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Want updates about the latest E.E. Knight releases? I send out broadcast emails through the social networking forum Knightreaders. I hate spam as much as the next guy, so I don't plan on doing much broadcast emailing.

There is also an E.E. Knight fan site on Facebook.

I received my WindyCon schedule. It's just Saturday stuff (I'm looking forward to wearing my Steampunk costume, it's inspired, even if I do say so myself). Sunday I'm doing the traditional Windycon Writers Workshop, but that's a private thing.

( Cut, for obvious reasons )

I'll be at Windycon (yes, in costume, at least on Saturday) in Lombard IL Nov 13-15 in all my Steampunk glory. Actually, my costume might be characterized as a Steampunk/Dieselpunk straddle, but that's carbonized bamboo filament-splitting. I think Sunday I'm doing Richard's traditional Windycon Writer's Workshop.

Speaking of Writing Workshops, in November I'll also be lecturing at our venerable Off Campus Writer's Workshop (Nov 5, 12, and 19). My contract says they can video record me, so it's possible that the lecture portions will be available at some point.

It looks like I'm not up on their website yet. The course will be a mixture of my "Writing the Genre Novel" presentation and critique sessions.

Sheesh, this blog is little but sad ruin of the fun timesink it once was. But I can post a few things.

Windycon is on my mind. I've been seriously cutting back on con stuff because of the baby, but this year's theme in Lombard IL is Steampunk. I desperately want to go and dress up. First off, I just plain like the look. Secondly, I can come up with a pretty neat costume on the cheap, because my sartorial taste means I have a lot of World War odds and ends, British Empire safari stuff, Old West bits, Belle Époque pieces, and even a item or two that wouldn't be out of place in the Regency. I'd have to buy a hat, and maybe some goggles, because the Hank Hill plastic safety gear would just look silly, but that just adds interest to the project.

The only drawback is that I was told very early in my writing career that it's just not kosher for authors to go to cons dressed as Chewbacca or whatever. People take you're insights into the Hero's Journey a little less seriously when the spirit gum gives out while you're on panel duty. And then Word Gets Around.

A corridor on the fifth floor at Penguin Group:
Kat (Ginjer's asst): Hey Ginjer, did you hear Knight went to a con wearing goggles?
Ginjer: Beer, safety, or those things that look like tuna cans with orange lenses?
Kat: The latter. See, here's a picture on LOLauthors.com.
Ginjer: Hmmmm. Well, I won't be offering on any more books from him.
Kat: I'll call his agent.

I suppose I could just go to the con as a civilian, but that strikes me as milquetoast. I mean, I was a fan before I was an author, right? And I'll be one long after my middling career finally peters out into tears, second-guessing, and regret, so shouldn't I just nail my late-Victorian cravat to the mast?

Besides, I think the Sprog would look cute in baby goggles and a vest with a watch-fob.

***

Saw an interesting and overlooked movie called The Last Legion, based mostly on a piece of historical fiction of the same name by Valerio Massimo Manfredi. Decent, intelligent action with a wonderful Patrick Doyle score.

Tolkien once said he wrote The Lord of the Rings to give the English a founding myth. That's what The Last Legion attempts to do, sort of by way of an Aeneid setup involving a group of Romans on the run from the Goths. The packaging rather gives it away, but it involves Arthur and Excalibur.

There are some family-friendly sword battles. It features Miss World Aishwarya Rai (Bride and Prejudice) as a warrior woman. Okay, it's a bit silly to see her downing men by the dozen with a sword, but so's Jimmy Stewart shooting a postage stamp out of a washer in Winchester '73 and I still happily go along for the ride on that.

Colin Firth (the reason for our picking it to begin with, Chats wanted to see him all sweaty in armor) gives it the old college try, but in a few scenes you could almost see him promising himself that in his next movie he'd be on location on the Italian Rivera, wearing a tailored linen suit and slip-ons, swapping clever dialog over espressos.

Still, I found it entertaining, though it could have used a bigger budget and about another twenty minutes of time in Britain developing the masked villain.

