As a member of the 2024 WorldCon in Glasgow, I’m entitled to both nominate and vote in the Hugo Awards awarded at that convention (and nominate for 2025). Notwithstanding recent events, the Hugo awards have traditionally been one of the big awards of the speculative fiction genre, and I was excited to be able to take part. I’m not usually great at reading very recent works (usually waiting a year for the paperback to come out), but for nominations I splashed out a bit so that I’d be able to nominate in an informed way. Nomination ends on Saturday and I’ve been filling in my ballot over the last few weeks. Below the cut is what I’m nominating.
BlogOfTheMoon
Thursday, 7 March 2024
Saturday, 3 February 2024
Podcast recommendations update
I wrote a series of posts in 2021 about podcasts that I listen to and since it’s been a couple of years and things have changed, I thought I’d write an update with new recommendations and remembering the ones that have ended in that period.
Ended, changed, and ones I’ve just given up on
So several podcasts that I listed in my earlier series have ended, changed, become irregular, or I’ve just given up on.
Despite saying a number of times that they had new episodes coming, Robby the Robot’s Waiting haven’t released a new episode since September 2021. I suspect it was mostly a pandemic project for all the hosts, and now that they’re no longer locked down, they’re away doing other things. Reply All had several internal scandals, and eventually wound itself up in June 2022. My Dad Wrote a Porno also decided to stop after the sixth book in the series, although they’re currently running a series monthly “best of” shows and keep talking about mysterious future plans.
Reasons to be Cheerful has changed its format. Since there’s a good chance that the Labour Party will win the next election, they don’t think they’ll have time to do the in-depth analysis that they’ve been doing, but they’ve changed up to just getting together every week for a chat (they call it the “cheerful chataroo”). Dungeons and Daddies finished their previous story arc and moved on to a new season playing the grandchildren of their previous characters, and that just wasn’t as much fun for me so I gave that one up. Finally, while Til Dice Do Us Part is still going, it’s now on a very irregular schedule, partly down to host health issues, and partly just life getting in the way. A new episode is always something to celebrate though.
New podcasts
I’ve added a whole bunch of new podcasts since 2021, so here’s a few of my favourites
Octothorpe
New releases of Octothorpe are posted on noted SF fan site File 770, which is where I first heard about it. One of the episode illustrations must have caught my eye, and I went and listened to an episode. I immediately started binging the archive and I still get a little hit of dopamine every time a new episode appears in my podcast feed. Octothorpe was started at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, by three British SF fans, talking mostly about fandom and a little bit about actual SFF material. I was still only part way through the archive when one of the hosts made the mistake of inviting letters of comment on older episodes. I immediately started doing so on Twitter as I was going along and got to hear them being read out on the podcast, which just led to me writing to them more. They ran their own online con during the pandemic (although I think that was before I started listening) and I’ve already met John at Satellite 8, and hope to meet the other hosts, Alison and Liz, at the Glasgow 2024 WorldCon.
They’ve recently hit their episode century, and episodes are released every two weeks, and tend to be about an hour long. Octothorpe has been nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Fancast several times now, although it has yet to win.
Hugo Girl!
Hugo Girl! consists of three (space) feminists reviewing Hugo Award winning novels, and anything else that takes their fancy. They’re sharp, clever and funny and their analysis is always incisive and in-depth. I love listening to their reviews, even when they hate a book that I’ve really liked. They take serious notes and discuss the books in depth, with regular segments including “goodies from GoodReads” where they look for other reviews of the book (usually at the lower end of the scale, since those tend to be funnier); “feminist favourite” and “misogynist moment” for the best and worst parts of the book from a feminist point of view; “boob talk” for male gaze; and, of course, the all important question: is this book more Star Wars or Lord of the Rings?
There should be a Hugo Girl! representation at the Glasgow 2024 WorldCon, and I hope to increase my SF podcasters collection by meeting one or more of them there.
