I’ll be attending Readercon in a couple of weekends and this time I’m on a bit of programming. If you’d like to find/stalk me, here’s the deets:
Friday, 3PM — VT: Interfictions 2 Group Reading
Delia Sherman (host) with Amelia Beamer, K. Tempest Bradford, Matthew Cheney, F. Brett Cox, Michael DeLuca, Jeffrey Ford, Theodora Goss, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Shira Lipkin, Rachel Pollack, Catherynne M. Valente, Genevieve Valentine
Readings from Interfictions 2: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing, edited by host Sherman and Christopher Barzak and forthcoming in the fall from Small Beer Press under the auspices of the Interstitial Arts Foundation.
Friday, 5PM — Salon E: Off Color
K. Tempest Bradford, David Anthony Durham (L), Eileen Gunn, Anil Menon, Cecilia Tan
At various sf conventions, we’ve been to more than one panel during which the panelists try to figure out why there seem to be so few writers of color in the field. As an alternative, we have invited several panelists to discuss what an sf field more enticing to writers of color might look like.
Friday, 8PM — ME/ CT: Annual Interstitial Arts (IAF) Town Meeting
Ellen Kushner with discussion by Liz Gorinsky, Theodora Goss, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Shira Lipkin, Delia Sherman, John Shirley, Sarah Smith, Catherynne M. Valente
Note: I’m not officially on this but will be there talking about the auction and salons and such.
Interstitial Art falls in the interstices of recognized genres. The Interstitial Arts Foundation is a group of “Artists Without Borders” fighting the Balkanization of art. They celebrate work that crosses or straddles the borders between media, the borders between genres, the borders between “high art” and popular culture. They are not opposed to mainstream fiction or genre fiction, nor are they seeking to create a new category. They are just particularly excited by border-crossing fiction (and music and art), and want to support the creation of such works and to establish better ways of engaging with them. The IAF has had a presence at Readercon from its beginning. In 2007, in cooperation with Small Beer Press, the IAF published Interfictions: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing edited by Delia Sherman and Theodora Goss, and in fall 2009 they will present Interfictions 2, edited by Delia Sherman and Christopher Barzak. They are also doing a lot with visual arts. Interstitial Arts is an idea, a conversation, not a hard-and-fast definition-and it’s a conversation you are invited to join.
Saturday, Noon — VT: Federations Group Reading
John Joseph Adams (host) with K. Tempest Bradford, Robert J. Sawyer, Allen Steele, Catherynne M. Valente,
Genevieve Valentine
Sunday, 11AM, Maine/Connecticut: The Future of Magazines, Part 2 (Online) — (part 1 is at 10AM)
K. Tempest Bradford, Neil Clarke, Robert Killheffer, Mary Robinette Kowal (L), Matthew Kressel, Sean Wallace
Are print magazines doomed? (Heck, if newspapers can’t make it …) Or will they survive in their tiny niches? Are there ways to make them more viable? Is that even worth the bother? After all, online magazines are now easy and relatively inexpensive to start — are they the answer?