***

The Sprog is teething. He hasn't been so much the happy camper he's been practically since birth. We're giving him cold chewies and a homeopathic teething medication from "Gentle Naturals." That and a little baby Tylenol (yeah, we heard about the recall, we're good).

***

Met with my old buddies from the writing group, Jack and Missy, on Monday to talk about Jack's next Dek Elstrom book. That was fun, though the Sprog kind of took it over by being cute.


So, that's about it for now. Back to my manuscripts and poopy diapers, and the unsettling feeling that there's not much difference between them.

I'm delighted to announce that I'll be participating at the BlogWorld & New Media Expo 2009, Las Vegas, Nevada, October 15-17. I'll be talking about using the web to market your work and the intersections between new media and traditional publishing, stuff like that. I don't know yet who the other print authors will be, but it is a pretty big event so there may be some cool folks showing up.

Turns out the CEO and Co-founder of the conference is a fan of the Age of Fire books and looked me up to invite me as his guest.

So it looks like baby's first trip will be to Vegas. I don't think he'll be quite ready to learn how to put a 5-spot in a stripper's g-string, but maybe I'll start building him some table stakes comps.

My first panel was “Creating Characters: Mundane or New Species”

There was some chafing about the definition of mundane. Most people took it to mean “ordinary humans” and that’s a great def. My own version of a “mundane” is anything we’ve seen a lot of: otherworldly elves, beardy dwarves, vampires, dragons, werebeasts allergic to silver, zombies who can only be taken out with a headshot. . . In other words, stuff that generally has an accepted fanlore built around it.

I defended the use of boilerplate fantasy in some circumstances. For example, there’s a built-in audience for reasonably familiar vampires. As long as what the vampires are doing and how they meet the bare necessities is fresh enough, chances are you’ll attract an audience.

The whole panel agreed that whatever you are creating, your characterization goal is the same: get the reader involved in how these people solve problems. Sherlock Holmes and Mike Hammer are going to bring in the bad guy using very different methodologies, but both make good reads for their respective audiences.

I talked a little about motivation, using my modified Mamet inventory: what does the character want (or think it wants), what is the character willing to do to meet those wants and needs, and why does it have to be now?

At the end I quoted Gene Wolf’s thumbnail guide to characterization: simply decide the one, two or three attributes of your character if boiled down to gravy, then just have them speak and act so those attributes are illustrated to the audience.


Then came “Writing with Vampires and Dragons” which seemed tailor-made for me.

The big point I made is that vampires and dragons are both very powerful beings. The audience won’t have much interest or fun if they win their battles easily thanks to those powers, so you have to figure out a way to make them underdogs.

With my dragons, I started them off as young and vulnerable. I gave each crippling defects (well, Wistala’s is more mental than physical). As the books progress, the dragons grow up and become more powerful, so I have to set them against other dragons or even more powerful entities.

With the Vampire Earth books it was easy. Since the vamps were the enemies, the tougher they seemed the better. I made the vamps nice and powerful to give my hero a formidable foe. Also, I put the Kurian Order on top, so to speak, so he not only has to fight the bloodsuckers, he has to overturn a whole social organization.

The next panel was on “Fan Fiction.”

I have very little expertise on this so I mostly listened. I talked about fan fiction from an author’s perspective a little: an author needs to actively defend his creations, otherwise it gets easier to muddy the legal waters. Though honestly, the first fiction I ever wrote was fanfic (though there wasn't a name for it back then). I think it’s great as “training wheels” in developing your skills as a writer, or to enjoy the experience of beloved characters living on, so to speak. I’m not inclined to actively dis something that gives pleasure to so many.

But if someone sends fanfic to me, I make a point of not reading it, and I don’t hunt it up on the internet.

The final panel was “Let’s Scare Them Half To Death.”

Basically, it turned into a discussion on the basics of horror writing. I did my usual spiel about everyone having their own “monsters of the Id” and an author should follow the “less is more” school of description for horror. I brought up H.G. Wells’s Martian war machines, how he mostly described them by what they were doing, rather than giving precise bolt-by-bolt descriptions. I recommended that you mostly describe monsters through verbs and simple metaphors.

