I've been posting at a pretty good clip so far this month, but over the holiday weekend I'll be at CONvergence, the Twin Cities' largest fantasy and science fiction convention. I've been attending since the beginning, and even though I'm in no way, shape, or form a bestselling author it's still a good feeling to have gotten to the point where I can talk about my own work in addition to how much I like the work of others.CONvergence is an annual convention for fans of Science Fiction and Fantasy in all media, held each July. We are a 4-day event with more than 4,500 attendees, and the premiere event of our kind in the upper mid-west.
We offer everything you expect and more from a major science fiction convention, delivered with that unique CONvergence style. You can read about all the things there are to do at CONvergence in the ACTIVITIES section at left, as well as amenities like ConSuite and the CoF2E2 Free Coffee Shop in the HOSPITALITY section.
This year's convention theme is TOMORROW THROUGH THE PAST, a celebration of yesterday's visions of tomorrow, and you can expect that theme to run through many of the panels, parties and costumes to be found at CONvergence this year.
While I enjoy the convention and would go regardless, this is also one of those cases in which an author's work is never done. I'll be promoting my novel, selling signed copies, and letting folks who are interested in the subject know about my new Enochian book that will be coming out later this year. You know, the things that in theory a publisher would do but won't unless (A) they're a huge company and (B) you're already on the New York Times Bestseller list. That's something you need to keep in mind if you're thinking about trying your hand at professional writing - don't quit your day job, especially if it's a good one. Even mid-level authors with solid but not enormous fanbases have trouble living off their earnings.
Along those lines, I recently came across this article, which while ostensively a humor piece is also quite accurate as far as my experiences as an author go. Enjoy, and I'll be back with more postings sometime next week.
I swear, Minneapolis/St. Paul must be the coolest city in the country. You've got your Druids, your Klingon Christmas Carols, your Convergence weekends, Caribou Coffee...
ReplyDeleteIf the winters were milder, I'd be tempted to move there!
I think the deal is that there has to be a lot of cool stuff going on to balance out the midwinter nightmare cold if anybody is going to live here. I've lived in Minnesota my whole life so I'm used to it, but I have to admit that most years I still find myself wishing I lived in a warmer climate by the time February rolls around.
ReplyDeleteThen you get winters like this last one, where it didn't get as cold but there was more snow than even our fleet of plows could deal with in a timely fashion. So you just can't win.