I’ve spent the last few days at ConJose, the 60th World Science Fiction Convention. It’s like a bank-holiday weekend visiting relatives. Fandom is clearly closely allied to the people and sub-culture I know, but with its own rituals and relationships and strange, orthogonal paths. Like family, it’s been by turns exasperating, entertaining, informative, irritating, and a bit wonderful. So far, the best bits have been listening to Vernor Vinge‘s presentation on the Singularity; the panel on nerdcore sf writing with Cory, Eileen Gunn, James Patrick Kelly and Charlie Stross; and the Hugo Awards.
The Hugos go to show how witty an awards ceremony can be if most of your winners are writers. It also has the side effect – given the underappreciated lot of most of them – of creating almost infinite gratitude in the recipients, which is much more fun to watch than the usual self-grooming celebs. Neil Gaman seemed genuinely amazed and moved to win Best Novel. His fine acceptance speech ended with him trailing off, staring at the statue, and saying “Fuck. I got a Hugo.”.
The Hugo list, as I suppose is the plan, is now my reading list for the next few months. I’ve just read Ted Chiang’s award-winning short story “Hell is the Absence of God”, online at FictionWise. You can download it for free at that link. It’s fantastic – a great short story, sf or not. And if you haven’t already read Charlie Stross’ Lobsters (again free online), you’re missing a treat. Vinge’s novella “Fast Times at Fairmont High” is the next on the list.
I was also supposed to be at ConJose to meet a trade mission of publishers to brief them about the EUCD, but someone at the DTI nixed that when they found out I was a journalist. You see? Just days into accepting the description, and I’m already getting excluded from all the best parties.
It turned out okay: Seth covered the meeting better than any journalist would, and instead that evening, I shared a ride with the man who plays Mr Shake Hands on the American version of Banzai.