There’s over 80 episodes out so far, and episodes are released monthly, and tend to be about an hour long. Hugo Girl! won the 2023 Hugo Award for Best Fancast (and, in a very classy move, have permanently recused themselves from consideration in future).
The Irish History Podcast
I know as little about Irish history as I did about Indian history, so I thought I’d try to correct that, after giving up on the History of India podcast. I think I found this by just searching in my podcast app, I tried a couple of episodes and decided to keep it. The presenter, Fin Dwyer, is an historian, but the episodes are much less dry than Kit Patrick’s style of presenting. The earliest episodes in my feed discuss the early medieval history of Ireland, including the Viking invasion and going up to the Norman conquest in the 11th and 12th centuries. I dipped in and out of this series, but too much of it was just kings and dates. But moving forward a bit, there were a lot of interesting series focussing more on the social history of Ireland, which is something I’m much more interested in.
There was a long series on Great Famine in Ireland, something which (somehow) made me hate the English establishment even more than I already did, and I’ve just finished a series on Irish involvement in the Spanish Civil War.
There’s over 350 episodes in the archive. Episodes are released (more or less) weekly and tend to be 30-40 minutes long.
Our Fake History
A podcast about “what’s fact, what’s fiction, and what’s such a good story that it simply must be told”. It’s a really interesting podcast deconstructing historical myths, looking for the truth behind the fiction. Subjects in the past have included Cleopatra, the Salem witch trials, the origins of modern wrestling and the history of martial arts. The host, Sebastian Major, is engaging and he researches his topics well, making clear what sources he’s drawing from. It’s very wide ranging, and often in depth. Some topics will be covered in a single episode, but some will extend to series of up to three episodes. He’ll not go beyond three episodes on a single topic, but that means that some of the episodes can run really long, if he’s got a lot to say.
There’s over 200 episodes in the archive. Episodes are released fortnightly and tend to be about 60-80 minutes long.
Be the Serpent
Be the Serpent is a podcast of “extremely deep literary merit”. And from that, you can imagine how seriously the hosts take themselves. They spend a lot of time discussing the craft of writing and storytelling, looking at aspects such as cities, character deaths, witches, monster sex, and an awful lot of dick jokes! The three hosts are all fantasy authors (I’ve managed to read novels by two of them so far) and listening to three people deep in the thick of it discussing aspects of their craft is fascinating. They also very much respect fanfic and tend to include a fanfic story as one of their “tentpoles” around which to discuss the topic of the episode. I think I picked this up because I was looking for new SF-related podcasts and was looking at nominations for Best Fancast over the last few years and picked this one to give a go.
This podcast is actually over. They decided to wind it up at episode 100 (I’m about half way through the archive so far) and episodes tend to be about an hour long.
There’s other podcasts I’ve picked up since my last post, but these are my favourites. Not that I need any more, but do you have any recommendations of podcasts that you’ve enjoyed?
Wednesday, 24 January 2024
The debacle around the 2023 Hugo Awards
I’m not going to go over the drama surrounding the 2023 Hugo Awards that erupted following the release of the nomination stats. File 770, Cora Buhlert and Camestros Felapton have detailed analysis and commentary, if you want the gory details (it’s even made the mainstream media!). There’s been some great analysis around the blogophere, but, as you’d expect, there’s a degree of hysteria as well, with some commentators suggesting that the awards are, or could become, irrevocably tarnished. I think this is a definite overreaction. I agree this is different to what happened during Puppy-gate, because this time it’s the award process itself that is under question, not an external group trying to game the awards, which themselves remain transparent. This time round, there’s no transparency at all, with obfuscation and diversion from Dave McCarty, the Hugo administrator for this year.
But, for me, at least, this is very much a 2023 problem, not a problem with the awards as a whole. I think the lesson to learn here is to not let McCarty have oversight of the awards, and that people will be watching Glasgow very closely (as they should), but I think there’s enough eyeballs on the awards to ensure that either their integrity remains intact, or that (as in this case) any meddling is caught quickly – I think the full 2023 stats had been up for only hours before the first social media and blog posts about the anomalies started going up. The community cares about these awards. There’s pride that they’re regularly referred to as the leading awards in the SFF field and I think this love is already being demonstrated in not just the detailed analysis of the stats, but also all the attention being paid to the WSFS constitution and its structures to try and find a way to prevent this from happening again.
