, why not? We lumber slowly through traffic (not just DC traffic, but big-football-game traffic). It’s only a handful of blocks away. We see the aquarium loom on the right. We see the aquarium go by on the right. Why are we not stopping? We see the aquarium disappear behind us. Why are we not stopping? No one knows. We drive, and drive, and turn right, turn right, turn right. We seem to be in orbit around our destination. Finally traffic grinds to a halt. We can all see on our phones that we’re only a few blocks away. Xena, Warrior Princess—striking in her microskirt, sword, and shield—rises snarling and strides to the front of the bus, gets off, and hoofs it. Most of the rest of us follow her bold lead. “I’m sorry, it’s the football traffic,” our beleaguered driver murmurs futilely as she loses her passengers. I thank her for her service.
The aquarium is great! (Except for the thousand-decibel DJ music booming for our special benefit.) There are many galleries, but my favorite is the big ocean tank with a cinemascope wall of glass behind which swim myriad fish, manta rays, turtles, and huge whale sharks. The music is less deafening here. I sit and enjoy. Here are a few snaps:
A place for love…
A place for wonder…
A big-ass grouper comes my way…
It feels like we have a connection. A long, special moment…
Dude!
When cosplayers gather…
Finally it’s time to leave and I catch my umpteenth Lyft ride. The driver glances back and asks if I’m cosplaying Dr. Hammond from Jurassic Park. Er, no, I’m just me, I say. With my hat. Do I really look like that white-haired guy in the movie? “Oh, yes,” he says.
