Wiscon 34, Saturday and Sunday

Eric got up early on Saturday morning to help with prep for the Tiptree bake sale. I dragged myself out of bed in time to see most of sdn's panel on the craft of Y.A. fiction. One of the panelists whom I talked to later said that she felt it was focussed more on middle-grade works. I could see this. I'm much clearer on the distinction between middle-grade and Y.A. than I am on the definition of Y.A. I never set out to write Y.A., but all of my books that have been reprinted are now being marketed that way, and they were frequently reviewed as Y.A. I enjoyed watching sdn correcting Ellen Klages's origin story for The Green Glass Sea and the way she brought facts to some slightly airy speculation. (She does this a lot.) I particularly liked the part of the discussion where people talked about what a child's world is like, before they can transport themselves by bus or bicycle; and also some of the discussion of what kids love passionately in their books and their reading patterns. The audience contributed to the latter in interesting ways. There's a write-up of the panel here.

Sharyn and I found Eric and went to have lunch in the hotel restaurant, since she had another panel at 1:15. It was nice to sit and talk in person and hear all her news. She went off to her panel and Eric and I went back to the room to regroup.

And there outside the windows were the lakes, the intensely green trees, blue sky and puffy clouds, sunshine. Eric had looked at maps and found James Madison Park, right on Lake Mendota, closer to the hotel than the seedy frat houses, where we could presumably walk along the lake. We went outside. It was extremely hot. The park was there. Like the university campus, it had some lovely mature trees, mostly ashes. The grass was mown very short. There were some flower beds. A sidewalk ran along the lake, but there was no shore; a concrete wall dropped down into the water. People were picnicking, sunbathing, walking dogs and riding bicycles. There was a continued absence of dragonflies. We sat on a bench for a few moments, but the scene, while pleasant enough, was crowded and not at all wild, and the heat kept getting worse, so we went back to the hotel. I got my pocket program, lay down on the bed to peruse the programming offerings, and ended up taking a nap. Eric woke me eventually, and we had a prolonged conversation. Then we went to the bake sale and split a plate that had one vegan and one non-vegan item on it. There was, I think, some conversation and mingling on the second floor, but I don't remember exactly whom we talked to.

I will mention here that I had several brief conversations with Aahz (WIEmphaticallyNOLJ), and saw catherineldf several times in passing, including when she was wearing The Outfit. I also got to talk too briefly with Jim Hudson and Diane, and a little more extensively with Ariel Franklin-Hudson, whom I hadn't seen since she was maybe twelve.

Our dinner date with wild_irises and alanbostick had been postponed until Sunday, so we went down to the lobby and almost fell in with an expedition to Himal Chuli. The people in it continued on to Chataura. When we went into Himal Chuli we realized why -- all the larger tables were already taken, mostly by people from Wiscon. We ended up at the same table where we had had lunch on Friday. I had a tarkari with tofu and vegetables, with roti. I don't recall what Eric had, but we were both well pleased.

We went back to the hotel, admired the sunset, and went to parties. I retired comparatively early and practiced reading the fragments of short stories that I had decided to read the next afternoon. I am extremely tired of the Amazing Expanding and Shrinking Novel, and was also worried, since Wiscon has group readings and I have a bad habit of going on too long, that I would take up too much time. The fragments were not long enough to cause this kind of problem; I timed them at about twelve minutes. I was very jittery about the reading, partly because I always am and partly because one of the fragments actually had sex in it. Eric did a very good job of distracting me every time I said, "Eeeee! I have to do a reading!"

We had decided not to try to go to meeting, because of the heat, the tightness of the schedule, Eric's impression that it was a fairly small meeting, so that we felt a bit inhibited about crashing it, and the general seductiveness of the parties. We got up earlier than was entirely pleasant and went to Buraka for lunch. We had coconut shrimp, a lentil dish, and a vegetable dish. They were very tasty, but we were a little surprised that the injeera was wrapped around the food like a tortilla, when we were used to its being laid flat and having the food dotted about on it.

The reading was well attended, which was gratifying, given that it was opposite Nnedi Okorafor's and she hadn't been able to read on Thursday. I should say here that the reading had been organized by yuki_onna, who was unable to attend Wiscon after all because of a surfeit of awards. So trupenny began by reading the first chapter of The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making. I love the way Sarah reads, so precise and with the emphasis just so, and I enjoyed the chapter very much.