In the end, since each WorldCon is an entirely independent beast, we can’t say that a previous mess will necessarily infect the next one, since there will (almost certainly) be entirely different groups of people running them (and hopefully willing to learn lessons from their predecessors). I’ve got no answers myself, but I’ve got faith that the community will work something out.
Tuesday, 11 July 2023
Links to the Hugo Awards 2023 short fiction
Once again, I’m pulling together a list of the freely available short fiction nominated for this year’s Hugo Awards since I can’t find one that exists already. This year the WorldCon is going to be in Chengdu, China, which means there were a lot more Chinese fans eligible to both nominate and vote in the Hugos. This has led to a number of untranslated Chinese works being nominated, which will make for an interesting awards – I think this is the first time that it’s happened, and it’ll be interesting to see how it pans out, and if there will be any translations (in both directions) made available in the Hugo packet (if there is a Hugo packet). Anyway, the list, with links, where I could find them, is below.
Best Short Story
- Rabbit Test, by Samantha Mills
- D. I. Y., by John Wiswell
These are Chinese-language only and I can’t find English translations.
- The White Cliff, Lu Ban
- On the Razor’s Edge, Jiang Bo
- Resurrection, Ren Qing
- Zhurong on Mars, Regina Kanyu Wang
Best Novelette
- If You Find Yourself Speaking to God, Address God with the Informal You, by John Chu
- Murder By Pixel: Crime and Responsibility in the Digital Darkness, by S.L. Huang
- A Dream of Electric Mothers, by Wole Talabi
- The Difference Between Love and Time, by Catherynne M. Valente
- We Built This City, by Marie Vibbert
This story is Chinese-language only and I can’t find an English translation.
- The Space-Time Painter, Hai Ya
Wednesday, 24 March 2021
Podcast Recommendations: Honorary Mentions
In the final part of this series, I’m going to talk about podcasts that don’t make the cut. For the most part, ones that I used to listen to but for whatever reason, fell off. Maybe not for me, but others might still enjoy these.
StarShipSofa
StarShipSofa is another really early podcast for me. It started off being hosted by two Geordie lads talking in-depth about a specific SF author each episode. Authors covered included Alfred Bester, Michael Moorcock, Henry Cuttner and Charlie Stross. I enjoyed that format and it both taught me new stuff about authors I was already familiar with and introduced me to new writers. At some point, one of the duo left the podcast, and the remaining host transitioned it into more of an audio fiction magazine. I didn’t really have time for these longer episodes any more, so I dropped it. It’s still running though and if you’re looking for SF short stories, you could do much worse.
Drabblecast
I think I started listening to the Drabblecast after the host, Norm Sherman (another chap with a great radio voice) guest-hosted Escape Pod a few times. Its tagline is “strange stories, by strange authors, for strange listeners”, and it ran “weird”, often pulp-like, fiction, that was usually, but not always, SF. A drabble is a story of exactly 100 words, and each episode would have one of those, followed by a longer story. I used to enjoy this, but it went on extended hiatus, and I eventually dropped it. I understand that it’s back now, but I seem to be spending a lot more time listening to non-fiction, preferring my fiction in written format. If you want weird, often humorous, tales, give this a spin.
The History of India Podcast
I know embarrassingly little about my ancestral homeland, so when an acquaintance recommended the History of India Podcast, I jumped at it. Since the history of India is a huge subject, the host, Kit Patrick, chose to focus on the story of one city – Pataliputra and how its story weaves into the wider story of India over the millennia. Since sometimes stuff happens that inconsiderately isn’t around Pataliputra, there are also special episodes that tackle culture, art and more that’s unrelated to the focus city.
