I got a new truck. That was the fun part. The hard part was coming up with the right name for it. The truck is a 2023 Ford Bronco Sport in a color they call Shadow Black. That’s basically black, but shiny, not matte. No blacked-out chrome or anything that would help me hide in the woods if I wanted to go off grid. This truck was built for off-roading, though, with standard four-wheel drive and adjustable G.O.A.T. modes. That…
By G. S. Norwood I’m convinced that everyone needs a good friend who is a bad influence. You might want to wait to get such a friend until after you’ve logged enough years as an adult to genuinely understand the basics of right and wrong: But once you get those habits ingrained in your soul, you need to find a good friend who can be a bad influence on you every once in a while. A Good Friend A good…
By Jan S. Gephardt Apparently this was the year for horror. At least, when it came to author readings at SoonerCon 31, it certainly seemed to be. I’m not sure why quite such a consistent stream of horror prevailed at the readings I attended. Perhaps living in the twilight of the Pandemic could be some of it. Maybe life at constant risk of mass-shooters the banners of books has done something to our collective psyche? Whatever the reason, SoonerCon 31…
By Jan S. Gephardt I promised a SoonerCon 31 summary, and I mean to deliver in today’s post. But this overview won’t be our last glimpse of SoonerCon. I love this convention, and I’m already looking forward to next year’s event. However – as at every convention – this one provided some “learning takes.” Our dealers table experiment continues, although after SoonerCon 31 the effort is looking ever more dubious as a genuinely money-making proposition. We had another unfortunate entomological…
By Jan S. Gephardt My ConQuesT 54 challenges provided yet another rough sf con experience. I love ConQuesT. It’s my “home con,” and I’ll go to every one I can. But ConQuesT 54 was kinda hard to love in several ways, and for several reasons. Post-Pandemic, and somewhat like DemiCon, it’s a smaller convention struggling against some bad breaks. Don’t get me wrong: there were a lot of bright spots, from my perspective. I reconnected with old friends, met some…
By Jan S. Gephardt I’ve been going to ConQuesT or about as long as I’ve been going to science fiction conventions. I think of it as my “home con.” It’s sponsored by KaCSFFS (we pronounce it “KAX-fuss”), the Kansas City Science Fiction and Fantasy Society. I was “discovered” by Robin Wayne Bailey and his wife Diana J. Bailey, when I showed my artwork at a relatively short-lived convention at a local community college. That was back in 1982. KaCSFFS friends…
By Jan S. Gephardt DemiCon 34 may have been my last DemiCon. I have a lot of great history with DemiCon as an institution, and as an eagerly-anticipated annual event. I’ve blogged about it in this space for the last several years, as veteran readers of this blog may recall. It was the convention that primarily inspired my 2019 post “Why I go to SF Conventions.” For a profile of DemiCon at its recent best, take a look at my…
By Jan S. Gephardt It’s that time of year again: getting ready for “con” season, and specifically for DemiCon 34. Repeated blizzard events over several recent years have discouraged us from attending Capricon in February. This means DemiCon, an annual, early-May convention in Des Moines, Iowa, has become our “new normal” first science fiction convention of the summer season. But for DemiCon 34, things will be a bit different from our usual. Some of the changes were planned, others not….
By Jan S. Gephardt I’ve been reading some very enjoyable books recently. They really are due a review. I’m an Indie author myself. Co-publishing out of a micro-press I run with my sister counts as “indie,” trust me. Thus, I know how vitally important reviews are. But frankly, reviews are important to all writers, whether indie or traditionally published. Every single review posted by an individual reader tells the world that this author wrote a book someone felt moved to…
By Jan S. Gephardt For me, this past month has been one long (exhausting) experiment in pushing the envelope. You may know this phrase, which originated in the aeronautics field. It passed into more common usage after Tom Wolfe’s 1979 book The Right Stuff (about supersonic aeronautics and the early US space program) was made into a movie by the same name in 1983. In aeronautics “the envelope” means the limits of an aircraft’s performance capability. Pushing past it is…