A good monster is something of a striptease. First you see the effects of the monster’s action (Jaws and Them are both good examples of this), then maybe you hear them or see shadows or have the yellow barrels come knifing through the water toward Quint's boat or what have you, finally in the end there should be somewhat of a reveal as the hero finally confronts the worst-case scenario. I take more of a burlesque approach than a no-g-string lap-dance reveal, though I know there are audiences for both.

We talked a little bit about building suspense, where after establishing early on how the monster operates (Dolarhyde’s home invasions in Red Dragon, for example) you then insert someone the audience cares about into that grim clockwork – Tippie Hedren waiting outside the Bodega Bay schoolhouse containing Cathy Brenner as the crows gather in The Birds.

So, that’s what I had to say in brief. It’s almost like being there! Just put some old funky sweatsocks under your nose and play some loud filk from the other side of the room divider as you read this and you’ll have the full con experience!

I'm back safe and sound from Archon.

It was great to meet the MST3K/Cinematic Titanic folks. Though I got all tongue-tied when I tried to talk to them, especially Joel Hodgson and Mary Jo Pehl. You guys are...well...gerr...uhh...cool! And I like ummm, that show you used to do. With the Milk Bone spaceship. What was it called again? All I can think is they shrugged and said "He's an author? No wonder nobody reads anymore."

Of all of them TV's Frank looks most like a typical con fan. Though the white hair gives him a flair most "Comic Book Guys" lack.

Oh, I met therevamped (and her cool mom Fran). She was what my twenty-year-old self would have called "jailbait" and, well...bouncy. I gotta say, I never expected to have teenage girls sproinging around like pogo sticks in excitement from meeting me. How many paunchy middle aged white guys with bad hair and indifferent skin can experience that?

Also saw kalyandra. She bought books out of my trunk.

The con offered to have me back next year to run a writing workshop. It'll be negotiated. I don't mind going to a fun fan con like this on my own dime, but if I'm putting in hours of prep before I at least want a room and a few expenses paid. Or am I being unreasonable?

John O'Neill from Black Gate gave me free rein to rummage through his on-sale book collection (I provided premiums in the form of signed books to go with subscriptions), so I came home with a ton of paperbacks. Basically anything with a chick in pasties or a shirtless guy with a sword went home in my bag. And if you know the history of 70s-80s DAW paperbacks, you'll wonder how they all fit in the Pursuit Special. Ka-trrrump! Thanks, and be sure to tip the waitstaff!

I also purchased a signed first edition of Brin's The Postman and some more Glenn Cook. I'll try and sum up the usual half-digested opinion I spewed out all over my panels tomorrow.

Back to good old Collinsville.

Hope to see a couple of you there this weekend.



Friday:
Creating Characters: Mundanes or New Species
E. E. Knight, Michael Shane Moore, Shirley Damsgaard, Rachel Neumeier
GC Salon D:5 3:50 pm

Writing with Vampires and Dragons
E. E. Knight, Cindy Appel, Elizabeth Donald
How do use a species with it's own legend.
GC Salon D:5 6:10 pm

Saturday
Fan Fiction
E. E. Knight, Joey Froehlich
What's good, or not. How to, or not
GC Marquette B 2:40 pm

Sunday
Let's Scare Them Half-To-Death
Michael Oliveri, Joey Froehlich, E. E. Knight, Ruth Souther
Monsters and other horrors
GC Salon D:5 11:10 am

From the Archon site:

I just received word from the Mr Con Chair (Steve Norris) that the MST3K guys will be at Archon. Joel Hodgson, Trace Beaulieu, Mary Jo Pehl, Frank Coniff, and Joshua Weinstein will be spending the weekend at Archon celebrating their 20th Anniversary this year and promoting their latest venture "Cinematic Titanic".

Huzzah!

Looks like my panel for Chicago's Printer's Row 2008 details have settled down. I'll be on a panel Sunday June 8 at 3pm. My co-panelists are Louis M. Bujold and Kaza Kingsley. It'll be moderated by the deputy editor for the Trib's Tempo section, Lilah Lohr.

Should be fun!

Hey Wiscon32, that check was good!



( Read more... )

I joked with Greg Ketter from Dreamhaven that I should just have my agent send a portion of my royalties to him and save all concerned a good deal of time.

