Day in the Life of an Idiot

Yesterday started with a conundrum. 

On Thursday, I just drove directly to the con and parked in the hotel lot. It was super convenient, etc., but I never even looked at the prices. I sort of foolishly assumed that the rates would be reasonable. As I was leaving after two hours? TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS (for my international friends, that's about 31 Canadian dollars, 21 English pounds, or 24.50 Euros). INSANE. So, I woke up yesterday very determined not to bankrupt the family parking in the hotel ever again. It was raining very hard when I woke up, and so the thought of public transportation daunted me a bit. It looked like I'd be able to get a ride in with naomikritzer , but then Mason reminded me that I'd promised him a ride to pick up some stuff at his work, so the timing didn't work out. I ended up taking the light rail in much later (my first panel was at 12:30 pm,) and that was FINE. It's a long walk down Nicollet Mall, since the light rail drops off almost at the butt end opposite part of that area of downtown, but there were buses I could have hopped on? So, it turned out okay.

I tell myself I probably needed the exercise. 

My first panel was "What If...?" a fan panel about the Marvel animated series of the same name. There was nothing overtly wrong with that panel, but, as I was telling another friend of mine afterwards, something about it felt very 1996. There were five panelists, two of which were women and one woman of color. The dude bros at the far end of the table were all comic book fans and had a very insular vibe? Like, I don't think they were INTENTIONALLY ignoring the female (and queer) end of the table, but they kind of liked the sound of their own voices a lot? (I mean, that can definitely be me in some situations, so no shade, necessarily.) BUT, at one point, I just grabbed my mic and started asking my fellow lady-appearing panelist questions.  And, I am also a long-time comic book fan, but I think there is value from hearing from people who are only MCU fans. A lot of value. I say that because there was a bit of an unspoken "Comic book fans are the One True Marvel Fan" vibe, as well, which no one ever said, but was heavy in the air, you know?

Anyway, I feel like I had to fight a bit to be heard on that panel and since the pandemic started the amount of spoons I have to make that happen is pretty low.

The "Faith in SF&F" panel was... well, I was talking to Naomi afterwards and I don't think she saw it as quite the disaster I felt it was. There were, in my opinion, a couple of things working against it from the start: 1) the topic is almost too broad, and 2) it was happening at CONvergence where the line between "are we talking about speculative FICTION, specifically, or are we talking about the entirety of SF/F fandom?" is very nebulous. The moderator did their very best, but religion is also a hot button topic and so, at one point, That Guy in the audience asked whether or not all of Judaism is negated by the fact that there is no archeological evidence for Exodus.  If I had been the moderator, I would have said, "Either reframe this question to include spec fic, or shut the f*ck up? This is never the venue to call into question anyone's religious beliefs." BUT THAT DIDN'T HAPPEN. So, we had to have a whole ten minutes of one of the panelist making all sorts of counter arguments which were 100% unnecessary, because religions are based on faith? So who the hell cares if there is archeological evidence for any of it?? (Says the former Unitarian, now Witch, who has had to sit through these arguments, particularly among pagans who really, really want the Stone Age goddess worship to be a singular, unbroken line between then and now, rather than sh*t a bunch of weirdos thought up during the Victorian Age. For myself? If the shoe fits, who cares who made it or when!")

ANYWAY, you can see how that nonsense derailed us. 

It wasn't our only moment off the rails, though? One of our panelists really, really wanted to talk about the Satanic Panic. This came up in our email chain pre-convention, and I might have tried a bit harder, if I were the moderator, to figure out exactly what they wanted to discuss--if only because its connection to SF/F is kind of tenuous? I mean, there was a whole lot of freaking out about D&D, which I remember having lived through this period in American history, but role-playing games are starting to stretch what I would consider speculative FICTION. I mean, yes, they are part of nerd culture and are a kind of private, living fiction, but are they stories in the traditional sense and, even then, what point do you want to make about the Satanic Panic and its effect on D&D or other spec fic related issues? Like, are there any novels that actually deal with this? Maybe that terrible movie with Tom Hanks, Mazes and Monsters, from 1982, which I feel like I saw a novelization of in my school library (and maybe even read), but otherwise I can't think of any bit of fiction that was either directly affected by this (banned or what have you) unless what the person on the end wanted to talk about was horror movies? Again, movies aren't technically FICTION in the strictest sense?  So, I dunno. I might have been more specific as a moderator and said, "Okay, but what specifically do you want to say about how the Satanic Panic relates to spec fic?" and try to draw that person out a bit more. Like, they barely got a chance to talk at all? I would have tried to coax more out of them, in general. 

