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~ Musings of a newly published writer

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Tag Archives: Ed Fortune

@mancunicon – a weekend in the life of Eastercon part 3: Sunday

06 Wednesday Apr 2016

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Adrian Tchaicovsky, Alan Garner, Ann Charnock, Annie Czajkowski, Communism, Deansgate Hilton, Doctor Who, EasterCon, Ed Fortune, Graphene, Jeff Noon, John Rylands Library, LM Myles, Madchester, Manchester, Manchester in Spec Fic, Mancunicon, Peadar Ó Guilínn, Peterloo massacre, Public engagement with science, R.A Smith, Ruth F Long, Starburst, Strange Horizons, The bookworm podcast, Tony Ballantyne


Sunday turned out to be the first (and only) full day I spent at the convention. I guess this is the disadvantage of living locally. While you get to save on hotel costs and travel costs, you miss out on some of the stuff that happens late into the night and early into the morning. Plus there is a tendency (for me anyway) to have to leave early to catch the last bus home and wander in lazily late the next day. Since it is unlikely Manchester will host for at least a couple of years, I suppose any future EasterCons I go to will be more full time.

As it happens, I made an effort on Sunday to get there early for a good reason which turned into an even better reason. I had promised R.A Smith that I would be present at the panel he was in with my camera so that I could take photos of him looking all knowledgeable and erudite. Since this panel was happening at 10am, and was therefore a so called ‘hangover panel’ this meant I needed to be in the building by not long after 9 in order (so I thought) to get a seat in what I suspected would be a packed room.

I was wrong on so many of the above assumptions…

This is where were staying... can you not see its similarity to a giant USB drive?

This is where were staying… can you not see its similarity to a giant USB drive?

When I wandered up to the Green room to see if I could track down Russ before the start of the panel, I was collared by  Starburst Columnist Ed Fortune, another of the panellists, and asked if I was doing anything just then. I said I was not and was therefore pressganged into service as a substitute panellist. Turns out Tony Ballantyne could not make it so I was a convenient Manchester based writer to contribute to the Manchester in Spec Fiction panel.

So, my assumption that I would not get a seat was unfounded as I had a reserved seat… right at the front. However, it also turns out that I didn’t need to worry even if I had not been in the panel as the venue was one of the larger rooms in the hotel rather than one of the smaller rooms such as used for the True Love and Trophies panel. There was still a large audience but the room was easily able to accommodate it with a few seats spare. I also did not manage to take any photos as I was somewhat busy being on the panel… Oh, and the audience were somewhat more awake than a ‘hangover’ panel might attract. They seemed to be a rather lively and interested group all told.

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The John Rylands library: for all your Cthuloid needs.

So… thrown into the deep end… and replacing a popular and well respected panellist in a HUGE auditorium with microphones instead of the more intimate setting of previous panels. The pressure was on. Luckily, I was able to call on a lot of knowledge I have about the city of Manchester. Myself, R.A Smith (the moderator), Anne Charnock and Ed Fortune discussed various things that made this city unusual and suitable as a setting for Spec fic. Anne was there with a lot of history references (first programmable computer, various other scientific advances including the recent graphene advances), I came in with the politics (Manchester has to take the blame for communism and even in the last election, when the map went decidedly blue, Manchester was one of the few areas still very red), Russ talked about the Madchester music scene and Ed rolled in some classics like Jeff Noon and Alan Garner while riffing off some Doctor Who audio set in the city and centring on the Peterloo massacre (with the comment made that he worked in an office on the corner of two of the streets mentioned in that audio and how that scared him). In all an excellent discussion and was supplemented by the comments from the audience about how strange some of the architecture in Manchester is… including the building we were in which does (as Russ pointed out) look like a giant USB stick. Speculations about what it might be downloading may be left in the comments below… Then there is the perfectly apt venue for an occult conspiracy novel that is the John Rylands library.

By the way, if the organisers of next years Eastercon in Birmingham are reading this, I would like to point out that I also lived in Birmingham for a long while and know an equal amount of weird stuff about that city should they wish a panellist for a similar topic… 🙂

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Apparently it is Starburst tradition to take a selfie with the Stormtrooper… who am I to go against such tradition?

