The Con And The Lonely Writer

Before I start explaining how cons have changed for me (and I for them) over the last several years, I’d like to tell you about what happened when my older son told a college friend about cons and going to cons and how attending these cons was a family affair. I don’t know how Robert said it. I first sold when he was three and he grew up in the business, so to him a lot of these things are “how life happens.” But after a while his friend asked, “So, these cons your family pulls – on whom do you pull them and have you ever been arrested?” Which of course is when Robert said “What? No.”

For those similarly unenlightened, by cons I mean conventions, specifically science fiction conventions. (I’ve also attended Romance, Mystery and Writers conventions which are very different. I had to explain to my son, after his G_d is a pantser post that sf cons are NOT writing cons as such, it’s just where our people gather.)

I am somewhat of an aberration for an American sf/f writer. Most of them seem to have come up through fandom and started attending cons either in diapers or as soon as they could get away from their parents, if they had the infelicity of being born to a non sf family.

Me, I didn’t know organized fandom existed. It didn’t in Portugal when I was growing up – though it might now, as a lot of other countries have fandoms in imitation of the US. (Though knowing Portugal, and I reallly DO say this with the deepest possible affection, as it’s one of the traits I can’t expunge from my character, I can confidently say it is at best a SEMI-organized fandom.) In a country that prizes its place in world lit’chature SF was a shameful habit, somewhat less objectionable than heroine, but more shameful than pot, and we addicts would gather in the grey light of morn outside bookstores on the days when a popular release from the single SF imprint – Argonauta – brought out a popular writer, so we could snag one of the books of the – limited, no reprints – print run. We rummaged hotel trash bins for books discarded by American tourists. Strung out and shaking with our dreadful need, we’d sometimes plunge into the backs of closets of our friends parents to find a pittiful half dozen Simaks or Heinleins hidden away beneath the porn. (You only think I’m joking.)

So the idea that I could gather with like addicts, in the bright light of day – or at least of hotel conference rooms – and discuss the intricacies of our shameful vice took a while to penetrate my admittedly thick skull. I started reading Locus sometime in the late eighties, to put faces to the names I read, but it took much longer than that for me to even look at the con listings. I THINK I attended a Mile Hi Con when all I’d sold were a couple of short stories. I THINK, but I’m not sure. The first major con I attended was World Fantasy after I sold my novel, and I went there to shop for an agent. (Got him, too, for my sins.)

For the next few years we attended both World Fantasy and World Con. World Con was daunting. No one had ever heard of me, I had no fans to meet and because the editors were busy with much bigger names – and fans – I got no business done. World Fantasy, OTOH, which is a business con in fannish trappings, allowed me to talk to editors and agents, and I almost always “did enough business” there to pay for my trip and more. So we attended WF for … seven years, I think, and World con sporadically.

I can’t mark when World Fantasy stopped paying off, but I’d say somewhere around 07? Part of this was because my career had taken a sharp turn away from the more literary fantasy and towards the more popular kinds. The other part was that WF had taken an even more so turn the other way (It was always a bit on the literary side.) I was mostly writing spec fic for Baen, which wasn’t even at WF.

So we stopped attending that too, except for last year, when we had business in Ohio at that time anyway. Of course we attended Denvention World con, though, because well… it’s in our backyard. At the time I was surprised at how different the con experience was for a mid list writer than for a raw newbie.

I still didn’t do business with editors/agents in the sense of getting work/assignments, but then to be honest, I was booked up to my hair roots, so that wasn’t even a consideration. OTOH I got to see old friends and people I’d lost touch with and go to dinner with other pros, and discuss what was going on. It was fun and interesting. Also, I met a LOT of fans. People who’d come from across the country or across the world, clutching my books to be signed. (Well, many of them probably packed them, but you know what I mean.) And I wondered if I needed to do more worldcons, just for the fans.

After this year’s world con, that question is still up in the air. I didn’t have the lines I had at Denvention, partly – I think – because I was a late addition to the program. Judging by the people approaching me in hallways and saying “I wish–” a lot of people didn’t know I’d been there. But I was accosted every ten paces in the hallway by fans, some of which were raving. (Mostly about Darkship Thieves.) Between that and running into old friends we hadn’t seen in a LONG time, it took us three tries to get through the art show (which I always love to look at even when I can’t afford it) and we never did make it through the huckster’s alley. (I always confuse this with hustler’s alley, which of course would make cons FAR MORE exciting.) On the sad side, some of the fans I know from my conference and wanted to see – like Chris French – I only got to drive by hug (to compensate, I’ll need to have him in A Few Good Men).

So… I still don’t know if Worldcon is worth the travel and the expense. I should point out that I don’t “like” cons. Oh, I love meeting fans. And I love talking to my colleagues. The problem is that instead of having an immune system, I have a velcro layer. Anything ANYONE brings to a con, I catch. (And if you saw me throwing up into a trash can at Reno airport at six am, no it wasn’t because I’d drunk too much. I had a glass of wine and a sip of Port ten hours earlier at the Baen party. It seems to be a stomach bug.) This means that a weekend con will in fact cost me three to four weeks. And you guys know I really like to write, and I’m impatient of ANYTHING that slows me down.

The other part of this is that I work seven days a week. I usually take my birthday and New Years off (and sometimes half of Christmas. Most of the time all of it.) We eat out at Thanksgiving, so I can come home to work afterwards (and work before.) I DESPERATELY need a vacation, most of the time, and don’t get it. Now, cons are like a vacation tease. The fans are in vacation mode, and I feel like I should be, only… of course, it’s work for me. I’m “on” all the time. (The exception to this was the Discworldcon before last, where I DID go as a fan and have a blast.)

Liberty con, in Chattanooga TN is my (adopted) home con because it’s more relaxing than the others. They bill themselves as the World’s largest family reunion – and they are. And frankly, I get to see most of my core fandom there. When I can afford it, I also do Constellation where I see the other half of my core fandom. I am booked for Fencon this year, and if I continue going to Dallas around that time of year, (for other reasons) I’ll continue doing it.

As for the big cons… I don’t know. All my peers tell me I need to do Comicon, but I’m afraid it will be like my early exposure to worldcon. I’ll just get lost. I keep meaning to do Dragoncon and will probably try next year.

I don’t want to be one of those writers no one ever sees, and frankly rubbing elbows with my colleagues and seeing my fans helps keep me human. With things moving in a more indie direction for all of us, knowing the fans are out there, eagerly waiting REALLY helps. And with things moving in a more indie direction for all of us the comparing of experiences with other pros ALSO helps. (I found for instance that nine out of ten pros are following The Business Rusch VERY closely indeed.)

As far as promotion and networking, though, which used to be the really important things in cons, I’m not sure how much it helps. My friend Kate Paulk has found these useful for getting word of mouth going on her books, but my friend Kate Paulk lives in the North East, which means there’s a largish con every weekend over summer, and half a dozen during the week. For me … I have two or three mediumish cons a year that I can make I to without braving the dreaded airline juggernaut (Our flights were fine and on time this time, btw.), without breaking the bank, and without taking way too long out of my schedule.

Most networking and promo I do online. So…

I don’t know. I’ll keep you posted as it goes. Meanwhile something I’ve decided to do is print the slightly bigger bookmarks – rack cards, actually – so I can sign them when people can’t fly with all their books (like us. We fly with only carry on, of course, if we can help it.) Also so I have something to sign for “ebooks.” And I think I’ll do chapbooks with some of my indie collections/novellas (no, not yet, but there WILL be some) which I can sell at cons for 99c, not so much as a money-making thing but as a “start the word of mouth rolling” move.

And then I’ll report back on these efforts….