Monthly Archives: August 2010

Armadillocon, here I come

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This weekend, I will be participating — along with scads of other Texas speculative fiction writers — in the 32nd annual ArmadilloCon. If it’s like the others I’ve attended, it should be quite the party.

This are more than 100 participants at this year’s Armadillocon, including guests Rachel Caine, Cat Conrad, Anne Sowards, Elspeth Bloodgood, Nancy Kress, Ilona Andrews and Michael Bishop. San Antonio will be well represented with myself, Scott Cupp and Joe McKinney in attendance.

Of course, the difference between Armadillocon and so many other cons is that the focus is on books rather than movies, TV shows and toys. In other words, there are a ton of creative panels covering all kinds of speculative fiction and (generally) no people walking around in wookie costumes.

I will be participating in the panels New Weird: Has the Old Normal Taken Over (5 p.m. on Friday), Trials and Tribulations of the Short Story (noon on Saturday) and Is Lovecraft Hurting Horror (11 a.m. on Sunday). I’ll also be doing a reading at 8:30 p.m. on Friday and 4 p.m. on Saturday and a 1 p.m. autograph session Saturday.

The con runs Aug. 27–29 at the Renaissance Hotel Austin, 9721 Arboretum Blvd. A three day membership is $50. Individual daily passes are available for $25 (Friday and Sunday) and $35 (Saturday).

Drop on by. If you haven’t been before, it’s quite a show. Even if no one is walking around in a wookie costume.

Horny Toads and Ugly Chickens: A&M’s speculative fiction collection

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The first issue of Amazing Stories is just one of the items in Texas A&M's speculative fiction collection.

Ever heard of the 1975 novel “Doomsday Clock,” published in San Antonio with an actual fuse sticking out of its cover? What about “Overshoot,” a 1998 Ace paperback about an elderly Alamo City woman reflecting on how global warming brought down civilization? Or the Asimov’s story “One Night in Mulberry Court,” in which a blue-skinned alien anthropologist moves into a San Antonio trailer park?

Don’t feel bad. Until a couple days ago, I hadn’t either.

I discovered their existence virtually via the online site for Texas A&M’s Science Fiction and Fantasy Research Collection. Seems the Aggies have amassed a 54,000-piece collection of speculative fiction plus related history and criticism, much of it Texas-related. The collection houses the papers and manuscripts of Chad Oliver, Michael Moorcock and George R. R. Martin. What’s more, it contains over 90 percent of the American science fiction pulp magazines published prior to 1980, including the 1923 debut issue of Weird Tales.

Perhaps even cooler, it’s all searchable by author, title, imprint, and subject terms via an online database.

As an added perk, the A&M site also includes Bill Page’s 1991 essay “Horny Toads and Ugly Chickens: A Bibliography on Texas in Speculative Fiction,” which draws the “Ugly Chickens” part of its title from Austin writer Howard Waldrop’s wildly imaginative short story of the same name.

“The mystique of the old west has long been an alluring subject for authors; even Jules Verne and Bram Stoker used Texans in stories,” Page writes. “As one reads science fiction and fantasy novels set in Texas, certain themes repeat themselves. There are, of course, numerous works about ghosts, vampires, and werewolves. Authors often write about invasions of the state, not only by creatures from outer space, but also by foreigners, including the Russians, the Mexicans, and even the Israelis.” (There he goes with another Howard Waldrop reference. This time, Waldrop and Jake Saunders’ novel “The Texas Israeli War.”)

The essay gives an exhaustive listing of Texas sf/fantasy/horror authors, both known (Robert E. Howard and Joe R. Lansdale) and not-so-known (Leonard M. Sanders and Joan Johnston), and a list of stories and books by non-Texans set in the Lone Star State. Bummer it’s almost 20 years old, though.

And while you’re there, you might as well peruse other features, including extensive bibliographies of Robert Heinlein, Judith Merril and Sam Moskowitz.

All told, the A&M site is an impressive resource for those of us who just can’t get enough Lone Star lore in our speculative fiction.

Fanning the flames of religious intolerance and fear

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What a hatemongering dunce looks like.

I’m saddened and disturbed that the debate whether to build an Islamic community center two blocks from the former World Trade Center has gone on this long and with such ferocity.

Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise, though.

People are pissed off about the economy, they’re fearful about the direction our country is headed, and I’m sure for many New Yorkers, the 9/11 attacks have left a painful wound that may never fully heal.

And once again, the cynical leaders of the American Right have stepped up to capitalize on all of this uncertainty and anger, fanning the flames of intolerance for their own political gain.

First it was a few New York politicians declaring Ground Zero “sacred ground” (as if there weren’t plenty of Muslims who died in the 9/11 attacks). Then it was Sarah Palin, who called the idea of a mosque near Ground Zero, “a stab in the heart” to families who lost loved ones there. Then Newt Gingrich, in a characteristically bizarre application of ass-backward logic, declared that the democratic United States shouldn’t permit a mosque near the World Trade Center site, “so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia.”

I have no idea whether boneheads like Palin and Gingrich actually believe the shit they spew or whether it’s all just part of their effort to pander to the angry masses. Either way, their proclamations are in complete opposition to our nation’s core beliefs of tolerance and religious freedom, not  mention they play right into the hands of extremists who seek to paint the United States as the foremost threat to the Muslim world.

Give it a fucking rest.

Blogging again… theoretically

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Profuse apologies for those of you who actually follow this blog: I haven’t done jack shit with it all summer.

Seems that grad school, on top of working a full-time job with a lengthy commute, writing, playing music and attempting to have a normal life takes a lot out of a guy. So much that it didn’t leave much time for blogging.

I now have a new job with a much shorter commute and more flexible schedule. Theoretically, that means I now have more time for writing and blogging. And hopefully I can get back on track with regular updates.

See you tomorrow.