FOGcon 2013

[metaphortunate]

Got my FOGcon assignment!

I'll be on A Great Read with Lisa Eckstein, @sairaforreal, and two more awesome people whom I see now (oops, sorry guys) are listed as "anonymous" so I won't mention them unless they say to but seriously they are friends of mine and SWEEEET. I am especially looking forward to this because we will be talking about:

Slow River, by Nicola Griffith

which is an excellent lesbian cyberpunk book about street crime, corporate crime, and sewage. And it is also pretty interesting to contrast it with Solitaire, written by Ms. Griffith's partner Kelley Eskridge, which is also a lesbian cyberpunk book; but which is less about sewage and more about being an introvert and getting lost in your own head. So to speak. Together they are the best fiction that I know of ever written about project management. Solitaire isn't officially part of the panel, but I know that at least two of us loved it, so it may come up.

Incidentally, Slow River won the Nebula award in 1996, beating out Neal Stephenson's The Diamond Age; and apparently this so incensed John Scalzi's fundraising troll that 17 years later he needs to run for president of SFWA. Or something. Anyway, if you want to see what the fuss is about, pick up a copy of Slow River and come see our panel! Saturday March 9, 10:30 am.

A brief quote on the book by Ms. Griffith:

Not long after I sent the Slow River outline to my agent, she called:

"This is not a selling outline."

"Why not?"

"Well," she said, "in Ammonite Marghe had a girlfriend because she had no choice, poor thing. But why does Lore like girls?"

"Because she's a dyke, Fran," and I fired her.

Comments

[sara]

This is that one I keep meaning to read, isn't it. I am even more enthusiastic about reading it if it'll piss off some right-wing nutjob.

Also, I am about dying at that quote. Yes, that IS a good reason to want to schtupp girls.

[hunningham]

I now want to reread Sloe River, it's been far too long since I first read it. Also, a BIG selling point for me, the book is set in Hull. I remember reading it and suddenly realiseing that I knew the streets they were describing. Wonderful.

[wordweaverlynn]

May I share this on the official FOGcon site?

[metaphortunate]

Sure, why not?

[amaebi]

That is a totally beautiful response in a conversation of conventional and banal appallishness.

[kest]

I liked Solitaire. I will add Slow River to my list of books to read (two after Brides of Rollrock Island) although I am working through that list at an embarrassingly slow pace these days.

[snippy]

I love both of those books, and wish I were coming to FOGCon so I could go to the panel!

[dancingsinging]

That me being anonymous thing was just FogCon being awesome about opt-/in/ rather than opt-out and me being lazy about my bio. I'm not meaning to be anonymous!

Thanks to the link on the Scalzi site. Man, that dude is awesome!

[brainwane]

Someone recommended Slow River to me this year and it's so excellent! Do you know of any notes or writeups from the panel? I'd love to read people talking about it.

[metaphortunate]

Alas, no! It turned out, like, 2 people came to the panel, so we moved the chairs into a circle and did a roundtable discussion, and it was really fun but no one wrote it up.

It is wonderful and I'd also love to hear what you think of _Solitaire_.