Then everybody looked at me, so I explained what I was doing, alluded briefly to having once been told by [a person dressed as Terry Pratchett's character] the Death of Rats that I had overrun my reading time; and read my fragments. Somebody said, "Oooo!" at the end of the second one, which I appreciated.

Then anghara read a story from an anthology of stories that interpreted urban legends in fantastical or science-fictional ways. I liked the viewpoint character, especially her childhood scenes, but I could tell that I was missing something, that there were bits that had more significance than I understood. carbonel asked afterwards which urban legend the story was using, and Alma said, "The Moth Man." Neither carbonel nor I had heard of this story, but it explained the bits I didn't understand.

truepenny finished up by reading the first chapter of her novel The Goblin Emperor. I realized that I had been sulking because there would be no more books in the Doctrine of Labyrinths, but the reading made me remember that it's Sarah's writing I like, not just one set of characters.

Eric and I went back to the room to regroup. Then I went to a panel called "Back to the Future," because oursin was on it. The other panelists were Chip Hitchcock, Amy Thomson, and Karen Babich. I slipped in a little late. The room was alarmingly cold. I really enjoyed the panel. It was like listening quietly to a conversation. I joined fandom in 1978, but I missed a lot of the history they were talking about, and though I'd read a lot of the books they discussed, mostly I read them years later, in the '90's or even the early part of this century. I talked to oursin a little afterwards. She said she thought it had been a little scattered, and I could see her point, but there was something so civilized and wide-ranging about it. It made me think about Wiscon panel culture, too, if that is a phrase that make sense. I'm not generally thought of as a pushy person, but when I was on panels at Wiscon in the 1990's, I was repeatedly horrified to realize that I was interrupting my fellow panelists. The four panelists I'd just seen worked very smoothly together. Sometimes two would begin to speak at once, but the one who stopped talking almost always seemed able to get his or her point in before the flow of the conversation had left it behind.

Then I went to the dealer's room and hung out at Darlene Coltrain's table for a while. I didn't get a chance to do more than wave at her, but that was pleasant. There was a gorgeous fishy starry scarf that I wanted to give Lydy for a graduation present, but it was much too pricy. I dawdled around Elise's table for a while too, mostly so that I could admire various pieces that I'd only seen in photographs, before they went off to join their people. I was almost grateful not to see anything that Lydy would particularly want. I looked at Darlene's jewellery in case there were moonstones or opals, but there weren't. Eric joined me, and we yearned over the Room of One's Own table. I ended up buying Pat Murphy's new book and also Ellen Klages's White Sands, Red Menace. She was at Elise's table when we went back to it, and she not only signed it for me, she got out her iPad and showed us images of Suze's first collage from The Green Glass Sea, and said that she would try to demonstrate some spinthariscopes for us the next day, if she was recovered from the auction. She also had a photo of trinitite, and described the entire process that created it, which was fascinating, if horrible. Eric had bought his own copies of two of Sarah Monette's books, and she was at Elise's table too, so he got his books signed as well.

After this very satisfactory interlude, we went through the art show. There was quite a bit of stuff that I liked, but at this remove what I mostly remember is intelligentrix's wonderful etched glass -- squid plate! -- and the amazing piece of wearable art called "Perelandra."

After that we went down to the lobby. We had not made any arrangements with Deb and Alan, but they turned up. We collected Beth as well, and went to Chataura. It was rather noisy, but the food was lovely and the company extremely pleasant. We mostly exchanged news, but we also talked about the creative process, and missed Mike Ford.

Then it was back to the room to put on clean shirts for the dessert salon and guest of honor speeches. Ariel was keeping the line in line, as it were, so we got to wave at her again. We ended up in line behind Cecelia Tan, who was very amiable and chatty. We sat with carbonel, lsanderson, anghara and her husband, someone who introduced herself as Margaret whom I'd have liked to talk to more, and a friend of hers whose name I couldn't catch in the hubbub.

The vegan desserts were delectable. Sharyn popped up once to demand if I was happy with them, and I duly assured her that I was. There was carrot cake and chocolate cake. I can't even remember the last time I got to have carrot cake.