Just got back from Windy City Pulp and Paperback. I came home with:

• A signed edition of E. Hoffmann Price's stories collected in Far Lands Other Days (Vampire Earth fans have probably figured out I'm a fan) complete with a letter from his last editor(!!) written after Price's death. There's a staggering amount of words in the volume (and a bellydancer on the spine) with wonderful illustrations by George Evans of EC Comics fame. I could go on about Price for quite a while, but he had a very clean, energetic style, sort of a cross between R.E. Howard and Hemingway and a good eye for detail. If you're looking for a guy who lets precise nouns and vigorous verbs tell a story, Price is your guy.


• A signed Easton Press edition of Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness. There's a preface by Joan Vinge (who I see now and then at cons) and a new introduction written for the volume by Le Guin.


• A first edition of Watership Down only slightly spoiled by someone's damn "from the library of" bookplate. That's probably why it was on the 50% off rack where I was shopping. But screw it, a first edition is a first edition. Now I just have to figure out a way to get it signed.

More on Price. This is from his introduction, which I found amusing, but it'll give you some idea of the flavor of the man. Plus, editorial war stories are always fun:

Selling fiction is as odd, in its way, as is writing the suff.

When I came out of the Mexican jungle in 1935 and headed for W.K. Mashburn's home in Houston, he handed me a letter from my agent. "Slapdash Jigglebottom likes your novelette, the one you did to his order, but he'd like to have you make some changes . . ."

The schedule of changes was long as a whore's dream.

I wrote my agent, in effect, thus: "Tell him that for $100 he may put my name on the bly-line, and write the story himself-- that way it will be exactly what he wants. I will not have time to revise the yarn. Before I can get back home and to the work, they'll fire that silly bastard! You dig in and sell it, as is."

When I got back to my desk in Redwood City, there was a letter from my agent. In it was a check for that story. And he wrote, in his message, "You must be psychic. They fired Mr. Jigglebottom a couple days ago."

He goes on to praise several of his long-time editors.

I also love the final line, dated 1974. He's writing about how many of the tales were inspired by his travel experiences

Go with me, to Far Lands, some of which I have seen and loved. My Other Days go back to the kerosene lamp, homemade ice cream, and the hand powered manure fork . . .

True, women did wear long, long skirts -- but they didn't sleep in their clothes, Glory Be!

My dance card this week ended up being fuller than I thought. I've some meals planned with friends and then there's Windy City Pulp and Paperback. Hopefully I'll see John O'Neill from Black Gate and probably Jason from the Return of the Sword antho.

Also, I updated the blog header to add my appearance at InConJunction in Indianapolis over the 4th of July weekend.

Okay, here's my write up of the Martin panel on characterization. Well, it was about a lot of stuff but mostly characters and points of view.

Please, keep in mind that this is a rough transcript. The description of what was said is as accurate as I could make them typing on my laptop but I had to paraphrase here and there, therefore I'm not using any quotation marks. I'm sure I made errors. So don't write George R.R. Martin and say that you don't understand what he said or you think he screwed the pooch with his Gandalf observation unless you were actually there, m'kay? All errors of style are mine.

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Hope you found this helpful or at least illuminating.

You know, every now and then I just sit back and wonder how all this happened. I’m floored by how cool this is.

I wish someone had told me when I was fifteen, when no self-respecting female would speak to me and I lived in fear of the dreaded double jock lock after gym class, that I’d have this life. That I’d be married to a bellydancing librarian who says something interesting or thought-provoking daily. That people would pay otherwise perfectly good money to read my words or come hear me speak and it would be enough money to allow me to climb mountains in Costa Rica. That I’d chit-chat with guys in Vladivostok or Japan fighting their way through the English language or USAF majors in Europe or Puerto Ricans who I entertained enough so that they wrote me to ask a question because they want to test or verify a theory that they’ve formed about one of my stories. That I’d eat pizza sitting next to the same authors who I used to have open under my desk or concealed in a textbook during study hall. And that it would be a tax write-off.

I'm so lucky. Talk about a million-to-one shot.

