I had a great time at Epic Confusion in Troy, Michigan, this weekend. In keeping with its Epic theme, there were more pro guests and more random pros than any Confusion in recent memory. That’s great for us pros, although I did hear some grumbling among fans that the fannish side of the con was a bit anemic. Not sure if that’s true or if it was just grumbling, but it was a great time for me. I also spent more time at the con than ever before, commuting up for Thursday evening, and then arriving early in the day on Friday thanks to a day off from work. That allowed me to avoid the slushy rush hour drive that tends to have me arriving at 8 PM and full of adrenaline.
Some highlights of the convention, in stream of consciousness order, include:
Picking Cat Rambo up from the airport at 1:30 AM–she was delayed a total of ten hours in her travel. I took her home instead of the hotel. If you want face time with an author, I highly recommend this sort of airport abduction. Much easier than trying to elbow through convention crowds or waiting in an autograph line. She was so tired, she didn’t even mind the duct tape.
Spending lots of time with Jay Lake. He is a font of wisdom about writing in an amiable, charismatic package.
A ukulele/iphone ocarina Radiohead singalong led by John Scalzi and Anne Harris, respectively, during a convention panel.
Hanging out with the Usual Suspects among the Michigan writer/fan community.
Making some new friends, including a student of Anne’s and Saline author Carrie Harris.
Being present for one of my best and oldest writer friend’s first Toastmaster gig. (He rocked it.)
Getting quite a lot of positive feedback on the elevator pitch for my novel-in-progress. (If I hear, “I love it already!” enough times, I start to believe it.)
Catching the Buckell twins in their costumes in time to snap a photo before they retired for the evening. I also had fun chatting with their Dad, Whatsisface, who hopes to be as popular as his girls one day.
Ironically, the Epically bad taco lunch buffet provided at a discounted rate by the hotel, which provided a great deal of conversation fodder and general agreement about the importance of guacamole.
Getting to sign an actual book at the actual mass author signing. All of my anthology publications are several years old, so having someone show up with one of them was very exciting for me.
I don’t know very much about the running of conventions, but from my outside perspective, it seemed like Confusion had the best concom it has ever had, and I definitely feel like Dave Klecha knocked it out of the park with lit programming. All of the panels I was on were really great topics, and I actually came away with some good ideas from a couple of them.