Albacon Recap
It’s been a week since the convention, but one thing or another has been taking up my time, and I haven’t really had a chance to put down my thoughts. Mainly because I knew this might be a long post.
First off, the drive to Albany was amazing. With my fancy new Garmin GPS navigator, there was no fear or anxiety about directions or getting lost, so Jay and I could just enjoy the ride. It’s the perfect time of year in New York; warm enough to go jacketless in the daytime, but cool enough so you’re not feeling overheated. The traffic vanished once we got out of the city, and the fall foliage was breathtaking:
Jay and I have been going to a lot of conventions lately. We have both been SF convention-goers all out lives, but what used to be once a year at best has changed to something more like once a month as I work to keep meeting people in the industry/community and to market my work, and as Jay keeps his contacts open and his freelance web spun.
For those of you who may not attend SF conventions, they usually break down into 5 parts: Dealer’s Room, Author Appearances, Previews, Panels, and the Bar.
The Dealer’s Room: This is historically one of the the big day-traffic draws of the convention, a bazaar of various SF related mechandise, much of it rare, and often autographed.
When I was a kid, the Dealer’s Room was Mecca to me. I was a serious comic collector (as serious as a kid can be), and I was always digging through back issue bins for books to fill the gaps in my collection. Like X-Men #137, where Phoenix dies? That was the fucking Holy Grail to me when I was 12. You were lucky if the comic shop even HAD one, and if they did, it was usually too expensive for a kid mowing lawns for money to afford.
But you might find it at a convention, cheap, if your heart was true…
Now, with the advent of eBay, “rare” has become less so, and you can do all your collectible hunting without having to leave your house, drive 45 minutes, and spend hours rooting through tables. The dealer’s room is not as powerful and magical as it once was. Still, I miss that thrill of the hunt. Even now, I treasure that hard fought, battle-worn copy of X-Men #137 like a part of my soul, because I EARNED that fucker.
Author appearances: Another major traffic draw, various SF authors, some new, some old, some popular, some obsure, all doing readings and signings and Q & A sessions.This works to benefit the dealers, too, as they sell books to be signed or acquire autographs for their stock. I have had several moving experiences in my fan life at author appearances that have profoundly affected my professional life. Like the time Robert Jordan scolded me.
Previews: A lot of cons display prototype action figures, demo as-yet unreleased games, and show extended previews or sometimes even advance screenings of upcoming SF movies or shows, often with the creators or stars in attendance.
Paneling: Paneling is when a writers, editors, artists, and other industry professionals get together in conference rooms to discuss set topics which are listed in the program. If you are a fan of the panelists or are interested in the topic, this can be the thing you get most excited about.
Unlike a discussion at a financial or medical conference, SF panels are frequently very casual, which has its ups and downs. On the plus side, it becomes much more like real people interacting, and the audience is often made a close part of the experience instead of being just people at a boring lecture. On the minus side, the panelists often take this casual nature as an excuse to not prepare in any way for the panel. Half the time they don’t even know the topic when they sit down, and oftentimes the most irritating personalities will overpower what otherwise could have been an intelligent conversation with inane nonsense.
A good panel can reveal secrets of the craft you can carry with you your whole life. A bad one can steal 45 precious minutes of your life. It’s worth the gamble, I think, but it sucks when you lose and are trapped listening to some loudmouth drown everyone out to brag about himself.
The Bar: Usually, at most hotel cons, the best part can happen at the bar. The best analogy I can make for this is a Sports Bar.
You know how in Sports Bars, you go in, and everyone likes sports? Like, if you love baseball, or football, or whatever, you can go to a bar filled with like-minded people who will share the experience with you as you watch the game, cheering and discussing and arguing all about a topic everyone loves and cares about.
We geeks don’t have that. There are no Buffy the Vampire Slayer bars, or Dungeons & Dragons bars, or Star Wars bars. I feel like a fish out of water at a sports bar, and never understood how it made some people feel until I started going to cons and hitting the bar. It was like being a sports fan in the bar where the team goes after the game. People who liked the same stuff as me, and wanted to discuss it in detail? While drunk? Awesome.
So. Albacon. Jay and I checked into the Crown Plaza and had just enough time to get our badges before I had my first panel discussion ever on the pro side of the table. This one was on Worldbuilding, a subject very near and dear to my heart and my craft. The panel was a little unwieldy at seven people, and the discussion tended to veer off topic quite a bit. It was certainly interesting, but it wasn’t the kind of intense discussion of craft that I had been hoping for.
We then hit the dealer’s room, which was small and book-focused, but still filled with a lot of interesting people to talk to and no end of books I had read and was happy to reminisce about. One dealer even had a Warded Man ARC he wanted me to sign!
The bar scene was kind of slow, so Jay and I wandered around downtown Albany Friday night.
My second panel, on Saturday, was about covers and what went into them, and was really an interesting discussion. Famed fantasy cover artist Barclay Shaw was there, along with veteran SF novelist Steve Miller. I balanced the panel as a newbie, but one with an Art History degree, and a book coming out in 2 markets, each with a totally different take on the cover. I learned a lot from Barclay and Steve, and was glad for the chance to discuss my own thoughts on the topic.
Then we wandered Albany some more, and somehow found ourselves in a baaaaaaad neighborhood. Like out of nowhere, it was all boarded up windows and broken down cars, like something out of a zombie apocalypse movie. I wish I had taken pictures, but all I have are the landmark ones we took:
Later in the day we met Jackie Kessler, a super-nice Dark Fantasy Romance writer, who speaks fluent comics and has a new book about superheros coming out next year. We went to her reading, which was a lot of fun.
My night panel was up against the con Banquet and Masquerade, so it was poorly attended, but I met Joshua Palmatier there, and he and Sam Butler joined us at the bar after, having a great time talking comics and the SF novel industry. Drank a LOT of Guinness…
Sunday’s panel was a bit of a surprise. The topic was whether or not men and women take the same understanding away from identical text (ie, both reading the same story). There were only four attendees, and four panelists. Two of them were long-retired writers, and all of us had very different backgrounds, and didn’t have a lot of overlap. I despaired as I sat down that I was in for a tedious hour.
Quite the contrary, though, after some fumbling, we had a fantastic time, 8 strangers varying wildly in age who might never have been in the same room together or thought they had things in common, suddenly laughing full belly laughs and talking about the joy of reading and what it meant to them. Magic. It just goes to show that you never know what might happen in a panel.
Did I mention I am totally psyched to go to World Fantasy in 2 weeks? Last year I got drunk at a bar table with Tom Doherty and George RR Martin. Who knows what this year might bring?
Good times my boy! I can’t wait until we go north of the border, into the land where Logan was operated on Weapon X scientists…ok, that was Alberta, not Calgary, but you know what I’m saying. I’m psyched!
Too bad you’re not going to Banff! You could meet Nightcrawler!
(See, Peat, sometimes I call them by their “real” names.)
You forgot to mention the masquerade! I always thought that was a staple of cons.