Over the course of the pandemic—I did not need this latest IPCC report at all to confirm it—I’ve pretty much committed to never flying anywhere again unless it’s to see my family. So I’ll probably never be at a WriteFest in person again, I’ll probably never go to ICFA, though I was literally just about to go when the first wave hit. I’m sad about that, but it’s time.
But! I have every hope of taking the train to Chicago WorldCon this fall, unless the whatever number of COVID wave this one will be says otherwise. And I am doing the following, virtually:
WriteFest, Houston, TX April 30 – May 1, 2022
I loved going to this cozy, intimate con in Houston, particularly in 2018 when it was at that echoey warehouse art space covered in tejanapunk murals. I loved sweating my balls off bombing up and down the concrete bayou and past the oil barons’ manses afterward questing for tex-mex-vietnamese crawfish boil on a rented bike. There are absolutely wonderful people in that city who in no way deserve to sink into neglected obscurity just because their vast state is controlled by reactionary fascist transphobes living in a manufactured reality. I gather the organizers have struggled resurrecting WriteFest after two years, and I’m afraid folks not wanting to travel to contribute to that regime is part of the reason why. So I was very happy to be invited to do this remotely. And they have put me on a lot of panels! With people I <3 and admire including Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam, Sim Kern, and Maria Haskins.
CliFiCon – October 1, 2022
This conference is new, the first of its kind. It’s organized by Android Press, the publishers of Solarpunk Magazine, with whom I have an essay forthcoming in their May issue titled “Solarpunk is a Hothouse Tomato”. Schedule and details are forthcoming, though they have a fundraiser going and are accepting nominations for the (also first-ever) Utopia Awards, for which I have already submitted my picks. Those include, not remotely surprisingly, lots of material from Reckoning and Stelliform Press. Nominations aren’t open to the public, but voting will be, and that starts in July. I’ll be sure to make you aware when that happens.
More to come, hopefully. And I hope to see you at some of them.