mschatelaine | Entries tagged with worldcon

I'm incredibly tired at the end of the week. Last weekend was the Worldcon and the weekend before that was a marathon slog at my thesis, with setting up and James visiting in between. I went back to work after barely a day to rest, and I should have taken the whole week off. I used to go to jazz festivals that would leave me exhausted after three days of partying, so imagine how I am after five, although I did my best to rest.

The weekend was marvellous. I had a bunch of friends to go about with and I met new people and got drunk with them. I also met various people I know from various internet sources and made the acquaintance of lots of authors, publishers and agents.

Let's see if I can make a list -

annafdd,

charlieallery,

fjm, Hooray for a Hugo winner!,

green_knight,

julesjones,

del_c, Tina Anghelatos, Liz Holliday, Vlatko Jurik-Kulik,

papersky, who cooked us all bacon and mushrooms with garlic on bagels on Friday morning, Helen Hall,

anghara and her husband, Chris Dollin, others of the

rasfc crew, and the Glasgow and Edinburgh writing crew, including Gary Gibson, Hal Duncan, Paul Cockburn, Rich Mosses, Jim Steele, Jim Campell, Mike Cobley, Debbie Miller, Neil Williamson, Andrew Wilson, Hannu Rajaniemi, Gavin Inglis (get him to read you the story about the fish, in Nova Scotia), Jack Deighton and many more. Gay and Sarah were also great company and I'm sorry I never picked your second names up if you are reading this. Ellie and Emma and Silwia were also lovely.

I got to say hello to

ianmcdonald, whom I sat behind while he hooted with laughter at the story about the fish, Steph Swainston, China Mieville, Liam Sharp, Jon Courtenay Grimwood - nice bloke, I had a long drunken chat with him,

karentraviss,

autopope, Hooray for another Hugo winner!, David Pringle, who sent me my first rejection note (two pages long! they don't come like that any more), Kim Newman, Justina Robson, Liz Williams, Wendy Bradley, whose Farthing magazine is great and I don't say that just as someone who is sending her a story, Pete Crowther, whose Postscripts magazine is equally impressive, Ken McLeod (who admits to no shame over the Alien Space Bats), Gordon Van Gelder, another nice bloke that I had a drunken chat with - have to send him a story some time, John Meaney, who I pleased no end by saying, "Excuse me, I think Context and Paradox are brilliant," when I passed him at a party, and Jim Burns, Hooray for yet another Hugo winner! who I had another long conversation with at the end of all things; the Dead Dog Party.

I have to give a special mention to

fjm. We have been correspondents by email since meeting once at Jersey Eastercon, and I was delighted to meet her once again, as she was delighted to see me. I'm incredibly pleased that this lovely and brilliant person has won a Hugo, and I look forward to seeing her again at Concussion.

The panels that I made it to were excellent and inspiring and so were the readings and other events. I have come away with more books than I should have done given my financial position this month but what the hell. Most are by friends and all are excellent. I have also come away with ideas and enthusiasm and a determination to write. Quite what, I don't know. I have a short story that is half done; I'll finish that first. Then there is another short in development, and a novel in outline. Those would seem to have the best chance of coming out well. Other things I have in mind, two other novels and a long and a short screenplay, each have their problems and I want to work on something that I can see how to write.

So, to work! (And I have my thesis to edit and polish up. But that doesn't count.)