Annotated World Fantasy Con schedule
The tentative schedule for World Fantasy Con has been posted, but it doesn't include any panel descriptions, and I had to look hard to find the draft panel descriptions. So I cut and pasted the two together for my own use, and the result is behind the cut.
ETA 10/29: updated to final version.
THURSDAY
3:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading:
3:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
3:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Sam Butler
3:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Diana Pharaoh Francis
4:00 PM City Center A. Native American Spirits.
Linda Donohue, Lawrence Connolly (m), Laura Ann Hill, Adam Niswander
* How are they different from transplanted European ghosts?
4:00 PM City Center C. Treasures in the Wastebasket
Irene Harrison, Rebekah Brown, Bob Brown, Greg Ketter (m)
* A panel for collectors. If only I hadn't thrown out that 1947 Arkham House catalogue ...
4:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Natalie Mallet
4:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
4:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading:
4:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Lynn Flewelling
5:00 PM City Center A: Sleepy Hollow and the Beginnings of the American Supernatural Tradition. Barbara Campbell, Joseph Bruchac, Mary Turzillo (m), Lloyd Currey, Saladin Ahmed
* [no description]
5:00 PM City Center C. Belief vs. Non-Belief On the Part of the Author. George Scithers, Holly Black, Samantha Henderson, James Alan Garner (m), Robert J. Sawyer
* Is it an advantage for the author to be skeptical of the supernatural as Lovecraft was, or will the believer (like Blackwood) write with greater personal conviction.
5:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Ian Randall Strock
5:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: J.C. Hay
5:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: David Levine
5:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
6:00 - 8:00 PM DINNER BREAK
8:00 PM Broadway 3 & 4 Opening Ceremonies
8:15 PM City Center Gallery. Ice-Cream Social
8:00 PM City Center A. The Evolution of a Drawing. Donato Giancola (m), Bob Eggleton, Shaun Tan
8:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading:
8:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Melinda Snodgrass
8:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Fred Durbin
8:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
9:00 PM City Center A. The Fantasy Graphic Novel. Doselle Young, Charles Vess, Andrew Wheeler (m), Alisa Witney Sheckley, Matthew Smith, Mike Dringenberg
* Think of Watchman, Maus, or The Sandman. How does the graphic novel (i.e. what we used to call a comic book, only different) achieve a depth and complexity on the level of an adult prose novel?
9:00 PM City Center C. International Horror Guild Award presentations. Paul Guran (m)
9:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Tom Doyle
9:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Mary Turzillo
9:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Anne Brallier
9:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Jessica Day George
10:00 PM City Center A. The Ghosts in Shakespeare. Janine Young, Liz Gorinsky (m), David B. Coe, Sarah Hoyt, Charles Gannon
* What impact have they had on subsequent literature? We just begin with Fritz Leiber's "The Four Ghosts in Hamlet." There is a lot more. How did the Shakespearean conception of the ghost carry on down the centuries?
10:00 PM Broadway 1. Open Mic Poetry Reading. Carolyn Clink, moderator.
FRIDAY
10:00 AM - Noon WF Board Meeting. City Center B
10:00 AM City Center A. Gilbert and Sullivan in Fantasy. Ellen Asher, Dana Paxon, Joselle Van Der Hooft, Jane Yolen, Richard Bowes (m)
* Some of their work, like The Sorcerer, has overtly fantastic content, but isn't ALL of it in a sense the product of another universe? How much have G&S influenced subsequent fantasy in various media?
10:00 AM City Center C. Neglected Practitioners of the Ghost Story. Michelle Slung (m), Christopher Roden, Robert Knowlton, Danel Olson
* F.M. Mayor (author of The Rector’s Daughter) and others.
10:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Lois McMaster Bujold
10:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Jeanne C. Stein
10:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Carol Emshwiller
10:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Thomas Monteleone
11:00 AM City Center A. Scary Stuff Beyond New Jersey: Horror In Non-Contemporary and Exotic Settings. Michael Laimo, Nancy Kilpatrick (m), Graham Joyce, Jacqueline Kessler
* Creating horror any time, any place, on any planet. MR James insisted that a ghostly story must be set in the present or relatively recent past. Was he right?
11:00 AM City Center C. The Author As Legend. Gary K. Wolfe, (m) George Scithers, Ben Peek, Mark Finn
* Sometimes the author seems, as Lovecraft was said to be, "his own most fantastic creation." Our sense of who the author was completely colors our view of his work. Think of Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Franz Kafka, or Philip K. Dick. Can an author create his legend intentionally, an artificial persona, or is that just phony? Can the author's life be separated from the text? Should it be?
11:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Mathew Jarpe
11:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: George R.R. Martin reading (55 mins)
11:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Victoria McManus
11:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: George R.R. Martin continues
Noon City Center A: The Tradition of Horrible Ladies. Tina Jens (m), Lisa Tuttle, Cheysa Burke, Lisa Mannetti, Di Barron
* The influence of women horror writers from the 18th century Gothics to today’s terrors.
Noon City City C. Lovecraft and the Rejection of the Supernatural. S.T. Joshi, William Jones, Tim Powers, Scott Connors (m), F. Paul Wilson
* HPL, hard-headed materialist that he was, explicitly rejected the supernatural as a holdover from the obsolete universe of religion and ancient myth. He then created Cthulhu. A discussion of Lovecraft's ideas about a mechanistic-materialist universe and how he used this concept in horror fiction.
Noon - 1:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading. Michael Dirda (one hour)
Noon Broadway 2. Reading: Julie Czerneda
12:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Dirda continues
12:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Tamora Pierce
1:00 PM City Center A. Kim Newman GoH presentation. Joseph McCabe, interviewer
1:00 PM City Center C. A Retrospective of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series. Betty Ballantine, Jim Minz (m), Tom Doherty, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Jane Jewell
* What it was and why it was important.
1:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Graham Joyce
1:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Tony Richards
1:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Melissa Scott
1:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Greer Ilene Gilman
2:00 PM City Center A. How a Book Cover is Chosen. Irene Gallo (m), Jacob Weisman, Tom Kidd, Lou Anders, John Picacio
* Art directors and artists discuss what makes a cover work.
2:00 PM City Center C. M.R. James and His Successors. Christopher Roden, John Langan (m), Kelly Link, Ramsey Campbell, Barbara Roden
* The "James Gang," their work, their methods, and their influence.
2:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Nick DiChario
2:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Alan Dean Foster
2:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Darrell Schweitzer
2:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Jane Yolen
3:00 PM City Center A. Moebius Presentation
3:00 PM City Center C. The Varieties of Ghostly Experience. Esther Friesner, Jennifer Swabach, Maria Lima, Paul Cornell (m), Stacey Cochran, Jennifer Dunne
* Other forms of the returning dead: zombies, vampires, dancing skeletons, and more exotic varieties, literary and folkloristic.
3:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Jay Lake
3:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ellen Kushner
3:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: M. Rickert
3:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Peter Heck
4:00 PM City Center A. George Scithers GoH interview. Darrell Schweitzer, interviewer
4:00 PM City Center C. The Psychic Detective in Literature. Howard Andrew Jones (m), Robert Sawyer, Kim Newman, David Drake, Barbara Roden
* From Carnacki the Ghost-Finder to Kolchak the Night Stalker. Exploring the history of the supernatural sleuth story, and the strengths and weaknesses of this unique form.
4:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: David Duncan
4:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Broad Universe Group Reading (55 mins). Nancy Jane Moore, Ada Milenkovic Brown, Elaine Isaak, Rina Weisman, Morven Westfield, Kathryn Sullivan, J, Kathleen Cheney, Samantha Henderson, Heather Lindsley
4:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Scott Lynch
4:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Broad Universe reading continues
5:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Sarah Hoyt
5:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Hal Duncan
5:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Dennis Danvers
5:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Kim Paffenroth
6:00 - 8:00 PM DINNER BREAK
8:00 - 11:00 PM City Center A and C. Autograph Reception
11:00 PM Broadway 1: Reading: Lawrence Schoen
11:00 PM Broadway 2: Reading. Gary Wassner
11:30 PM Broadway 1: Reading: Douglas Cohen
11:30 PM Broadway 2: Reading: Christopher Barzak
Midnight Broadway 1. Ghost Story Slam. Jeanne Cavellos (mod). Open mike event. Come one, come all. Bring a FIVE MINUTE ghost story.
SATURDAY
1O:00 AM City Center A. The Best Fantasy Worlds. Colin Harvey, Kathleen Woodbury (m), Delia Sherman, Joel Champetier, Charlaine Harris
* Why they are successful. Which ones do we want to read about, or would we want to live in?
10:00 AM City Center C: Tolkien as a Horror Writer. Christopher Cervasco, Jeanne Cavelos (m), Douglas Anderson, Ysabeau Wilce. Nicholas Ozment
* There are scary bits, undoubtedly. Did Tolkien have any coherent horror aesthetic?
10:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Robert Buettner
10:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Michael Shea
10:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Sharon Shinn
10:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: John Grant
11:00 AM City Center A. Charles L. Grant Memorial Panel. Al Sarrantonio, Stephen Jones, Jo Fletcher (m), Craig Shaw Gardner, Kim Newman
11:00 AM City Center C. An Hour with Christopher and Barbara Roden.
11:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Mattie Brahen
11:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Laird Barron
11:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Anne Bishop
11:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Patrick O'Leary
Noon City Center A. Robert Aickman and the Aesthetics of Ambiguity. Jim Rockill (m), Peter Straub, Lisa Tuttle, Kathryn Kramer
* Here is a ghost-story writer who did NOT follow the rules. What rules? Do his stories make sense? Do they need to? After all, isn't the supernatural supposed to be, at the end, an incomprehensible mystery? How did Aickman address this and to what extent can his stories be models for others to follow?
Noon City Center C. Animal Fantasy. Laura Ann Gilman, Elaine Isaac, Judith Berman (m), Carol Emshwiller, Gordon Van Gelder
* From Aesop and Coyote stories through Animal Farm and Watership Down, this seems to be a universal form. What is the special appeal of having a story acted out by animals rather than people? And how anthropomorphic must they (or shouldn't they) be?
Noon Broadway 1. Reading: Paul Park
Noon Broadway 2. Reading: Scott Edelman
12:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Gene Wolfe (55 min)
12:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Jennifer.V. Jones
1:00 PM City Center A. There's an Archetype in My Soup. Elizabeth Bunce, Sarah Beth Durst, Tim Powers (m), Mark Ferrari, Margo Lanagan
* Much fantasy deliberately employs elements of fairy-tale and myth, often after much scholarly research. But there's still the old argument that if you have to learn an archetype, it isn't one, that these patterns are universal in human storytelling. What is the mythic "buzz" we all know when we see it, even when we have difficulty defining it?
1:00 PM City Center C. . The Victorian Era as a Setting. Barbara Roden, Nancy Kilpatrick, Tiffany Trent (m), Kim Newman, Tamara Siler Jones
* We still gravitate to it. Is this merely by association, because so many great ghost stories were written then, or is there something inherent about the Gaslight Era which is inherently spooky?
1:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Gene Wolfe continues
1:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Andy Duncan
1:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Guy Gavriel Kay (55min)
1:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ysabeau Wilce
2:00 PM City Center A. Ghosts and Revenants Down Under. Garth Nix, Jack Dann, Robin Hood, Kaaron Warren, Deborah Biancotti (m)
* [not listed]
2:00 PM City Center C. Surrealism Trapped in a Jar. Alan Clark, Heidi Lampetti, Stephen Segal (m), Paul E. Martens
* What IS Surrealism, really? It is a word we use very loosely, without any clear definition. CAN it be defined? It is not really practical to demand that any "surrealist" writer or artist have signed the Surrealist Manifesto in the early 20th century or even have been a pal of Max Ernst or Salvador Dali, but "surrealism" does seem to have stemmed from a specific movement (artistic and literary-we tend to remember the painters more than the novelists) which has had a broader impact on the general culture. Is "surrealism" the same as fantasy, a specific kind of fantasy, or something different altogether? Bring your dripping clocks and fur-covered spoons.
2:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Guy Gavriel Kay continues.
2:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ramsey Campbell (55 min)
2:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Jeffrey Ford
2:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ramsey Campbell continues
3:00 PM City Center A. Lisa Tuttle GoH presentation
3:00 PM City Center C. The Pre-Christian Ghost. Gene Wolfe, David Drake, Diana Paxon, Noreen Doyle (m)
* Ghostly fiction and apparitions before the European Middle Ages. A starting point for this might be L. Collison-Morley's Greek and Roman Ghost Stories. How were the ghosts of the ancients different from the more familiar ones? For one thing, they certainly didn't wear trailing white shrouds, which are a product of the Industrial Revolution. For another, they were more readily attracted by blood sacrifices…
3:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Young Adult Writers group reading. Holly Black, Cassie Clare, Sarah Beth Durst, Tiffany Trent.
3:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Patricia McKillip
3:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: YA reading continues
3:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Carol Berg
4:00 PM City Center A. The Digital Divide. Jane Frank (M), Les Edwards, Jill Bauman, Bob Eggleton, Donato Giancola
* [not listed]
4:00 PM Survey of the Field, 2007. Paula Guran, Charles N. Brown, Jonathan Strahan (m), Ellen Datlow, Stephen Jones
* [ no description]
4:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Ellen Klages
4:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Christopher Golden
4:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Catherynne Valente
4:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Laurel Winter
5:00 - 8:00 PM DINNER BREAK
7:00 PM Broadway 1 and 2. Setup for MR James Live
8:00 PM City Center A. Joseph Bruhac Presentation
8:00 PM City Center C: Other Than Arkham House. Stuart Schiff (m), Lloyd Currey, Mark Owings, W. Paul Ganley
9:00 - 11:00 PM City Center Gallery. Art reception.
9:00 PM City Center A. The New Weird. Tim Waggoner, Caro Soles, Ginjer Buchanan
* Is a movement? A publicity stunt? A marketing tool? A package-and-design issue? A sea change in the whole nature of fantasy? What DO we mean when we point at it?
9:00 PM City Center C. The Legacy of Shirley Jackson. Charlaine Harris, Kathryn Cramer, Alexandra Sokoloff, James Frenkel (m), Kelly Link
Charlaine Harris, Kathryn Cramer, Alexandra Sokoloff, James Frenkel (m), Kelly Link
* Did "The Lottery" and The Haunting of Hill House change our (or the public's) ideas about what constitutes a horror or ghost story?
8:00 - 9:30 PM Broadway 1 and 2. MR JAMES LIVE performance
10:00 PM City Center A. When Fantasy Becomes SF and SF Becomes Fantasy. George R.R. Martin, Joe Haldeman, L.E. Modesitt, Walter John Williams, Nancy Kress (m)
* We read a good book recently about persecuted children with special powers, who yearned to escape to Another Place where their unique abilities would be appreciated… But it wasn't Zenna Henderson's collected People stories or even Children of the Atom by Wilmar Shiras. It was about fairies and changelings. Do such motifs move between genres depending on which is more popular at the moment, or is something deeper going on here? The story about fairy-children probably could not have been published in the early '50s, admittedly, and would have to be "disguised" as science fiction. Today is it perhaps a more viable strategy to disguise science fiction as fantasy?
10:00 PM City Center C. Small Press and Independent Publishers. Ron Drummond, John O'Neill, Jeremy Lassen, Mary Robinette Kowel, Jetse de Vries (m), George Scithers
* [no description]
11:00 PM - 12:30 AM Broadway 1 and 2. M.R. JAMES LIVE performance.
SUNDAY
10:00 AM High Rock Room. WF Board Meeting. (2 hours)
10:00 AM City Center A. What Are the Taboos in Fantasy Today? Sharyn November (m). John Grant, Tom Doherty. Steven Erikson, Lucienne Diver
* They shift with the times. Is the writer ever really free to write about ANYTHING?
10:00 AM City Center C. The Ghostly Lore of New York State. Mason Winfield, Rick Wilbur, Patricia Bray, Betty Ballantine
* Is this area uniquely haunted?
10:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Lilith Saintcrow
10:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Melinda Thielbar
10:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: David Louis Edelman
10:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: David Anthony Durham
11:00 AM City Center A. Does a Ghost Story Have to Have Ghosts? Ramsey Campbell, James Maxey (m), Jane Yolen, Julianne Lee, Toni L.P. Kelner
* 'Ghost stories' as a misleading description: everyone knows, or thinks they know, what a ghost story is: it features a ghost, right? Wrong. Many of the best 'ghost' stories don't actually feature a ghost: demons, revenants, magic, various other-worldly phenomena, but no ghosts in the traditional white-sheeted-figure-drifting-down-the-hallway sense. Take a look at famous 'ghost' stories and see whether they could be prosecuted under 'truth in advertising' laws.
11:00 AM City Center C. Urban Fantasy. Sedia Ekaterina, Ernest Lilley (m), Marie Brennan, Melanie Fletcher, Jenna Black
* It seems as if most urban fantasy uses the familiar European myths. What other possibilities are there? Which authors have successfully exploited them? [listed as "Urban Fantasy-Beyond the Usual Suspects"]
11:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Bruce Coville
11:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Nancy Kress
11:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Wen Spencer
11:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Paul Witcover
Noon - 12:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: John Crowley
Noon - 12:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading. Esther Friesner
1:00 PM Awards Banquet in Saratoga Ballroom
After Awards Banquet Broadway 1. Judges Panel
ETA 10/29: updated to final version.