But, if you ignore those two wildly divergent tangents, the panel was OK? I'm not convinced that there was more substance than flailing about, but some panels are like that. 

I hung out with Naomi and a couple of other friends in between my two panels in the Con Suite (and then later outside on the Nicollet greenway, which was LOVELY,) and one of the things that kept coming up whenever I complained about how a panel went and how everything kind of felt a bit like the entire con was reverting to some less enlightened age is that apparently CONvergence is having a bit of a personnel shake-up? I don't know very many details about this, except that there was apparently some kind of great exodus of volunteers this summer due to some cult of personality types deciding to retire/quit/what have you. And we speculated that some of the things that used to be done by careful assigning of panelists, etc., might just have become, "Whelp, whatever!" in a mad rush. So, maybe that's part of why the whole thing feels like an earlier version of itself? I don't know about that, but it's interesting to consider.

Meanwhile, I got my final ChiCon panel assignments and, as my UK friends might say, I am well chuffed. I will post about them after I finish all this CONvergence write-up stuff. 

I am not planning on attending CONvergence this year. There are several factors that went into my decision. I am ready to do a lot of socialization, finally, but.... not with three thousand people, indoors. But, on top of that August is generally going to be a crazy month for me because we will be sending Mason off to Connecticut for school (Wesleyan University, for those who are interested.) 

When they made their decision to go in-person, I was asked if I wanted badges for me and Mason and I told them just what I told you. Next year, I'll be up for it, but this year I am taking a pass for reasons of COVID + College. 

Somehow the message didn't quite get through? Possibly because, long ago, I also filled out volunteer form? I did so, however, when there was still talk of possibly hybrid, we don't know. 

A couple days ago my panel assignments arrived.

They both looked great? I would happily done both of them (and more) in any other year. And, I re-read the descriptions a bunch of times but there were notes like "panelists should arrive in the room x minutes beforehand," and I started to worry that this was not a virtual room they were talking about, but a physical, in-person one. The biggest clue was that there was no link to a Zoom or any other technical info for an online recording/live-stream.

I hated doing it, because I don't want to get on someone's off list. but I had to say, "If this is in-person, which it seems to be, I am not attending this year.  Please take me off?" 

I feel especially bad about this because, independently, I happened to be part of an earlier email chain of a half dozen people who, when asked if they'd be willing to be a warm body to help save a panel that a friend of mine wanted to turn viable, EVERY single ONE of them also said that they wouldn't be attending in-person this year. Given that experience, I'm also wondering if I killed two panels?  I'm a little worried that they might be having a talent problem--I would find it difficult to believe that CONvergence, of all local cons, couldn't find enough volunteers to sit on panels, but maybe? Especially since they're limiting attendance?

I will say that I was surprised that they didn't do a better job with their online con. Last year, I took part in at least two panels at Virtual CONvergence. One was a live-stream and the other was a recorded reading (which they scheduled opposite one another? They had a full weekend schedule to fill and my fans had literally a single choice, either listen to my reading OR watch me talk, live. I mean, I don't have a lot of fans? But that one person had a tough choice! Which, I mean, I was finally on two panels at once, which is kind of a dream of every author...) But, anyway, that part seemed to be exactly like most on-line cons I'd been to that year, but I found their chat/hangout space to be much harder to navigate. For reasons known only to the con com, CONvergence didn't use one of the pandemic-standard chat platforms, like Discord or Slack. Instead, they had their own web site that you had to remember to go to? I think I went to it once. It's weird when smaller, less structured/organized/well funded cons did a better job with their pandemic cons... and so I very much understand the desire to be back in the venue that they shine in?  

But this also makes me fairly certain that there will not be a hybrid option for CONvergence, which make me sad. I am fond of virtual cons? 

Am I the only who is going to miss them??

