Monday, June 19, 2006

Ze's Convention Ramble Part 1

Survived children and Texas. Home until vacation in July--flying in a plane with Cal. Eep. Enough of my blabbing. Here's Ze....
I promised my mates Tamara & Elisa a ramble about the convention I recently attended. I think it's going to be a series of rambles!! This is the first. It covers the first two days.

The Second Annual GCLS Convention

Man I had a great time. I went to the GCLS Convention in Atlanta a couple of weekends ago. GCLS is The Golden Crown Literary Society. Check out their site if you want to know more. Folks who were expecting Bardcon or another fanfiction type of con were probably a touch disappointed. And I have to admit I was slightly upset/annoyed by a few of the participants attitude towards fanfiction, particularly the Xenaverse, and internet writing generally. IMHO anything that gets people reading lesbian fiction and draws them into to buying books is "A Good Thing". But mostly I ignored those people. I hate intellectual snobbery - even though I'm guilty of it myself on occasion - well - far too many occasions really. Instead of letting them get to me I hung out with my friends, (I'm lucky enough to be able to call some really high-flying authors 'friend') and they were all very respectful. Damn I know some good people!!

Anyway - the con. Thursday was authors' day. And since I consider myself just that, naturally I attended. There were workshops presented by several well known authors and editors on various aspects of writing. POV, plot structure etc. I learned such a lot. I wanted to remove all my fics from the 'net immediately and rewrite them. I doubt that would make me popular with webmistresses though. So I'll content myself with rewriting everything on my laptop that isn't yet published.

In the evening a mate drove us to a nearby bookstore where some of the authors were doing a signing. Including one mate who is a very new author - on a chatgroup we're in she's affectionately known as "Tigger". Boy was she living up to her name. She bounced all weekend. Even when sitting she was never still. But that evening she wasn't just bouncing - she was going for the world championship of bouncing. It was fantastic to witness her joy.

Friday was the start of the con proper. There were two "tracks" to choose from. Of course I picked the one more suited to authors each time. I did feel the con was slightly more geared towards writers - but there was plenty of interest to readers too. And there were a couple of publishers and a couple of bookstores/distributors with tables of books to buy. I'd allowed myself $200 for books. Needless to say I spent the lot. There were opportunities to have the books signed at the con. And not one author declined - even when they weren't officially signing. Lesbian writers ROCK.

I went to the panel "From internet fiction to published novel" I'm far too polite to say more. Meanwhile some of my friends were having fun over in the "True Lust" panel on erotic fiction. There was an impromptu handcuffing demonstration that I would pay good money to see re-enacted!!

In the evening there was the awards banquet. There were a number of fine tuxes on display. Including on a mate who looked very dashing. And an impressive array of party frocks - to which I'm afraid I lack the vocabulary to do justice. The meal - well I'm vegan and I was a bit miffed that there was little I could eat. In spite of the con organisers having warned the hotel. Ah well - nothing I'm not used to. At the banquet the dj (who obviously hadn't cottoned on to the fact that this was a serious literary awards dinner not a bar mitzvah) decided to get the diners to "sing for their supper" and went round the tables with his mike. You sang - you got to stand in line for food service.

Big, big mistake.

I wasn't the only Brit at the con. There were four of us - we all knew each other from a yahoo group. Well, Brits are evil. They have a wicked sense of humour. The height of fun is to drop a mate in it. So you can imagine what we do to someone who isn't a mate. We got him to come to our table and we promptly treated him to the chorus of a good old traditional Rugby song. "The Good Ship Venus." Funnily enough after that he stopped trying to get people to sing.

After dinner the "Goldies" were presented. These are awards for best new author, best fantasy, best romance - that sort of thing. Several former fanfic writers won awards for their books.

And the the dance. Oh boy. Probably the less said about certain aspects of that the better. It was a great dance, good music and more than enough cute femmes in leather skirts to warm the cockles of my heart (Hah!! you wondered what I was going to say there didn't you??). Unfortunately there was a woman there who decided to drink like a man without the ability to handle it like a gentleman. She made a bit of a nuisance of herself to several people. Including one very important writer. Not smart. She also had two attempts at removing my shirt. Not a bloody chance mate!! My friends rallied round. And eventually the GCLS Executive Director personally told her to go forth and multiply.

I even tried to learn to dance to "Cotton Eyed Joe". Well - it was fun. I could get the forward steps but kept fluffing the backward.

The remainder of the evening is not for public consumption. All that needs to be said is that a friend explained that my English body language which said "come and get me" was looking to an American like "go away". As soon as I adapted my body language. Well. *g*

And so Friday ended and the convention was half way through.

More tomorrow.

Ze


Hey, thank Ze for sharing her time at the GCLS Con. Enjoy the updates!

Tamara

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1 comment:

E said...

Waiting expectantly for part 2!!

7:30 PM

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