Once that panel was over, Ed invited me over to the Starburst offices to do a spot on the Bookworm – FAB radio’s regular Sunday book related show. We spent an hour talking book news (JK Rowling’s publication of her rejection letters being a major item of interest) and discussing the convention. As all three on the show (me, Ed and Ann the producer) were Eastercon newbies this mainly revolved around the atmosphere of the event as well as a discussion about some of the panels we had each attended. My first time on radio… The Podcast version will be published soon and I will post a link to that once it is up.

The Public Engagement in Science Panel

The Public Engagement in Science Panel

I got back to the venue and had a spot of lunch before wandering into the Public Engagement in science panel. Here a number of the conference delegates who were also scientists were discussing the issues of getting the public interested in all things science related. This, like the biology one on Friday, was an issue close to my heart and something I see both writers and teachers being involved in. The discussion was initially focussed on semantics – the differences between Understanding and Engagement, for example – and there were some good thoughts on how it should be about the public doing science – using the innate curiosity that humanity possesses to explore the universe – rather than just reading about it. Not sure they managed to solve the problem, at least not by supplying any practical solutions, but there were ideas aplenty.

IMG_8268

A storm hits Manchester, as seen from the 22nd floor

My final official engagement of the day was a visit to the Strange Horizons Tea party which was taking place in the Presidential Suite, 22 floors in the sky. There I hobnobbed with the editors of Strange Horizons and chatted with Ruth F Long again, mainly discussing Irish history and some strange anomalies in the Irish census data. A fun hour of chat and drinks and a chance to see the city from the great heights of the 22nd Floor. While a major storm was blowing in…

Then I ended the evening with a bit of relaxation in the form of a game of D&D refereed by Adrian Tchaikovsky. In this I joined R.A Smith, Ed Fortune, LM Myles, Peadar Ó Guilínn and Annie Czajkowski as a disparate group of monsters (I was a hobgoblin sergeant major) forced together out of mutual desire to escape a curse. It turned out exactly as you would expect a game run and played by a bunch of creative lunatics to go. Luckily the day was saved (thanks to cunning subterfuge, careful following of the letter of the rules, beheading a forger and the catchphrase ‘Greetings fellow humans!’) in time for me to head home…

In our final instalment shudder as the unexpected happens and Sunday is inexplicably followed by… MONDAY!

World Book Night

19 Sunday Apr 2015

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Publicity

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Bookworm podcast, Dalek, Ed Fortune, Fab Cafe, Frances Hardinge, Manchester events, Miriam Khan, Ninfa Hayes, Portland Street, R.A Smith, Skaro Evening News, Starburst, TARDIS, Tony Ballantyne, World Book Night


This Thursday (23rd April) sees the annual World Book Night event explode across the world again. In venues the world over you can pop in to meet with authors, chat about reading or writing, listen to readings and, of course, pick up free copies of one or more of this year’s World Book Night special editions. The aim is to promote reading across the globe so, if you are someone who doesn’t normally go in for that reading lark, why not find an event local to you and give one of the free books a try. There is quite a range of genres to choose from so there is something for every taste and if you are already a reader why not

The Literary Critic from the Skaro Evening News

The Literary Critic from the Skaro Evening News

wander out of our comfort zone and read something new?

As last year, there is an event on at the Fab Café in Manchester which I will be attending along with R.A Smith, Ninfa Hayes and Miriam Khan. This has been organised by the team at Starburst magazine as represented by the wonderful Mr Ed Fortune (who is their Sequential Arts editor). Also, as last year where Frances Hardinge agreed to grace us with her presence, we have a special guest in the form of SF and Fantasy author Tony Ballantyne.

Unlike last year, where we were fashionably late, this event will actually be on the right night (assuming they work out how to set the controls of the TARDIS correctly, that thing is notoriously hard to navigate due to the vagaries of 4 dimensional space) and there is talk of panels and discussions and readings. Obviously the resident critic from the Skaro Evening News (News to Exterminate to) will be in attendance as he was last year to exterminate any who fail his strict critical standards, so authors and attendees had better be on their best behaviour!

So if you happen to find yourself in Manchester City Centre on the night of Thursday 23rd April, 2015 and you fancy some free books why not pop along to 109 Portland Street and head down into the basement. We’ll be there so feel free to say hello!