Thursday, July 5

3:30pm
Death Note Fan Panel
Are you a fan of Death Note? With the release of the American Netflix version released last year, let's talk about what we loved and didn't care for in Death Note manga, anime, & movies. Panelists: Lyda Morehouse (mod), Kristopher Pflipsen, Susie Kline, Jei Herald-Zamora


Friday, July 6

9:30am
In Defense of: Timothy Dalton as James Bond
Was Timothy Dalton all that bad? Come and argue with us. It will be fun. Panelists: John White, Ty Blauersouth, Lyda Morehouse (mod), Nathan Anderson, Jeremy Stomberg

7:00pm
CONvergence Poetry Slam
Nerds have words, and we want to hear them! Show up, sign up, and if the lottery gods are kind you (yes, you) may be drawn to read two three-minute poems to an audience of drunken strangers, and watch your heart and soul assigned numeric value. Panelists: Allison Broeren, phillip low, Dan Marlow, Cole Sarar, Bryan Worra, Lyda Morehouse, Ben San Del, Pat Harrigan, Sam Cook

10:00pm
Pounded in the Butt by the Chuck Tingle Fan Panel
Talking about Chuck Tingle and his work. Panelists: Kristina Winn, Rory Ni Coileain, Lyda Morehouse (mod), Jonathan Palmer, Sharon Stiteler


Saturday, July 7

12:30pm
Literary Awards
Does getting a literary award help your career? What's the impact, both positive and negative, of being recognized for your work with a big, heavy, piece of metal or glass? Panelists: Amal El-Mohtar, Lyda Morehouse, Naomi Kritzer (mod), Eleanor Arnason

5:00pm
Understanding the Hugo Awards
There has been a lot of controversy surrounding the Hugo Awards for the last few years. What’s it all about? Panelists: Lyda Morehouse, Scott Lynch (mod)

 I'm at the Caribou/Einstein's Bagel across from the con hotel; Mason is at home, still asleep. My extroverted introvert announced last night that he has had a tremendous time, but he is officially DONE with people. I understand completely.  I may be an extroverted extrovert, but that doesn't mean that a five day con doesn't wear on me.  

Yesterday was an especially busy day.  I had only two panels, but they were spread out over a whole day.  My first one was at 2 pm and my final one started at 8:30 pm. Plus, I wanted to be sure to catch Lois McMaster Bujold's signing because I had a faraway friend who wanted an autograph, and that was at 12:30 pm. Naomi had invited me to meet her and a friend at Caribou at 11 am, too, and while the kids and I managed to get to con by 11... we did not find parking until almost ten minutes later and I showed up at the Caribou around 11:30.  I sent the kids off to DQ for lunch and ran off hoping  hadn't blown my chance to hang out.  

Luckily, I didn't miss Naomi.  Even luckier, Tyler Tork, his wife (whose name currently escapes me), and Bryan Thao Worra were there.  I have always liked Bryan, ever since some Minicon somewhere lost to the annals of time where he was the only person at a Krueshenko's party who could tell me what had happened to Captain America after Cap had been shot (I'd been catching up with Marvel comics at this point and I was a little desperate for news.)  Plus, I've been following his travels via Facebook and, in the way of social media when it works as it should, that has bred a certain sense of connection and familiarity in my heart (even if Bryan doesn't necessarily feel the same way, you know?)  

So we had a lovely chat about all sorts of things because everyone there was super-interesting. I could have had my own little con right there, all day, but Naomi being GoH and Bryan, being Bryan (and a former guest of honor, like myself,) had places to go.  I wandered over to the signing, disappointed that there were no books by Lois to be had in the dealer's room. For whatever reason, there is only one bookseller in the dealer's room, and they're a publisher, so they are only selling their own authors... which I don't think includes any of the GoHs?  I might be wrong about that. However, the con has dealt with this by having a certain number of author books for sale at the merchandise window, which normally mostly sells con tee-shirts. I was able to pick up something for my friend there and get it signed.  

I wandered around for a while and, by chance, ran into the entire Slash panel (my 8:30 pm panel) in the cosplay poolside atrium. We were chatting and squeeing about Yuri on Ice and other current fandoms that are seeing a lot of slash action and we ended up talking a bit about Free! and I awkwardly recommended my Bleach/Free! x-over TO THE WOMAN WHO PODFICC'D IT (Opalsong) who, even more AWKWARDLY, I HAD ALREADY MET,  in person, a couple of years ago.  

At that point, I decided I may have "won" CONvergence for being the most braindead person, ever. 