Of course I worry. Howard Mohr in his book How To Talk Minnesotan: A visitor’s guide says that people from Minnesota don’t really enjoy good weather because they know it’ll have to be paid back eventually in snowstorms and tornados. There’s a bit of that in me too. I keep waiting to hear the fatal diagnosis from my doctor or my plane to go down. I just don’t see how this run can last. But I’m making an effort to enjoy it.

We're both kind of tired because we were up until like 3:30 last night which is a rarity for us these days. Good con. George R.R. Martin was great and I now have a signed first edition hardcover of A Game of Thrones. So that's going on the "don't mess with it without asking permission" shelf.

Also -- authors, learn by my experience! Have a hot, personable young woman running around the con talking up your books and you'll sell a lot more and people will actually show up for your readings (this has now been done twice, once by rhonawestbrook at MidSouthCon and now by Monica Valentinelli aka darkshiver). It really works. The Dreamhaven gal said she wished she'd brought down 10 copies of Dragon Champion and Way of the Wolf. People were running over to Borders to get them.

I'll try and post my summary of Martin's panel on character creation in the next couple of days.

ETA: I just counted -- we came home with 13 new books, not counting Martin or my author copy of the Return of the Sword anthology. Our friends Bill & Tracy took us to lunch and the "Last Square" game store. They have a very good military history section and I went a little bananas. As a shirt I saw at the con said -- "Who needs drugs? I can go broke buying books."

I think Chats summed it up best in the car on Sunday: "That was the schmoozinest, boozinest World Fantasy ever!"

( on to the pics and dirty details )

Had a great time. The hotel was great and the con staff was killer. Got so hot down there the Pursuit Special had part of a door seal come loose, so there I was, doing auto repairs in the parking lot this morning.

I don't know if you guys want all the mundane details, but I just want to point out a few highlights:

1. I wish I had more opportunities to mix with my long-term readers. I got to know a guy who's been on the VE forum since about day three and it was like hanging out with an old college pal.



2. Anyone with school-age children should make an effort to see the Lincoln Museum if they're ever in Illinois. It's worth the three hour drive from Chicago. I'm better than average when it comes to Lincoln trivia and Civil War factoids but I was learning something stunning every time I turned a corner. Plus all the waxworks and animatronics are fascinating, and not a few are emotionally moving. We went absolutely nuts in the giftshop afterwards; I wanted some disposable dollars supporting the place.



3. Extra special bonus was a tour of Wright's Dana-Thomas House in Springfield. Interesting to see what Wright could put together when doing a commission for a rich silver heiress.



4. I got some gaming in, GMing Savage Worlds. I think everyone enjoyed themselves. The players really got into the he-man Sgt. Rock-on-steroids sweats vibe (even Heather, the gal who was playing - she didn't even want either of the female characters, she ended up choosing the womanizing Cockney medic). And by the way, Aaron, you made an awesome CO. So yea!

I'll be at the Twilight Tales booth at Printer's Row this Saturday from 2-4. Drop by and get a book signed.

Back safe and sound. Tired and happy.

Saw some old friends. Hung out with a few fans, lj friends, and fellow writers. The fan base included a new one who tried WOLF last year (Hi George!) and completed his collection by buying the Age of Fire series over the weekend.

Got cool books and videos in the dealers room. No action figure purchases. We were also taken on a shopping trip to "The Last Square," Madison's incredible miniature/gaming store. Just as well I don't live in the area, or I'd be disposing of too much income there. I bought a print of a mounted Sioux warrior.

Most interesting conversation was with a librarian/archivist for NIU, my alma mater. She wants the Collected Papers of E.E. Knight. Okay, they're not collected, and they're mostly digital, but she's welcome to them. She and Chats got on like a blazing domicile. NIU's library is now a SFWA repository, bless it, and I'm happy to add to the collection, for the future use of the writer of the masters' thesis "How Did This Nimrod Ever Get Published? E.E. Knight and the Dark Fantasy Third Wave"

She's also got a first edition Hobbit from the late Thirties she's going to let me peruse. Awesome! I finally get to read the original version of "Riddles in the Dark."

Next year Oddcon is hosting George R.R. Martin!