Snowdrops!
On the way out to the door to Boskone I spotted these in the newly uncovered earth: snowdrops! In flower even. So it’s just a cellphone pic, but a pic nonetheless.
And Boskone? The usual. Went to a couple panels. Hung out with friends. It’s still not Readercon.
Does anything ever really end? Even coming home from Boskone and talking about it afterwards, my friends were still recommending more books to read.
Naturally, the last panel I went to at Boskone was “How Do Endings Matter?” It was a small crowd eager to join the discussion with Debra Doyle, Toni L. P. Kelner, Jim Mann, and Peter Weston Toni L.P. Kelner opened with the classic definition of a good ending being one that leaves you surprised, but it couldn’t have ended any other way. Debra Doyle said it’s like the perfect birthday present: you’re completely surprised by something you always wanted.
Consider how many YA books were mentioned at the “If You Liked That, Read This” panel, I was expected even more recommendations from “Why Adults Love YA.” But Bruce Coville, Michael J. Daley, Sarah Beth Durst, Margeret Ronald, and Navah Wolfe pretty much stuck to the topic. Short answer: What’s wrong with liking books that tell a rattling good story that leave you feeling optimistic?
One thing we book readers love to do is recommend books to each other. At “One More Time – If You Liked That, Read This …” Debra Doyle, David Anthony Durham, Faye Ringel, Edie Stern, and Christopher Weuve did their best. Christopher Weauve even had a card listing books for those interested in naval history or a naval perspective on SF.
Here are the suggestions I managed to write down:
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Possibly the high point of hanging with friends and talking came at the literary beer at the end of Saturday, with various alumnae of the Ultimate SF Workshop, headed by one of our teachers, Craig Shaw Gardner. Sadly, Jeff Carver succumbed to mystery bugs. So Hello again to Fran, Chris Howard and his daughter Chloe, Skott, Badger, Elena, Tim, Andrew, and at least one more whose name I failed to write down. And some of us may turn up at Vericon in March.
Since beer was involved, I wasn’t exactly taking detailed notes, but there were also some intriguing books mentioned. Thus, the Books To Investigate list grows.
In contrast to the trashing given to SF’s ability to predict the future at Readercon last year, last Friday at Boskone, “The Place of Prediction in SF and Reality” confined the trashing to Hugo Gernsback’s ability to predict the future. He sure inspired a whole bunch of other people to do better.
So what did I do at Boskone?