My first panel was "Take a Pew, Pew, Pew" about religion in science fiction, which I think went well, though... in the way of CONvergence panels, it wasn't necessarily very in-depth.  The cool part of that panel was that we had a woman on it who is a Church of England vicar. She has written an FAQ about what vicars do, to which I teased, "since most Americans only know about vicars from the BBC" and then my friend/fellow panelist Bill cut in to add, "And yet somehow she left out all the bits where she solves crimes once a week!"  But, so you see, that was the tone. It was funny and clever, but not terribly deep.  I still had fun and learned some, so that was worth it.  

I had wanted to hit Naomi's reading after that, but the kids were hungry so we went over to Friday's.  By the time we got back, I was able to see "Refugee Life Hacks" which was amazing and Saymoukda Vongsay is  my new girl-crush. She is brilliant and funny and bad ass, and I am now a devoted fangirl. I may actually have to attend poetry readings and theatre in my future just to catch more of her work.

The kids and I met up to watch "Judging a Book by its Cover" which is one of those annual "comedy/improv" panels that CONvergence does.  The idea is that a team of panelists is shown a real-life book without its cover and they have to not only guess the title, but make up the story of the plot, as though they're experts on the book.  It's one of those that's intentionally over the top. Even if you've read the actual book, you're supposed to come up with all the silly.  It was very silly.  I enjoyed it a lot.  Plus, I found out that the vicar's husband is none-other-than Paul Cornell, who came over to introduce himself and tell me he enjoyed the panel, etc.  That was kind of cool, because Paul has long been one of the "cool kids" of CONvergence.

My slash panel went much as it always does. As I was telling a friend, the point of it is to be a sort of "a state of the union" of slash--and overview of what's new and what's trending, and while I participate in the slash fandom regularly, I'm not an expert on All of The Things.  So I had a great time because I love everyone on the panel, but I'm not a MAJOR contributor to the discussion.  I talked enough not to feel excluded, but I'm pretty sure Bess and Jo could run that panel on their own. If you're curious what we recommended this year, Jo helpfully put together a great list: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1EvaiDBDu6KFfQGH76lgbG9QvMFXQsJe-ZarsD7e7SvM/edit

Okay, I have to run off and collect my badge from the car, because of course I left it on the seat... and then I'm off to my 11 am panel today "Women of a Certain Age" with Lois McMaster Bujold.

 Actually, I think we have things under control, but in a fashion that is very typical of my family, today, only about four days before CONvergence starts, Mason says, "Oh, yeah, there's some cosplay stuff I should probably get together."  Only the stuff?

Is all of it.

However, this year he's decided on someone fairly do-able, IMHO. This year, Mason wants to go as the medic from TF2 (Team Fortress 2) a video game:



The biggest hold up is, of course, the coat.  I have suspenders, we found a wide, black belt. The gloves can be faked with dish washing gloves painted the appropriate color. He's got any number of pants and we can find not-perfect/but close-enough boots.  We drove all over creation today attempting to find a trench coat we could modify.  No luck!  However, I had the brilliant flash that we could find a double breasted (or possibly even single-breasted) coat like this at a chef's uniform store (I saw a lab coat on their web site that was very close for $30) at somewhere like Midway Uniform which is literally right up the street (next to Ax-Man).  

Guess what?

It's closed today for the holiday.

Luckily, Mason and his friends probably won't go to CONvergence until Friday at the earliest, so I think we're going to be able to pull this one off. Mason has the round glasses already. He wears them every day.  His blue hair isn't quite right, but it's a similar haircut and he thought he might as well go as the "blue team" version (probably with a white coat, but again, we're all about the "close enough" look).  He and his friends have already made one of the props that this guy carries--a hacksaw gun.   So, that will also be recognizable enough.

Some day we will start this process earlier.

Feels like that, anyway.

As class ended last week, one of my students asked me if I "do" CONvergences and I was all flippant and said, "Of course, of course..." and might even have SOMEHOW managed to let slip that I'm a former GoH. He takes all this in stride and says, "Yeah, I'm hoping to actually be on programming for the first time this year," and starts making it sound like he's already getting his schedule. Suddenly, my heart is in my throat and I think, "!" and I think, "!!" and then, "!!!" and then: "OH GOD, DID I EVER EVEN ACTUALLY TELL THE GUEST LIASON THAT I WANTED TO COME THIS YEAR??