Exit pursued by a Dalek… A tale of a fashionably late World Book Night

27 Sunday Apr 2014

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

After the Funeral, Agatha Christie, Anna Percy, Ben Aaronovitch, books, Dalek, Dermot Glennon, Doctor Who, Ed Fortune, Fab Cafe, Flapjack Press, Frances Hardinge, free books, Jackie O'Hagan, Manchester, Manchester Museum, Ninfa Hayes, Poetry, R.A Smith, Rivers of London, Sarah Grace Logan, Starburst Magazine, TARDIS, Tony Curry, Transitions, World Book, World Book Night, Zach Roddis


Myself and Ed Fortune sat in front of a TARDIS. Picture taken by Frances Hardinge

Myself and Ed Fortune sat in front of a TARDIS. Picture taken by Frances Hardinge

World Book Night happens annually on the same day as Shakespeare’s Death, the 23rd April. On this day, volunteers give out free books in order to encourage reading in those who do not read much. Being a World Book Night giver I was of course giving out books on that night…

Except I wasn’t. Because I was giving them away on the 24th April. A day late… Damned temporal distortions again.

That was the base concept behind the Fashionably Late World Book Night party at the Fab Café in the city centre of Manchester. To be fashionably late in giving away our books. So, I turned up at a Geek themed basement bar with a bag full of books and author Frances Hardinge in tow for a night of poetry, prose and free books.

And there were a lot of free books:

freebooks6

Not only were there the 18 copies of Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London and the 36 copies of Agatha Christie’s After the Funeral provided to our givers by the World Book Night charity but also a large collection of ex review copies of books that had been sent to the Starburst offices and which were now no longer needed. This meant that any SF or fantasy fan could walk out with quite a haul if they so chose and the murder mystery fans were not ignored either. The books proved very popular with the crowd in the venue. Some of them had come here just for the books, some of them had been drawn by the promise of readings by local writers and poets and the chance to hob nob with them. Many more had come because it was a Thursday night and they always went to Fab on a Thursday.

The readings and guest writers were also popular. Everywhere you went there were conversations between writers, poets and their fans in topics ranging from their latest books to why it is not possible to do a decent film version of Lovecraftian horror. The bar was doing a roaring trade and the atmosphere was friendly and open. The SF theme decorations added to the unique nature of the venue and had at least one contributor (who shall remain nameless) running around gleefully with a camera taking shots of Daleks, Cybermen and TARDIS’s left right and centre. I was also taking photos, of course, but in my case it was, um, for professional reasons.

 

hobnobbing7interview2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even the presence of some of TVs most intimidating and scary villains did little to dampen the mood.

 

There was only one critic present at the event but he was notoriously brutal...

There was only one critic present at the event but he was notoriously brutal…

Though they did seem to lurk menacingly off stage whenever a writer was up doing their reading…

reading6

reading3However, the presence of the resident critic from the Skaro evening Chronicle (tagline ‘News to exterminate to’) did little to deter the performers. We opened with R.A Smith who read an extract from his debut novel, Oblivion Storm. It went down well, he got applause and was not exterminated.

This was followed by, um, me… reading an extract from Transitions. This was my first ever public reading and I was petrified. Yeah, I know, I’m a teacher as well as a writer and yes speaking in public (sometimes in front of very hostile audiences) is part of the job. It’s practically all the job (well, apart from the planning, marking, admin and occasional public appearances for publicity) so I shouldn’t have been so scared. Shouldn’t but I was. You see, there is a difference between standing there and talking freely about a topic you know a lot about and reading something out loud. With the former there is room for improvisation and the chance to have discussions and take questions from the audience – to get them involved and active in the process. Reading aloud is more static and you have to stick to the script. It is not the time to start subconsciously editing your own work and reading out this new edited version instead of the published one (which I may have done a little bit). Also, the lack of light made reading difficult (thankfully the representative of Flapjack Press was able to supply a reading light to those who came after me to solve this problem). Despite all these issues I managed to struggle through the section where Gaius Lucius meets the mad old man in the cave and got my own round of applause and absence of extermination.

The poets and writers of Flapjack Press then took the stage in turns and wowed the audience with their poetry and prose. They included Tony Curry who read out poems relating to what it was like to be a man and Sarah Grace Logan whose poetry contrasted nicely with its more feminist vibe and her works based on the objects she sees daily in her work at the Manchester Museum.

reading10 reading11This was followed by Frances Hardinge who read out a chilling extract from her latest and as yet unreleased novel, Cuckoo Song. It was unfortunate that due to a postal service snafu there were no copies of this book available for sale or signing. If the expected parcel from her publisher had actually arrived that night would have been the first time and place that book would have been on sale in the reading15world – a true exclusive.