The tone of the podcast is very different to others I listen to. It often feels more like a set of lectures (without slides) than anything else, with very little in the way of razzmatazz. There’s a huge amount of information in there, but as time went on, I found I wasn’t really absorbing the material, and I never really looked forward to the next episode. So after about three series, I decided to bow out. But it’s a good solid, detailed introduction to a dauntingly wide subject.
Monster Man
Somewhat differently to the others, Monster Man is a podcast that I’m still, for the moment, listening to. It’s a podcast where the host, James Holloway, is reading through every entry in the 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Monster Manual, talking about each one in turn, including its real world history, culture, inspiration and suggestions for how to use it in games. This, I suspect, is a podcast that’s perhaps more of interest to a GM than a player of D&D, but the episodes are short (usually about ten minutes) and I’m half way through the Monster Manual by now, so I figure I’ll keep going until the end of that book. There’s a lot more after that, but unless something really catches my attention, I probably won’t continue beyond that.
There’s actually a spin-off podcast called Patron Deities in which the host gives the Deities and Demigods book the same treatment, except in more detail. Unfortunately, although the first episode was in the main feed, the rest is a subscription-only thing, available if you subscribe to the host’s Patreon. I actually really enjoyed that taster, particularly how it tied the deity back to its origin in the real world and the wider culture that it tied in to.
50 Things That Made the Modern Economy
This is only in the honourable mentions because it seems to be over. There have been two seasons, each encompassing 50 items or ideas that helped create the modern economy (plus a handful of extras). It’s another podcast from the indomitable Tim Harford with short episodes in mini-essay format.
And that’s your lot. That’s a whole bunch of podcasts, I hope you’ve found something in this series you like. Feel free to tell me why I’m wrong or what I should be listening to instead/as well. The other parts in the series are listed below.
Tuesday, 9 February 2021
Podcast Recommendations: Speculative Fiction
My first introduction to the world of podcasts came from my friend Kenny Park in the mid 2000s when he pointed me to Escape Pod, a science fiction podcast, which ran free short stories every week. I eventually worked my way through the archive as it stood then (and wrote a blog post listing my favourite stories), and also subscribed to its spin-off podcast Podcastle when it launched. I dabbled in a few others over the years, but my listening time was limited.
That changed a few years ago when the world just got too much for me and I stopped listening to the BBC radio news programmes on my commute to and from work, which opened up more time to listen to podcasts, so I expanded my repertoire. Skip to 2020 when lockdown and working from home meant that to continue some exercise I was doing long walks every day after work, which gave me even more time. My podcast collection has built up a lot in that time, so I thought I’d talk about a few that I enjoy. I say a few, I’m going to be talking about quite a lot really, so I’m going to split this across multiple posts. First up is my first love: science fiction. I’ve been an SF nerd since before it was cool, so below are the SF- and general geek podcasts that I’ve been listening to.
Escape Artists
Escape Artists is the parent company of Escape Pod, the podcast that got me into this spoken word audio stuff in the first place. They’ve got four podcasts, covering science fiction (Escape Pod), fantasy (Podcastle), horror (Pseudopod) and Young Adult (Cast of Wonders). I only listen to the first two, since horror isn’t really my thing and I’m probably not exactly the target market for YA fiction.
All the EA podcasts are free and are listener funded. These days they’re a SFWA-recognised pro-paying market and they also put the full text of the stories they publish up on their websites too, which is great.
Escape Pod
Escape Pod is one of the oldest and longest running SF fiction podcasts around, running more or less continuously since 2005, with over 700 episodes to its name. As I mentioned above, my pal Kenny introduced me to it and I spent an enjoyable few years working through the archives. Original host Serah Eley was personable and her intros (later outros) were always thought-provoking and interesting. Eley left after about five years at the helm but a succession of editors have kept the ship steady since then. Eley’s original intent was to provide fun SF stories (and fantasy in the early days, before Podcastle launched). Some of the later editors have taken the show in darker directions, but that original guiding principle is still there and keeps me coming back, week after week.