CONvergence should not have been that far from my mind. My BFF Naomi is going to be one of the literary GoHs and I was asked to write her bio. Mason, my son, has only been having crafternoons with his cosplay buddies for the last several weeks, building their costumes for CON. So, it's not like I could possibly have forgotten that CONvergence was coming, but somehow I FORGOT THAT CONVERGENCE WAS COMING.

In an utter panic on Tuesday night at like 10:30pm, I dug up the email asking if I was coming to con. (Thank you, Gmail, for never making me delete anything, ever!) There is was, FROM JANUARY, very politely asking if I could please let them know my attendance for 2017. I hit reply so hard and typed out a desperate, apologetic, OMG PLEASE STILL TAKE ME I AM SO ASHAMED I AM REPLYING 4 MONTHS LATER message. Thank goodness the CONvergence folks are flexible and professional and accommodating even to pathetically forgetful old ladies like me. So I will have a badge! *whew!*

That settled, my next freak out was about paneling. The way my student was talking I was half-convinced final schedules were going out and that panels were all already filled. Plus, a couple of my twitter peeps were talking about the annual midnight slash panel in a way that ALSO made it sound like maybe it was already scheduled and my panic level kept rising. I was fairly convinced I had MISSED THE BOAT. COMPLETELY. So, I shot off an email to programming, who were very nice but a little confused at my panic and wrote (paraphrasing here), "Uh, we only just opened it? Here's a link: http://panels.convergence-con.org."

Deep breath.

I am happy to say that I've since filled out my programming form and should be set. I got the little acknowledgment email, so unless the universe conspires against me, I should be in the programming matrix somewhere. That is good enough for me. At least I didn't miss the deadline. I really was convinced I had.

So yeah, class. I have to say I have always been tremendously lucky when it comes to my Loft classes. I can really only think of one, very early group, that I would have categorized as 'meh.' That was the class that, when I asked them what their favorite science fiction or fantasy novel was, told me, almost to a person, that they didn't have time to read and/or "weren't big readers." After that group, I started making sure to have at least one part of my lecture series entitled, "So you want to write? THEN YOU'D BETTER F*CKING READ."

I also started assigning readings after that class. With the Loft, I can't actually _assign_ anything. I put it on the syllabus and I *strongly* encourage people to read the stories if they have time, but the majority of my students work full-time (and have families, etc.) This year I have one student (besides myself) who is faithfully reading the stories. We're going through some of the Nebula nominees right now, so we've read, ‘‘Welcome to the Medical Clinic at the Interplanetary Relay Station│Hours Since the Last Patient Death: 0’’, Caroline M. Yoachim (Lightspeed 3/16) and ‘‘This Is Not a Wardrobe Door’’, A. Merc Rustad (Fireside Magazine 1/16).  I actually highly recommend LISTENING to the podcast of "Welcome..." It's a kind of a chose-your-own adventure and the narrator pauses in a way that, I think, makes it a little easier to parse? I'm not sure, but, the point is, I really enjoyed it as an audio story.  The structure of it makes me think it'd be harder to read, I guess. (Though, admittedly, I did not try.)

it's interesting that one of my students (one who had to dropout, actually,) was talking about how difficult it is to sell portal fantasy. I think that's still true for novels, perhaps, but there are two stories on the Nebula ballot that are portal fantasy related, Rustad's and Seanan McGuire's "Every Heart a Doorway" (novella). I see that I can listen to McGuire's... hmmm, I might have to consider that option. Naomi was telling me about the plot of that one and it sounds like... well, it sounds like parts were problematic, but that it's still a good read.

At any rate, the point is my class is great. I love teaching the advance class though I have not quite hit my stride with lectures. Usually, by this point (this was the third class) I've had a talk where I thought, "yes, that was good information. I have given them INSTRUCTION!" That has not happened yet for this class. I think, in some ways, it's because they're all active writers and therefor, my peers. I feel less beholden to pass on INSTRUCTION! to my peers, you know? And I think that sense creeps in when I start to stand in front of them. Last time, in fact, I was supposed to talk about character building but instead ended up asking each of them about their process--where they started, what hit them first.  I think this next time I'm just going to have to confess that this class has turned into a round-table.  :-)

If we weren't doing a lot of critique, I think my evaluations would suck this time around.  But, luckily, the majority of class is critique and that's like high-intensity learning that covers All The Topics.