There was then a short break before the second half of the evening, this compered by another local poet, Anna Percy who also performed her own poetry. She was joined by Dermot Glennon, Zach reading25Roddis and the wonderfully anarchic comedy poetry of Jackie O’Hagan making this night a truly North Western literary occasion. All performers were well received by the audience and did sterling sets that ended in applause. More importantly, none of them were exterminated by the resident critic, for which I am sure they were all grateful.

Unfortunately we had to leave before the end, though I hear that the evening ended with dancing to nineties classics which I am sorry we missed. On the free book table as we left there were no more copies of Rivers of London and only a handful of copies of After the Funeral. The Starburst review copies were also much reduced, presumably meaning that there is now much more room in their offices for future ARCs. I grabbed a handful of the Agatha Christies as we said our final goodbyes to Anna Percy and the other contributors. Those copies were offered to students at my college the next morning and one was gifted to the college library.

Shown here are only a handful of the photographs I took that evening. I’d try to cram more in but I fear this blog post would be an endless sea of photography. If you want to seem more of them, you can go and look at my Flickr account. If any of the poets or writers who were there wish to  make use of any of these for their own web pages or blogs you may feel free. Contact me and I can send you the original copies. I’d appreciate an acknowledgement in return.

With such a successful night I am not sure how we can beat it next year but I am sure we will have a damn good try. There may have to be ballet dancing elephants.

 

 

A tale of World Book Night

26 Friday Apr 2013

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Bites, books, D.A Lascelles, Ed Fortune, Joy Phillips, Judge Dredd, literature, Ninfa Hayes, Oblivion Storm, R.A Smith, World Book Night, World Book Night event


So, this Tuesday gone was World Book Night and yours truly was there in Costa Coffee Prestwich for a night of books.

The lucky recipients show off their acquisitions

The lucky recipients show off their acquisitions

It was actually quite a while ago, on one of our regular writers’ group meetings that R.A Smith suggested that we do something for World Book Night. The plan: All five of us apply to be Givers on the WBN webpage and we organise an event together in a local library in order to give them away. At the same time we would do readings and give aways and other things to keep the punters amused. We support the cause of spreading the love of reading, get some local community kudos and maybe a bit pf publicity for our own projects as an added bonus side effect.

So, with alacrity we set this plan in motion by us all logging into the WBN website and submitting our applications. We each applied for different books as our first choices and enough variation in second and third choices in order to hopefully avoid any overlaps and began to discuss the event itself.

Our initial plan of using libraries fell a little flat. We got no response from any of the libraries in Stockport, where a good number of our members lived, so at a quite late stage we had to expand our search to other areas. Being selfish and lazy and not wanting to travel more than a short distance, I offered to check out the possible venues in Prestwich, all of which are only a short walk from my house. Prestwich library were very helpful when I visited them and told me that they were closed on Tuesday afternoon (insert rant about local council budget cuts and their impact on local services here…) which was why they could not host (unless they could find a member of staff willing to work overtime for no pay) but suggested that I talked to the Coffee shop just over the plaza from them as they sometimes hosted events for them. I did just that and very soon we had a venue set. All that remained then was publicity…

The books laid out ready

The books laid out ready

Another problem was when we got the notification of what books we had got. We found that only three of us had been appointed givers (myself, Joy Phillips and Ed Fortune) which was more than 50% which was good. However, despite our careful planning, we got two batches of the same book. This meant we had 40 copies of John Wagner’s The Dark Judges and only 20 of Malorie Blackman’s Noughts and Crosses. Nevertheless, this gave us the challenge of having 60 books in total to give away to anyone who wanted them…

On the day itself, we got to the coffee shop by 530pm to be ready for a 6pm start. We laid our books out on one table and on another we put all our publicity stuff – bookmarks and leaflets and so on. Ninfa Hayes had thought to provide a double sided A4 sheet with extracts from two of her stories on it which I thought was a nice touch and we’d also each thought to bring along copies of all our in print books for guests to browse through. Since Transitions is not (yet) in print, I had a copy of Pirates and Swashbucklers for this.