Nnedi Okorafor got a standing ovation for her speech, and completely deserved it; it was hilarious and horrifying by turns, and sometimes both at once. She talked about her students and their reception of her work, and also about childhood events; about formal and informal education, really, in their many aspects. Despite the many ways she made us laugh, I felt stiller and stiller, and more and more awed, the longer she spoke.

Mary Anne Mohanraj spoke next. She talked about books she had read as a child, and how she was always the character to whom someone would come and demand that they be the hero. Then she talked about having children, with devastating honesty: "It turns out that I hate babies." This line got a big laugh, but much of what she said was not funny, just true. It hit me fairly hard, because one reason I never had children was a strong suspicion that I would have the same kind of very difficult experience with waiting for the baby to become verbal that Mary Anne described. Mary Anne presented her struggles as seemingly unheroic, but as they unfolded one could see the essence of heroism. She ended by saying that such struggles were heroic, and calling all of us to be the heroes, as if she had shown up on our doorstep and told us where the sword in the stone was. I became very tearful at this point, and indeed am again now, as I type. She got a standing ovation too.

After that they presented the Tiptrees. Victor introduced Greer Gilman, and compared her work to Mike Ford's, which was a rather choky moment. nineweaving was incandescent, and her speech the epitome of grace and humor. They gave her an antique music box that played three songs ("John Barleycorn is important!" she exclaimed when they told her the names of the songs). Just as she left the podium, she said softly into the microphone, "The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo."

Fumi Yoshinaga couldn't be present, but Mari Kotani, in an amazing kimono, read her acceptance speech to us. It made me wish I could read manga. I didn't get a very good look at the piece of art they gave her, but it was shiny.

I think it was at this point that Jim Hudson announced that it would be about two minutes before the chorus assembled to sing to the Tiptree winners, and half the audience immediately began humming the Jeopardy theme. All the tables had been provided with the lyrics, to the tune of "Frere Jacques." It was gloriously silly and unexpectedly moving all at once. We even sang the last part as a round, and it sounded excellent.

There was also a lot of convention business, thanking the present Troika for running the convention, thanking people who had been in charge of things, introducing the people who would run Wiscon 35. At one point they had everybody who had been on a panel or done volunteer work to stand up, and thanked all of us. Wiscon does these things with a nice flair, but I have to admit many of the details escape me now.

Then there were more parties. The only things I am sure happened on Sunday evening rather than on some other are these:

Greer came along and showed us her music box close up.

I ran into rarelylynne wearing a wonderful Regency dress, and she said that it changed the way she moved and her gestures. I don't remember if I asked her whether she wanted to hit people with her fan or if she demonstrated the impulse, but Ellen Klages said, "I wouldn't want to be hit with a fan. Some fans are very large. BAM!" Later on, she came towards me along the hall, windmilling her arms, yelled, "BAM!" and bonked me lightly on the arm. This cracked me up for several minutes and also abashed me in a nice way.

Eric and I had a very pleasant conversation with one of the Fogcon people, Eva, whom Eric had also met last year.

I had a bit of conversation with Elizabeth LaVelle, felt very guilty about buying my books from the Wrong Table (she didn't know and wouldn't have said anything in any case, I just felt guilty the moment I saw her), and vowed to visit Uncle Hugo's very soon.

I fell over around two. Eric came in an hour or so later and we had a nice sleepy winding-down conversation.

On Monday we got up too early, packed, checked out. Eric helped me get settled for the Sign-Out and then went off to find some breakfast. The Sign-Out treats writers very graciously; there were little menus with a quite reasonable assortment of breakfast foods and beverages on them. I couldn't eat any of the protein, but I had tea and a fruit plate. To my delight, Karen Healey, whom I had enjoyed listening to on the Y.A. table, came up and asked if she could tell me how much Tam Lin meant to her, or if I was sick of it. I told her I never got sick of it, but I am not sure I really let her tell me, either, preferring to ask foolish questions about New Zealand, which she answered very kindly. I have a copy of her book now, kindly lent by Sharyn.

Nobody had books for me to sign, but several people came up to say how much they liked the short-story fragments, which pleased me very much -- as did the people who came up to me on Sunday to say the same. oursin popped up to say goodbye. At 12:30 Beth came to fetch us. Eric persuaded me to ask Pat Murphy to sign my new copy of Wild Girls, and I did, too shy to even fangirl her a little. Then I fled, and we drove back to Minneapolis.

Pamela