CONvergence is this weekend. In fact, my con will probably start Wednesday night. I don't have a TON of panels this year, but enough to keep me coming back pretty much every day of this four day con:

Thursday:

5 PM - "Avengers: Age of Ultron"
7 PM - "Guardians of the Galaxy"

Friday:

8:30 PM - "Slash Panel"

Sunday:

11 AM - "The Best Recent YA Fantasy and Science Fiction Novels"


None of these are exactly meaty, but I get to talk TWO Marvel films, so I'm not complaining at all. I'm not quite sure why I got tapped to talk about YA novels. I've reviewed a few, but not that many. On the other hand, it's easy enough for me to make a list of this year's YA novels that are up for awards to bring to con.

I bought Mason a membership this year, slightly ahead of time. I'm going to bring him with me on Thursday and we'll probably spend the day there exploring and whatnot. I purposely didn't schedule myself on Saturday, because it's the 4th of July, and Mason really loves going to see the fireworks. In the past, my CONvergence schedule has made it tough for us to go.

Today is shaping up to be a productive and possibly social day for me. I managed to get a bunch of errands all done before 9:00 am (including returning a purchase to Target) and Shawn just e-mailed to say she might be available for a lunch get-together. At 1:00 pm I'm going to be meeting a friend from KSW to read his astrology chart. So, that's like twice as many people as I usually see in any given afternoon.

Otherwise, after about fifteen minutes or so, I'm planning on getting up off my sorry butt and doing the dishes while watching Anime. I'm still working through the original (1984) FullMetal Alchemist. Mason suggested I just give up on it since so many people seem to prefer The Brotherhood, but I'm stubbornly seeing the storyline through to the end. Because I'm like that.

CONvergence is clearly picking up steam, as I've been contacted a bunch of times about various preferences and arrangments. I still can't quite believe how awesome it is that I'm going to be one of their guests this year. This is the event, after all, that much of the Twin Cities simply refers to as "Con" (which implies it's the ONLY ONE, Highlander-style.)

It has now been confirmed by the programming guy that my con schedule for CONvergence is "crazy busy." Anton had earlier hinted that my programming was "a metric tonne." So, I guess I get to have ALL THE PANELS. Hooray! It's like Christmas in July!

Yesterday, despite NOT being Mason's favorite parent, he and I went to the park. In the way of my little nerd, we brought along books to read. (New LEGOs catalogue arrived!!!) We started at Mirriam Park, but quickly discovered that it was empty and very cold. So, after a quick stop back home for sweaters and such we headed for the River Road (Saint Paul side.) By chance we ended up reading on a park bench right next to the Desnoyer Park extension (a little paved path that disappeared into the woods towards the Mississippi River.) After hanging out on the park bench just reading for a half hour or so, Mason decided he was up for a little adventure. So we checked out the extension path. It took us down to the river's edge where Mason spend several hours just finding large rocks to toss into the river. We watched some people on the opposite shore play with their dogs on a wide sandy beach, and then we followed the trail awhile until Mason found some easily climbed sandstone cliffs and including one weird little crevass that in a horror film would have housed some giant trapdoor spider, but as it was, was a great place to slip and climb in the white sand.

Mason soon declared this was "the best day ever." So, while I might not be the parent du jour, I get to share the very best days with him. I decided that was a pretty good deal after all. :-)

He's aggitating to go back to the River Road today, and we may do that, although we have a new LEGO Star Wars game at home to figure out. Mason joined Half Price Books' Summer Reading Program, wherein if you read at least 15 minutes a day for seven days a week you get a $3.00 coupon to use at the store. Mason exchanged three weeks worth of reading yesterday and bought the game, a sticker book, a Marvel All Ages "Fantastic Four" graphic novel, and, of course, Mommie and I bought a ton of stuff (although Mama sighed and said that nothing compares to Uncles and we'll just have to make time to get over there before her next business trip to Seattle in the next week.)

Anyway, we're hanging out at the coffee shop right now and I think Mason is at the end of his patience for sittin' and reading, so I may have to keep things short.

Here's my CONvergence schedule:

Friday July 3


7:00 PM: Tricks of the Trade: How to Publish and Not Perish


Saturday July 4


11:00 AM: Lyda Morehouse Signing

12:30 PM: Meet the Wyrdsmiths

2:00 PM: Writers Groups: The Secret to Success in Fiction?

3:30 PM: Broad Universe Rapid Fire Reading


Oh, and hey, we have a Senator. Whoot!