Stories are run weekly, and they sometimes have flash fiction interspersed in there too, although these days, they tend to run a few flash stories together in a regular episode. Episodes are usually between 25 and 45 minutes, although some can run longer. They sometimes run even longer pieces, split up over multiple weeks.
Podcastle
Podcastle is Escape Artists’ fantasy podcast. It started a few years after Escape Pod, in 2008, and there over 650 episodes covering pretty much the entire fantasy genre. Like its siblings, it runs weekly stories, with episodes ranging from 20 minutes to about an hour. It also sometimes runs longer stories over multiple weeks.
It’s had some great editors over the years, including founding editor Rachel Swirsky and the multi-award winning Ann Leckie. Podcastle (and its siblings, to be fair) has done an enormous amount over the last few years to increase representation in the stories it tells, whether this is stories from LGBTQ+ writers, writers from around the world or under-represented minorities. This is a wider trend in SF fandom, and I’m glad to see it in my SF fiction podcasts of choice.
Robby the Robot’s Waiting
Robby the Robot’s Waiting is a pretty new discovery for me. It’s a podcast about (mostly media) sci-fi hosted by two former editors of SFX magazine (Rich Edwards and Dave Bradley) and a sci-fi journalist (Tanavi Patel). I discovered it because they had a couple of special episodes where they got together the other editors that SFX has had over the years to talk about it on its 25th anniversary. I’ve been a reader of SFX right from the start so was interested in hearing all its past (and current) editors in conversation. From there, I looked at a few of the episode descriptions of the show and was intrigued enough to listen to some. The gang obviously love their subject and enjoy nerding out together on the show, which makes it a joy to listen to, even when they’re talking about shows I’ve never seen or wasn’t that interested in.
The format is to start off talking about what they’ve been consuming since the last podcast, then a guest that joins for the rest of the show, starting with a deep dive into a piece of SF from the past (Buffy, Flash Gordon and New Galactica have all been done); finishing off with news about upcoming SF. It’s not been running all that long, with fourteen main episodes since July 2020, as well as a bunch of specials. The (main) episodes are released fortnightly, and are about an hour long.
The name is apparently a Bananarama reference.
Til Dice Do Us Part
I must confess that I’ve got a personal interest in Til Dice Do Us Part, it’s a podcast about tabletop RPGs run by my dear friends George and Ailsa. George has been the GM for my RPG group for over three lustra now and I’ve whiled away many an hour talking about roleplaying. And now he, and his partner Ailsa, decided that these conversations should be available to a wider audience.
It’s a pretty new podcast, with just half a dozen episodes under their belt at the time of writing, but they’ve got a varied format, with different segments that they bring in and out of episodes, including the Elevator Pitch, where they talk about a specific game system that they’ve played (well, played in Alisa’s case, more likely to be run in George’s); quizzes on deep dives into the subject matter; and Ask a GM, which is, er, exactly what it says on the tin. Topics that have come up include inclusivity in gaming; dealing with nervous players; and how to handle sex and relationships in a game.
Specific games that they’ve talked about include Night Witches, King Arthur Pendragon and Umläut: Game of Metal. Although George and Ailsa have been part of a few other groups over the years, I’m a member of what I’m egotistical enough to call their “main” RPG group, and have played in all the games they’ve talked about so far. It’s been fun revisiting those, although they’re good enough at talking about them that you don’t need to have played the games to find them interesting. Whether you’ve just got a passing interest in D&D or you’re a hardcore indie gamer, there’s a lot to enjoy in this podcast.
I especially enjoy their little fictional menagerie of podcast helpers, including Twike the social media goblin, the Inch-High Incel (more a hindrance than a helper, that one), and, my personal favourite, the Mailer Daemon. The fake adverts mid-episode are often hilarious, advertising such things as SheDice (dice for girls!), fictional game systems and dating apps for superheroes. Episodes are around an hour long and are released fortnightly.