I had been concerned that we had not done enough publicity, that no one would bother to show up. However, these concerns were soon dispelled as people began to filter in. Some people we already knew, friends of ours who lived locally, but there were also a good few who were not known to us who had been drawn here by the leaflets and posters. There were discussions, with each of us drawn off into small groups to talk about the books or our books or publishing in general and while there was an initial mistrust of the ‘free books’ (a number of people asked how much they cost…) they were soon snapped up by all there. The ‘demo’ books were also much read, being passed around from person to person. It is to be noticed that Oblivion Storm is not shown in the photograph of the ‘swag table’ This was because it was at the time being ardently read by someone. Ninfa was even nice enough to let one of the guests take one of her paperback copies of Bites away with them – signing it for her too.

We ended the event with two readings, both done by R.A Smith. One was from Oblivion Storm the other from Bites. I had intended to do a reading from Transitions but realised that the only copy of it I had on my Kindle was actually a pre-edit copy and so not the best for a reading.

By 8pm, the official end of the event, the pile of 60 books had been reduced to a much smaller pile. We had only a couple of copies of

The swag

The swag

Noughts and Crosses and about 15 of The Dark Judges. Several of these were snapped up by the event guests as they left. One copy of each was taken to be put into the library of a local school (which I personally consider a win) and several of the rest were grabbed by some friends of ours to give out to random people they saw on their way home (at least one copy was given to the staff of the chip shop we all stopped at for dinner). At the end, we were left with 8 copies of the Dark Judges and none at all of Noughts and Crosses.

I hope that all those out there who took books will enjoy them… I do feel proud of what we achieved on that day and I think a number of the event guests enjoyed the event a great deal. Next year we plan to do the same again and this time make it bigger and better!

As for the 8 books we have left… well, they are there to be given away and we *could* just give them away to people we meet in the street or leave them in a pub or on a train or something like that. However, we have discussed it and decided to run a competition to decide who gets the books. Therefore, myself, R.A Smith and Ninfa Hayes will be taking at least two of the books each and will be announcing how you can win them very soon…

A few things here and there

05 Friday Apr 2013

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

23rd April, blogging, books, Ed Fortune, Interviews, Joy Phillips, Michael Brookes, Ninfa Hayes, R.A Smith, Starburst Magazine, Transitions, World Book Night, writing


Well, Vampire Month is finally over and I have just got back from a brief holiday during which I had my birthday. It’s been a rather successful month with some great vampire writers contributing some really good articles on a range of subjects. In this first week of april, however, there have been a few things cropping up here and there which need to be shared.bookmarks

First of all, I was interviewed by Michael Brookes over at The Cult of Me blog. The interview went live yesterday and in it you can find out all sorts of things about me. Go over there and check it out. I talk about the first book I ever wrote which, thankfully, no longer exists save as a bad memory and a few other things.

Secondly, I have signed up for Authorgraph. This is a system which allows signatures to be added to ebooks. You can find Transitions on there by following this link: http://www.authorgraph.com/authors/areteus. Basically, you can click the ‘request authorgraph’ button and I will get a notification telling me you are wanting a signature. I can then choose to do this freehand (using a touchscreen or mousepad but be warned my ‘handwriting’ is terrible using a mouse…) or using a font. I can also add an inscription. You basically get a pdf of this with a picture of the book cover sent to you. This app seems to be a good way to fill a niche caused by the ebook revolution. I have heard many say that one thing you cannot do with an ebook is sign it. Now, I will not say that this is going to replace ‘signed copies’ in any way (I am not convinced, for example, that you will be able to sell the signed ebook copies for a greater value) but it is a step in that direction. It will be interesting to see how it works out over the next few years.

Scan this using your mobile phone and an appreopriate tagging app...

Scan this using your mobile phone and an appreopriate tagging app…

Finally, preparations for World Book Night are progressing. Myself, Ninfa Hayes (author of Bites), R.A Smith (author of Oblivion Storm), Ed Fortune (columnist for Starburst magazine) and Joy Phillips (upcoming debut novelist and organiser of innovative new LRP Fall of Vusoria) are getting together to give away free books to anyone in the Manchester area who wants to come and get them. We will be announcing a venue sometime soon (hopefully). It should be a good night and we have around 60 books between us to giveaway. As part of this I have decided to have some bookmarks made up and I have also sorted out a couple of QR tags so that people with mobile phones can scan them and quickly and easily buy a copy of my books in any ebook format. I am rather proud of the bookmarks, which I designed myself using elements of the cover for Transitions.

So, if you fancy meeting any one of us, getting any of our work signed or just want a free book, feel free to pop along on the 23rd of April and all of this will be possible…

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