I was up at 8:30 AM, headed down to the hotel lobby to do a little bit of writing (promised mabfan that I’d do this) and eat breakfast. Eric came down a little later, ate and then hit the road for home. My first session wasn’t until 11 AM, so I spent some time wandering about the convention, and in particular, in the huckster room looking through books and magazines. Eventually, I picked up 3 things: (1) a copy of the July 1995 issue of ANALOG containing mabfan‘s first published story; (2) The John W. Campbell Letters, Volume 1, and (3) Charles Stross’ book, Iron Sunrise.
At 11 AM, I attended one of the most fascinating panels of the conference, “Will 2008 Be the Year When eBooks Make It?”. The panel was made up of Darlene Marshall, Ellen Asher, Don D’Ammassa, and Charles Stross. I have been torn on the eBooks issue and I spoke up in this discussion. There are pros and cons to eBooks, I said, but the one con that no one has mentioned is that you can’t take an eBook to get signed by your favorite author at a convention like Boskone. Since many publisher and authors are giving away free copies of their books, under creative commons copyright, I asked if publishers would considering giving away an eBook copy with the purchase of a physical book. Charles Stross answered that this is the very thing some publishers are considering, which I think is a great idea.
At 1 PM, I attended “Don’t Stand So Close to Me: Problems with Writing Near-Future SF”, which was another fascinating panel with Alexander Jablokov, James Patrick Kelly, and Charles Stross.
That was my last panel. Around 2 PM, I found mabfan, gnomi and others in the Con Suite and we sat around a small table and gabbed for the next 90 minutes. Michael graciously signed the July 1995 issue of ANALOG I presented to him. I ducked out for a few minutes to get Charles Stross to sign Iron Sunrise. Cecilia Tan came by the table showing off the copy of Bombers 2008 Broadside: An Annual Guide to New York Yankees Baseball and when she heard I was a Yankee fan, she gave me a copy! Oh, and mabfan, fiendish devil that he is, finally got me an introduction with David Hartwell.
At about 3:30 PM, I said goodbye to everyone and left the conference after having a wonderful time. It really was a great science fiction convention.
I caught a taxi to Logan. I couldn’t get an earlier flight so I was stuck on the 7 PM flight to Dulles, but I got through checkin and security pretty quickly and spent a few hours in the Red Carpet Club before hopping on the plane. I was back at Dulles just before 9 PM and back home just after 10 PM. By the time I got home, my voice was going, having held out most of the weekend through cold, coughing, and sneezing. Kelly was home and it was very good to see her. However, not wanting to get her sick, I spent the night in the guest room while she slept in my room.
RSS - Posts