Imaginary Worlds
Imaginary Worlds was a recommendation from my friend Matthew. It’s tagline is that it’s a show about how we create them and why we suspend our disbelief. The host, Eric Molinsky, is a former animator and radio producer and is an all-round geek. Each episode he takes a deep-dive into a particular subject within the science fiction, fantasy and horror genres, whether that’s an analysis of the uncanny valley; learning about Magic: The Gathering; the composer behind the original Godzilla films; or discovering tabletop RPG-ing and, later, LARP. There’s occasional mini-series topics for which have included looking at aspects of Doctor Who, and superheroes from the angle of sidekicks.
It’s a thoughtful podcast with Molinsky never skimping on the research for his subject that episode. Episodes are released fortnightly and are usually around half an hour. It’s been running since 2014 and there are over 150 episodes in the archive.
Our Opinions Are Correct
Our Opinions are Correct is my newest podcast, and I’m only a handful of episodes in so far, but I’ve got a feeling it’ll be a keeper. It’s presented by Annalee Newitz and Charlie Jane Anders, the same duo who founded io9, and is the two of them talking about subjects within science fiction that interest them. It’s very broad-ranging, and talks more about literary SF than, say, Robby the Robot’s Waiting. The first three episodes have covered the first season of Star Trek: Discovery; mind control in SF; and SF novels that have stood the test of time.
The hosts are knowledgeable, both in terms of breadth and depth of knowledge of the genre, and their conversational style keeps it ticking over nicely. It’s been running since 2018 and has won the Hugo Award for Best Fancast for its first two years (in 2021 the hosts recused OOAC since they’d already won twice, which, I think, shows some class).
Episodes are released fortnightly, with about 75 in the bank already, and are about forty minutes long.
Next up will be a mix of podcasts that I’ve hand-waved together under the category of culture and ideas. Do you have a favourite podcast? I’d love to hear about it (although the last thing I need is yet more podcasts).
The other posts in the series are:
Sunday, 19 July 2020
Links to the Hugo Awards 2020 short fiction
I’ve not been entitled to vote at the Hugo Awards since I was a member of LonCon in 2014, but I still find the awards a good way to keep up with the state of the art in speculative fiction, and while I can’t read all the longer works, most of the works in the shorter fiction categories are available online. Escape Pod used to run the short story finalists every year in the run-up to the awards, but they stopped doing that on the grounds that the short fiction was now pretty widely available online.
Locus usually list all the nominees and links to them, but for 2020, they haven’t linked the short fiction that is available for free. So for my own reference, and for anyone else who wants to read good, modern speculative fiction, here they are, all collected in one place.
Best Novelette
- For He Can Creep, by Siobhan Carroll
- Omphalos, by Ted Chiang (part of the author’s collection Exhalation, so not available online)
- Away with the Wolves, by Sarah Gailey
- Emergency Skin, by N.K. Jemisin (you might only be able to read this if you’re an Amazon Prime member)
- The Blur in the Corner of Your Eye, by Sarah Pinsker
- The Archronology of Love, by Caroline M. Yoachim
Best Short Story
- Do Not Look Back, My Lion, by Alix E. Harrow
- As the Last I May Know, by S.L. Huang
- And Now His Lordship Is Laughing, by Shiv Ramdas
- Ten Excerpts from an Annotated Bibliography on the Cannibal Women of Ratnabar Island, by Nibedita Sen
- Blood Is Another Word for Hunger, by Rivers Solomon
- A Catalog of Storms, by Fran Wilde
Wednesday, 18 January 2017
Missing Banksie All Over Again
Some time ago I found a long interview with Iain M. Banks that I didn’t have time to read at the time, so I stashed it into my bookmarks and then forgot about it. I found it again the other day and started reading. Early on, the famous essay A Few Notes on the Culture was mentioned and I realised that I’ve never actually read that so took a tangent that I’ve not made it back from. It’s a really interesting essay both for fans of the Culture and for general fans of future history and worldbuilding. I found a fantastic quote which seems very apt for the times we’re living in, which I was going to tweet, but then Bankie was never really known for being concise, was he?
