As I mentioned in my last post, I attended Confluence in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, this last weekend.
For those who’ve not heard of Confluence, this is a small convention run by Parsec, a SF&F organization out of the Pittsburgh area. I’ve been going for years now, both before I became a writer and after, and have always enjoyed myself. I’ve made some great friends and gotten some great ideas from other writers. I highly recommend it to those interested in literary SF&F.
I should note for health reasons, I didn’t attend much of the convention’s functions this year. Hopefully next year I’ll be able to spend more time in the consuite with my good friends Lara and Nan!cy. BTW, Lara runs an excellent consuite. Kudos and more kudos!
My first and only panel on Friday was with Elektra Hammond and discussed the way fandom has spread out and possibly schismed. We discussed the role of the internet in increasing our connections to different fandoms and each other. Also well-noted, one of our attendees mentioned that a great deal of fandom seems to have become tied to specific shows or books, rather than genres. Not sure it’s a problem, but it’s definitely an aspect of modern fandoms.
Saturday morning I spent at the signing table with Brandon Ketchum and chatted with various convention goers, including some old friends whom I hadn’t been able to see earlier this year thanks to my own personal bout with Covid. I also got to pet one of those friends’ new puppy, so there was that.
My first Saturday panel with Geoffrey Landis, Stephen Fisher and Darrell Schweitzer, discussed Science Fiction and Fantasy Classics from 1972, which proved fascinating despite the fact that I was the baby on the panel at 58-59 years of age. The others had been heavily into the genres at the time and had some excellent insights into what it was like to be in on the early days of Ben Bova’s editorship of Analog and such.
Had a Kaffeklatch right after the 1972 panel where I and my co-host Charles Oberndorf had an excellent discussion on writing and writing processes with my good friend Nan!cy Janda. Got an idea from that on what to do with a short story idea and generally enjoyed shooting the bull.
My last Saturday panel was with Mary Soon Lee and Lesley Wheeler, where we discussed the influence of classic fantasy on modern works. We had a great audience for that and discussed everything from older mythology and folklore to Tolkien and CS Lewis. Great fun!
Sunday I attended Timons Esias’ talk on logistics in fantasy writing and why writers should take them into account. As always, Timons’ panel was funny and informative, with anecdotes ranging from Alexander the Great to General Philip Sheridan’s efforts in the Civil war. It certainly emphasized the old saying about how an army marches on its stomach… about two days out and two days back at best. Watch those supplies!
My final panel was a reading in the Solstice Room, which I did alongside Mary Soon Lee, who read from several of her short stories and had us all chuckling throughout. I read from the beginning of my upcoming book, The Bookhunters: Apprentice.
All in all, I had a great con and am looking forward to next year. With the strong hope that our current health crisis will have lessened, if not gone away entirely.
Thanks to Confluence staff and my good friends from Pittsburgh for helping to make the experience an excellent one!