THURSDAY
3:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading:
3:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
3:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Sam Butler
3:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Diana Pharaoh Francis
4:00 PM City Center A. Native American Spirits.
Linda Donohue, Lawrence Connolly (m), Laura Ann Hill, Adam Niswander
* How are they different from transplanted European ghosts?
4:00 PM City Center C. Treasures in the Wastebasket
Irene Harrison, Rebekah Brown, Bob Brown, Greg Ketter (m)
* A panel for collectors. If only I hadn't thrown out that 1947 Arkham House catalogue ...
4:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Natalie Mallet
4:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
4:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading:
4:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Lynn Flewelling
5:00 PM City Center A: Sleepy Hollow and the Beginnings of the American Supernatural Tradition. Barbara Campbell, Joseph Bruchac, Mary Turzillo (m), Lloyd Currey, Saladin Ahmed
* [no description]
5:00 PM City Center C. Belief vs. Non-Belief On the Part of the Author. George Scithers, Holly Black, Samantha Henderson, James Alan Garner (m), Robert J. Sawyer
* Is it an advantage for the author to be skeptical of the supernatural as Lovecraft was, or will the believer (like Blackwood) write with greater personal conviction.
5:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Ian Randall Strock
5:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: J.C. Hay
5:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: David Levine
5:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
6:00 - 8:00 PM DINNER BREAK
8:00 PM Broadway 3 & 4 Opening Ceremonies
8:15 PM City Center Gallery. Ice-Cream Social
8:00 PM City Center A. The Evolution of a Drawing. Donato Giancola (m), Bob Eggleton, Shaun Tan
8:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading:
8:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Melinda Snodgrass
8:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Fred Durbin
8:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading:
9:00 PM City Center A. The Fantasy Graphic Novel. Doselle Young, Charles Vess, Andrew Wheeler (m), Alisa Witney Sheckley, Matthew Smith, Mike Dringenberg
* Think of Watchman, Maus, or The Sandman. How does the graphic novel (i.e. what we used to call a comic book, only different) achieve a depth and complexity on the level of an adult prose novel?
9:00 PM City Center C. International Horror Guild Award presentations. Paul Guran (m)
9:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Tom Doyle
9:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Mary Turzillo
9:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Anne Brallier
9:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Jessica Day George
10:00 PM City Center A. The Ghosts in Shakespeare. Janine Young, Liz Gorinsky (m), David B. Coe, Sarah Hoyt, Charles Gannon
* What impact have they had on subsequent literature? We just begin with Fritz Leiber's "The Four Ghosts in Hamlet." There is a lot more. How did the Shakespearean conception of the ghost carry on down the centuries?
10:00 PM Broadway 1. Open Mic Poetry Reading. Carolyn Clink, moderator.
FRIDAY
10:00 AM - Noon WF Board Meeting. City Center B
10:00 AM City Center A. Gilbert and Sullivan in Fantasy. Ellen Asher, Dana Paxon, Joselle Van Der Hooft, Jane Yolen, Richard Bowes (m)
* Some of their work, like The Sorcerer, has overtly fantastic content, but isn't ALL of it in a sense the product of another universe? How much have G&S influenced subsequent fantasy in various media?
10:00 AM City Center C. Neglected Practitioners of the Ghost Story. Michelle Slung (m), Christopher Roden, Robert Knowlton, Danel Olson
* F.M. Mayor (author of The Rector’s Daughter) and others.
10:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Lois McMaster Bujold
10:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Jeanne C. Stein
10:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Carol Emshwiller
10:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Thomas Monteleone
11:00 AM City Center A. Scary Stuff Beyond New Jersey: Horror In Non-Contemporary and Exotic Settings. Michael Laimo, Nancy Kilpatrick (m), Graham Joyce, Jacqueline Kessler
* Creating horror any time, any place, on any planet. MR James insisted that a ghostly story must be set in the present or relatively recent past. Was he right?
11:00 AM City Center C. The Author As Legend. Gary K. Wolfe, (m) George Scithers, Ben Peek, Mark Finn
* Sometimes the author seems, as Lovecraft was said to be, "his own most fantastic creation." Our sense of who the author was completely colors our view of his work. Think of Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Franz Kafka, or Philip K. Dick. Can an author create his legend intentionally, an artificial persona, or is that just phony? Can the author's life be separated from the text? Should it be?
11:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Mathew Jarpe
11:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: George R.R. Martin reading (55 mins)
11:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Victoria McManus
11:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: George R.R. Martin continues
Noon City Center A: The Tradition of Horrible Ladies. Tina Jens (m), Lisa Tuttle, Cheysa Burke, Lisa Mannetti, Di Barron
* The influence of women horror writers from the 18th century Gothics to today’s terrors.
Noon City City C. Lovecraft and the Rejection of the Supernatural. S.T. Joshi, William Jones, Tim Powers, Scott Connors (m), F. Paul Wilson
* HPL, hard-headed materialist that he was, explicitly rejected the supernatural as a holdover from the obsolete universe of religion and ancient myth. He then created Cthulhu. A discussion of Lovecraft's ideas about a mechanistic-materialist universe and how he used this concept in horror fiction.
Noon - 1:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading. Michael Dirda (one hour)
Noon Broadway 2. Reading: Julie Czerneda
12:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Dirda continues
12:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Tamora Pierce
1:00 PM City Center A. Kim Newman GoH presentation. Joseph McCabe, interviewer
1:00 PM City Center C. A Retrospective of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy Series. Betty Ballantine, Jim Minz (m), Tom Doherty, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Jane Jewell
* What it was and why it was important.
1:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Graham Joyce
1:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Tony Richards
1:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Melissa Scott
1:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Greer Ilene Gilman
2:00 PM City Center A. How a Book Cover is Chosen. Irene Gallo (m), Jacob Weisman, Tom Kidd, Lou Anders, John Picacio
* Art directors and artists discuss what makes a cover work.
2:00 PM City Center C. M.R. James and His Successors. Christopher Roden, John Langan (m), Kelly Link, Ramsey Campbell, Barbara Roden
* The "James Gang," their work, their methods, and their influence.
2:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Nick DiChario
2:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Alan Dean Foster
2:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Darrell Schweitzer
2:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Jane Yolen
3:00 PM City Center A. Moebius Presentation
3:00 PM City Center C. The Varieties of Ghostly Experience. Esther Friesner, Jennifer Swabach, Maria Lima, Paul Cornell (m), Stacey Cochran, Jennifer Dunne
* Other forms of the returning dead: zombies, vampires, dancing skeletons, and more exotic varieties, literary and folkloristic.
3:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Jay Lake
3:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ellen Kushner
3:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: M. Rickert
3:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Peter Heck
4:00 PM City Center A. George Scithers GoH interview. Darrell Schweitzer, interviewer
4:00 PM City Center C. The Psychic Detective in Literature. Howard Andrew Jones (m), Robert Sawyer, Kim Newman, David Drake, Barbara Roden
* From Carnacki the Ghost-Finder to Kolchak the Night Stalker. Exploring the history of the supernatural sleuth story, and the strengths and weaknesses of this unique form.
4:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: David Duncan
4:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Broad Universe Group Reading (55 mins). Nancy Jane Moore, Ada Milenkovic Brown, Elaine Isaak, Rina Weisman, Morven Westfield, Kathryn Sullivan, J, Kathleen Cheney, Samantha Henderson, Heather Lindsley
4:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Scott Lynch
4:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Broad Universe reading continues
5:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Sarah Hoyt
5:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Hal Duncan
5:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Dennis Danvers
5:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Kim Paffenroth
6:00 - 8:00 PM DINNER BREAK
8:00 - 11:00 PM City Center A and C. Autograph Reception
11:00 PM Broadway 1: Reading: Lawrence Schoen
11:00 PM Broadway 2: Reading. Gary Wassner
11:30 PM Broadway 1: Reading: Douglas Cohen
11:30 PM Broadway 2: Reading: Christopher Barzak
Midnight Broadway 1. Ghost Story Slam. Jeanne Cavellos (mod). Open mike event. Come one, come all. Bring a FIVE MINUTE ghost story.
SATURDAY
1O:00 AM City Center A. The Best Fantasy Worlds. Colin Harvey, Kathleen Woodbury (m), Delia Sherman, Joel Champetier, Charlaine Harris
* Why they are successful. Which ones do we want to read about, or would we want to live in?
10:00 AM City Center C: Tolkien as a Horror Writer. Christopher Cervasco, Jeanne Cavelos (m), Douglas Anderson, Ysabeau Wilce. Nicholas Ozment
* There are scary bits, undoubtedly. Did Tolkien have any coherent horror aesthetic?
10:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Robert Buettner
10:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Michael Shea
10:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Sharon Shinn
10:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: John Grant
11:00 AM City Center A. Charles L. Grant Memorial Panel. Al Sarrantonio, Stephen Jones, Jo Fletcher (m), Craig Shaw Gardner, Kim Newman
11:00 AM City Center C. An Hour with Christopher and Barbara Roden.
11:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Mattie Brahen
11:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Laird Barron
11:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Anne Bishop
11:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Patrick O'Leary
Noon City Center A. Robert Aickman and the Aesthetics of Ambiguity. Jim Rockill (m), Peter Straub, Lisa Tuttle, Kathryn Kramer
* Here is a ghost-story writer who did NOT follow the rules. What rules? Do his stories make sense? Do they need to? After all, isn't the supernatural supposed to be, at the end, an incomprehensible mystery? How did Aickman address this and to what extent can his stories be models for others to follow?
Noon City Center C. Animal Fantasy. Laura Ann Gilman, Elaine Isaac, Judith Berman (m), Carol Emshwiller, Gordon Van Gelder
* From Aesop and Coyote stories through Animal Farm and Watership Down, this seems to be a universal form. What is the special appeal of having a story acted out by animals rather than people? And how anthropomorphic must they (or shouldn't they) be?
Noon Broadway 1. Reading: Paul Park
Noon Broadway 2. Reading: Scott Edelman
12:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Gene Wolfe (55 min)
12:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Jennifer.V. Jones
1:00 PM City Center A. There's an Archetype in My Soup. Elizabeth Bunce, Sarah Beth Durst, Tim Powers (m), Mark Ferrari, Margo Lanagan
* Much fantasy deliberately employs elements of fairy-tale and myth, often after much scholarly research. But there's still the old argument that if you have to learn an archetype, it isn't one, that these patterns are universal in human storytelling. What is the mythic "buzz" we all know when we see it, even when we have difficulty defining it?
1:00 PM City Center C. . The Victorian Era as a Setting. Barbara Roden, Nancy Kilpatrick, Tiffany Trent (m), Kim Newman, Tamara Siler Jones
* We still gravitate to it. Is this merely by association, because so many great ghost stories were written then, or is there something inherent about the Gaslight Era which is inherently spooky?
1:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Gene Wolfe continues
1:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Andy Duncan
1:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Guy Gavriel Kay (55min)
1:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ysabeau Wilce
2:00 PM City Center A. Ghosts and Revenants Down Under. Garth Nix, Jack Dann, Robin Hood, Kaaron Warren, Deborah Biancotti (m)
* [not listed]
2:00 PM City Center C. Surrealism Trapped in a Jar. Alan Clark, Heidi Lampetti, Stephen Segal (m), Paul E. Martens
* What IS Surrealism, really? It is a word we use very loosely, without any clear definition. CAN it be defined? It is not really practical to demand that any "surrealist" writer or artist have signed the Surrealist Manifesto in the early 20th century or even have been a pal of Max Ernst or Salvador Dali, but "surrealism" does seem to have stemmed from a specific movement (artistic and literary-we tend to remember the painters more than the novelists) which has had a broader impact on the general culture. Is "surrealism" the same as fantasy, a specific kind of fantasy, or something different altogether? Bring your dripping clocks and fur-covered spoons.
2:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Guy Gavriel Kay continues.
2:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ramsey Campbell (55 min)
2:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Jeffrey Ford
2:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Ramsey Campbell continues
3:00 PM City Center A. Lisa Tuttle GoH presentation
3:00 PM City Center C. The Pre-Christian Ghost. Gene Wolfe, David Drake, Diana Paxon, Noreen Doyle (m)
* Ghostly fiction and apparitions before the European Middle Ages. A starting point for this might be L. Collison-Morley's Greek and Roman Ghost Stories. How were the ghosts of the ancients different from the more familiar ones? For one thing, they certainly didn't wear trailing white shrouds, which are a product of the Industrial Revolution. For another, they were more readily attracted by blood sacrifices…
3:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Young Adult Writers group reading. Holly Black, Cassie Clare, Sarah Beth Durst, Tiffany Trent.
3:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Patricia McKillip
3:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: YA reading continues
3:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Carol Berg
4:00 PM City Center A. The Digital Divide. Jane Frank (M), Les Edwards, Jill Bauman, Bob Eggleton, Donato Giancola
* [not listed]
4:00 PM Survey of the Field, 2007. Paula Guran, Charles N. Brown, Jonathan Strahan (m), Ellen Datlow, Stephen Jones
* [ no description]
4:00 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Ellen Klages
4:00 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Christopher Golden
4:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: Catherynne Valente
4:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading: Laurel Winter
5:00 - 8:00 PM DINNER BREAK
7:00 PM Broadway 1 and 2. Setup for MR James Live
8:00 PM City Center A. Joseph Bruhac Presentation
8:00 PM City Center C: Other Than Arkham House. Stuart Schiff (m), Lloyd Currey, Mark Owings, W. Paul Ganley
9:00 - 11:00 PM City Center Gallery. Art reception.
9:00 PM City Center A. The New Weird. Tim Waggoner, Caro Soles, Ginjer Buchanan
* Is a movement? A publicity stunt? A marketing tool? A package-and-design issue? A sea change in the whole nature of fantasy? What DO we mean when we point at it?
9:00 PM City Center C. The Legacy of Shirley Jackson. Charlaine Harris, Kathryn Cramer, Alexandra Sokoloff, James Frenkel (m), Kelly Link
Charlaine Harris, Kathryn Cramer, Alexandra Sokoloff, James Frenkel (m), Kelly Link
* Did "The Lottery" and The Haunting of Hill House change our (or the public's) ideas about what constitutes a horror or ghost story?
8:00 - 9:30 PM Broadway 1 and 2. MR JAMES LIVE performance
10:00 PM City Center A. When Fantasy Becomes SF and SF Becomes Fantasy. George R.R. Martin, Joe Haldeman, L.E. Modesitt, Walter John Williams, Nancy Kress (m)
* We read a good book recently about persecuted children with special powers, who yearned to escape to Another Place where their unique abilities would be appreciated… But it wasn't Zenna Henderson's collected People stories or even Children of the Atom by Wilmar Shiras. It was about fairies and changelings. Do such motifs move between genres depending on which is more popular at the moment, or is something deeper going on here? The story about fairy-children probably could not have been published in the early '50s, admittedly, and would have to be "disguised" as science fiction. Today is it perhaps a more viable strategy to disguise science fiction as fantasy?
10:00 PM City Center C. Small Press and Independent Publishers. Ron Drummond, John O'Neill, Jeremy Lassen, Mary Robinette Kowel, Jetse de Vries (m), George Scithers
* [no description]
11:00 PM - 12:30 AM Broadway 1 and 2. M.R. JAMES LIVE performance.
SUNDAY
10:00 AM High Rock Room. WF Board Meeting. (2 hours)
10:00 AM City Center A. What Are the Taboos in Fantasy Today? Sharyn November (m). John Grant, Tom Doherty. Steven Erikson, Lucienne Diver
* They shift with the times. Is the writer ever really free to write about ANYTHING?
10:00 AM City Center C. The Ghostly Lore of New York State. Mason Winfield, Rick Wilbur, Patricia Bray, Betty Ballantine
* Is this area uniquely haunted?
10:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Lilith Saintcrow
10:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Melinda Thielbar
10:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: David Louis Edelman
10:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: David Anthony Durham
11:00 AM City Center A. Does a Ghost Story Have to Have Ghosts? Ramsey Campbell, James Maxey (m), Jane Yolen, Julianne Lee, Toni L.P. Kelner
* 'Ghost stories' as a misleading description: everyone knows, or thinks they know, what a ghost story is: it features a ghost, right? Wrong. Many of the best 'ghost' stories don't actually feature a ghost: demons, revenants, magic, various other-worldly phenomena, but no ghosts in the traditional white-sheeted-figure-drifting-down-the-hallway sense. Take a look at famous 'ghost' stories and see whether they could be prosecuted under 'truth in advertising' laws.
11:00 AM City Center C. Urban Fantasy. Sedia Ekaterina, Ernest Lilley (m), Marie Brennan, Melanie Fletcher, Jenna Black
* It seems as if most urban fantasy uses the familiar European myths. What other possibilities are there? Which authors have successfully exploited them? [listed as "Urban Fantasy-Beyond the Usual Suspects"]
11:00 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Bruce Coville
11:00 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Nancy Kress
11:30 AM Broadway 1. Reading: Wen Spencer
11:30 AM Broadway 2. Reading: Paul Witcover
Noon - 12:30 PM Broadway 1. Reading: John Crowley
Noon - 12:30 PM Broadway 2. Reading. Esther Friesner
1:00 PM Awards Banquet in Saratoga Ballroom
After Awards Banquet Broadway 1. Judges Panel