The market, for all its (profoundly inelegant) complexities, remains a crude and essentially blind system, and is – without the sort of drastic amendments liable to cripple the economic efficacy which is its greatest claimed asset – intrinsically incapable of distinguishing between simple non-use of matter resulting from processal superfluity and the acute, prolonged and wide-spread suffering of conscious beings.
Given the briefings coming from Westminster about turning the UK into a deregulated tax haven, slashing workers’ rights while making corporations even more unaccountable, I fear Banks’ words are all too true.
I think it may be time to get away from it all with a Culture reread.
Wednesday, 23 April 2014
That was the con that was: Satellite 4
I had a brilliant time at this year’s Eastercon, Satellite 4, in Glasgow. There was a very strong programme, and like previous Satellite cons, there was very strong science thread running through it, not least through having Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell (or the Queen of Pulsars, as Sacha put it) as one of the guests of honour. I got to know a few new people, mostly thanks to dancing with them at the ceilidh, and went to a lot of panels and talks.
Some of the programme highlights for me included the privilege of hearing Dame Jocelyn discuss current and upcoming trends in astronomy; finding out more about the Historical Thesaurus developed at my alma mater; an excellent discussion of women in science and SF; a discussion of CubeSats by local boys Clyde Space; scone tasting; inadvisable rocket science; and the intersection of gynaecology and lasers (Sacha again).
The guests of honour were all delightful as well. Juliet E. McKenna was kind enough to point me to some of her free fiction online when I twittered that I hadn’t read any of her work (after reading it, I’m afraid it’s not really to my taste, but it was still very kind of her to respond on Twitter). I picked up several of John Meaney’s books in the dealers’ room and spent the rest of the con trying to corner him to sign one. I eventually spotted him making a beeline for the bar at the dead dog party on Monday evening. I approached him, and not only was he very happy to sign for me, but he offered to buy me a drink (something which I was going to offer him) and spent ten or so minutes just chatting (turns out he’s a Haskell and formal methods fan), confirming the impression that I had formed of him during the rest of the con as a thoroughly nice chap and all round good egg. I bid on a couple of prints by (artist GoH) Jim Burns in the art auction, but was outbid on both of them. I did attend his interview though, where I learned that he had provided some early conceptual artwork for Blade Runner, which I hadn’t known before.
Other con highlights include the aforementioned conversation with and signing by John Meaney; talking to Charlie Stross about the future direction of the Laundry series (spoiler: doooooooooom!); the ceilidh (although I felt the band themselves were a bit bland and less than engaging) and, of course, the general hanging around in the bar. I should also congratulate the committee on wrangling cheap tea and coffee at the hotel bar. Normally, you pay an arm and a leg for bad tea at cons, so I was very pleased to see that the bad tea was going for just £1 a cup.
The one problem with the con, that was more noticeable as the con went on, was the under-representation of women. Fandom has worked pretty hard over the last few years to move towards panel parity, or at least an equal-ish overall number of men and women doing talks and on panels across the event as a whole, and I didn’t think that Satellite 4 managed that. This may have been a function of the panels and events that I attended, but I did notice a few people on Twitter saying the same thing. Hopefully this is just a blip in the process but it was a bit of a shame, I felt.
Sir Terry Pratchett was supposed to have been a special guest at Satellite 4, subject to health. In the end, he couldn’t make it, but he did record a short video message that was shown at the opening ceremony. And it was heartbreaking. The video was very short, but Sir Terry was obviously struggling, and the whole thing took multiple takes to do. My heart goes out to Sir Terry and his family and I wish them all the best. I’ll treasure my own con memories of Sir Terry all the more now.
Other than that, and despite my inability to last beyond midnight for two out of the four evenings, I had a blast. I had a lot of fun with my friends, and got to know some new people, and to cap it all, the weather was absolutely gorgeous all weekend. I’m not sure what the next con that I’ll go to will be, but roll on Satellite 5!
Tuesday, 28 January 2014
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