lady_schrapnell | Mythopoeic awards awarded..

An Exciting and Exacting Wisdom didn't win, unfortunately. Nor did McKillip's Alphabet of Thorn or Kage Baker's The Anvil of the World - Jonathan Strange did, unsurprisingly. I'd read two and a bit of the books in the adult lit. section, though, which never happens! In children's lit, it was T. Pratchett for A Hat Full of Sky, which is on my TBR pile (only virtually, so far). But I hadn't realised there was a third book by Monica Furlong after Wise Child and Juniper (the trilogy was short-listed). Must get hold of that! Someone somewhere at Worldcon mentioned those books on a panel and I can't for the life of me remember who and where. It was fun to hear someone else bring them up though...

Been watching the first and second episodes of Lost this evening, and left daughters watching the latest one, but I'd had enough for the moment. Not my favourite kind of thing, but I can see it's addictive.

Last panel attended on Sunday was 'Waiting for the Fantastic: What Is Known but Never Stated', which was fascinating, in a frustrating kind of way. Graham Sleight was mod again, and the others were John Clute, Graham Joyce and Kelly Link. It was fascinating because they were talking about books in which all is not spelled out, wrapped up with a bow (or chain) and dropped in the reader's lap. Books in which you're hesitating between several or even many possibilities and don't necessarily feel that even the author has decided which is 'right'. It was frustrating because I'd read almost none of the books or stories mentioned (and with John Clute, you can imagine how many were thrown around), and people (especially Kelly Link, the only one on the panel whose work I have read) didn't say 'in my story - X - I did thus and such, and this is what I mean'. All a bit too reticent, perhaps. Or I'm just too badly read... J. Clute talked about what he called 'the novel of equipoise', which was related to what Todorov had said about the fantastic, but not the same. Well, I would have looked up what (little) we did on Todorov back when I studied Dracula had I but known! I'd love to have known whether anyone would consider The Perilous Gard an equipoise story, but was far too timid to ask. B. mentioned The Wind-up Bird Chronicles, in a v. quiet whisper to me, which I'd also have been interested to know about, but we were both too timid to ask.

Afterwards, I marched on Kelly Link with my Magic for Beginners in hand, which she kindly signed, told her why I loved 'The Faery Handbag' so much, told her that we'd both been going around telling everyone they should read her and B. had been telling everyone how she (KL) gave her (B) a present when she (B.) told her (KL) the book she (KL) was signing was a birthday present! More on that later though...

After the panel, I saw Sharyn N., apparently alone, sit down at the cafe, where we were having tea, and went over and asked if she'd a minute for a question. Stella hadn't known, and suggested I ask Sharyn, what the tribute to DWJ was in Megan Whalen Turner's The Thief. Sharyn didn't know either, and said she'd ask if I emailed to remind her (which is yet to be done - the con-induced lack of shyness having worn off more than a bit). Then Graham Joyce joined her, and Sharyn went to get them food, and I stayed and talked with GJ, who'd recognised me from the last panel. (It was a very small room, and we were early and near the front, and J. Clute was seriously annoyed about the size of the room!) GJ said he shared the feeling of not having read any of the books, which I'm sure was far less justified in his case than in mine, and - yet another wonderful, approachable, interesting writer! Somehow we got onto the subject of M. Wells saying that her publisher might want her to change her name, and he said that one time (one of) his was going to make him do the same, except for the lucky chance that Stephen King was also with that publisher and told them they couldn't do that - he liked Graham Joyce! If only every good writer had a Stephen King equivalent minding his or her back. His latest is Limits of Enchantment (or possibly not the latest, but recent, and mentioned on the panel), which looked fantastic, and which I tried to buy on Monday, but more of that later...

Then the Hugos. I only caught part of the ceremony, but was there in time to see Farah and Edward get theirs, and Kelly Link get hers, which was very gratifying! Older daughter was especially sad that China Miéville hadn't won, but more of that later...