The MarsCon 2010 Reports

Well, it’s here at last: my very first convention as a Guest Author. Apart from being almost ill with nerves for the first hour or so, it has so far been the most amazing fun I’ve had in years. I’m remembering why I love science fiction/fantasy conventions so much!

Highlights thus far: Opening Ceremony (complete with champagne!), someone dressed as a Purple People Eater (no, I’m serious), more than one really funny “oh!” moment when FB friends finally connected my face with the name on their posts; almost as many “uh, no” moments when someone mistook me for a different FB friend of theirs; hugs for/from Kudo (always a favorite of mine); Filking in the bar (which I suspect annoyed the pool-players mightily, but who cares), with some great tracks from Rob Balder and Danny Birt; an awesome drumming class with Lord Ramirez and his belly-dancing assistants; Filk & Cookies in the Con Suite, with a mind boggling array of cookies (the ones I brought, unfortunately, seem to all have been inhaled by the con staff before ever hitting the front table–no worries! As long as someone enjoyed them, that’s all that matters!)– highlights of that particular filking session include Rob Balder and Danny Birt singing “The Balrog Sleeps Tonight” and a round-robin take on “What Do You Do With A Drunken Gamer?”.

I also sat on my first panel, which was called “Vampires, Werewolves, and Ghosts, Oh My!” with Pamela Kinney, Helen Madden, and Cheralyn Lambeth; Helen very kindly kept me from drowning in uncertainty and made the panel more fun than I’d expected. Thanks, Helen! And there was so much more . . . and will be even more tomorrow, I expect, when I’ll be sitting on two panels: “Name Your Favorite Alien” and “WorldBuilding: Monsters 101″. Oh, wait, no, make that three, because Allen Wold invited me to attend his writing workshop–no guarantee I’ll be on the panel there, but he was so sweet to invite me I’ve been buzzing about that all day!

In short, this was a fantabulous first day of the con, and I know it’s just going to get better. If you missed Friday night, no worries, just get yer bee-hind over to Williamsburg for all the Saturday and Sunday joy! This is just flat out AWESOME.

And now to bed, perchance to sleep . . . and start all over again in a few short hours . . . . utter joy. I’m lovin’ this.

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Still buzzing along . . . day 2 as a guest author and I am mainly just amazed at how friendly & generous everyone is being. I’ve always known that the MarsCon crowd is awesome, of course, but it was from the perspective of working chair massage. As a guest author, I half expected to be sitting in a corner watching people avoid me so I wouldn’t talk their heads off about my writing; but instead, people have been seeking me out in the hallways and *asking* me to talk about my writing! And the panels I’ve been on have just been SO fantastic . . . let’s see:

I started off attending “Webcomics: Beyond the Web”, hosted by several established webcomic authors, including Rob Balder–and honestly, the only reason I don’t name the others is that I don’t remember their names. The program isn’t any help, either, since it lists about nine people and only five showed up to run the panel! But it was lots of fun; even though I have no actual intention of creating a webcomic, I learned a lot about the internal workings.

All right, moving along . . . I went into Allen Wold’s writing workshop as a panelist and had a TERRIFIC time; all the participants were wonderful and came out with really good quality first drafts. I’ll be returning for part two on Sunday, where we see what second drafts the participants came up with overnight, and boy I can’t WAIT to see that!!

All right . . . then I had a panel with Tony Ruggieo and Mike Pederson, “Aliens! Rate Your Favorite Alien” , which was fun if a little frustrating: I’ve read my way through hundreds if not thousands of science fiction books, watched lots of movies . . . but when asked questions on the topic, I couldn’t remember a single thing beyond “Avatar” and Robert Silverberg. Tony was very kind and didn’t shred me over my mind-blank moments, and I think I held my end reasonably well, but I had to dodge several times and turn the question sideways a little bit in order to be able to give any kind of an answer. So, that was probably the worst panel of the lot, but still fun. After that, I took a break until around four, then went into “Design Your Favorite Monster” with Tony Ruggiero and Steve Gannon. That one was a bit of a floundering experience, as the scheduled moderater didn’t show up and we had only a hazy idea of what he’d intended the panel to accomplish; but I think we had some good discussion there too, so that was all right.

I tried to go to “World Building: Using a Historical World as a Model”, but my eyes slid closed fifteen minutes in and I had to bail out to get some sugar in my system–which is a shame, because David Weber was on the panel and I was told later that it was terrific fun.

I intended to attend more panels–so many sounded so interesting!–but I just couldn’t stand it any longer and spent the rest of the evening talking to folks and attending relaxing parties. I collected terrific advice and wisdom from many people on the subject of being a guest author, the best way to make coffee, and how to stay out of online flame wars, among much else . . . Whew! I didn’t stop until after 11 pm.

Now on to day three, during which I will Read From My Novel and hopefully get to a few more panels.

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Today went by in what seemed only moments: the second part of Alan Wold’s writing workshop, which I had to sneak out of early in order to attend the Author Readings (which featured, among others, Catherine Asaro’s stellar reading of her latest novel (Diamond Star) and samples of Danny Birt’s marvelous 55-word fiction pieces); helping to finish off the last of the con suite food (such a chore, but you know, someone’s gotta do it); talking to all the wonderful staff, volunteers, and guests; attending one . . . last . . . panel on epublishing (I loved Helen Madden’s T-Shirt: “Imagine me: A Ninja Pirate Riding A Zombie Dragon”) at two pm and then a final round of goodbyes and out the door at last. And now . . . I’m exhausted, slugging down coffee just to stay awake long enough to write this post, which I will no doubt edit like crazy once I’m awake enough to see all the stoopid errors . . . but in the meanwhile: to all those who were there and were nice to me, even going so far as to talk to me for a moment, THANK YOU! You made the entire con incredibly wonderful and fun. For those of you who weren’t there: thanks for bearing with me during these few days of posting rabidly about the con, and for your support in general; and I really hope to see you at RavenCon (better yet, at my book launch! First Saturday in April, at the Peninsula Fine Arts Center in Newport News, and more details may be found on my web site!)

Thanks to all, and to all a good–
*faceplant*
zzzzzzz . . . .