Blog

You just know that these reports are going to get briefer and less coherent as the con goes on. It's a wrap at this point and here's what I recall from the last 24 hours.

Saturday Evening

When last we heard from our valient heroine, she was about to dress up a little and head off to join up with various other folks from File 770 to attend the Hugo Award ceremony. OK, so not all my readers may know what all that means. The Hugo awards are the annual member-voted awards from the World Science Fiction Society, given at Worldcon. There are awards for both professional and amateur writers, artists, etc., and for fiction, commentary, various types of activity (podcasts, either print or online magazines, etc.) relating to science fiction and fantasy writing and the SFF community. File 770 is a "fanzine", that is, an amateur publication of news, commentary, and discussion of the SFF scene, originally founded as a print periodical, but now also existing as a website that has developed a very active discussion and commenting community. It's a forum where I've been quite active in the past year and where I've made a number of new friends. And both File 770 and its founder, Mike Glyer, were finalists for Hugo awards (for Best Fanzine and Best Fan Writer). So those of us who had gotten to know each other through the site did a lot of socializing at this year's Worldcon--especially given that Our Gracious Host, Mike Glyer, was not able to attend for health reasons. So we sat in a group and were able to cheer together when Mike and File 770 both won in their respective categories. Here's a picture of the physical awards, held by John Hertz, who stook in to accept them for Mike...and he let me hold one of them for the picture.

After that, it was another evening of having startling success at finding fun conversations at the Marriott bar, but for the life of me I can't remember all of them. All I remember was that I succeeded in doing a few chained introductions where all manner of amazing people who hadn't previously known each other now do.

Sunday

I had two panels, with the earlier starting at 11am, so I had to skip the last business meeting, but as I expected, the various decisions were ones I would have supported. The first panel was "When the Magic Goes Away", discussing stories and settings where magic is in transition, the magic-technology interface, the continuing echoes of the "lost golden age" motif, and the various purposes that both magic and its loss serve in stories.

The second panel was "Austen and Shelley and their influences on SFF" which was an amaingly fun discussion moderated by Mary Robinette Kowal that covered the literary, historic, and social contexts of Austen and Shelley's works, the reasons why the themes in their work continue to inspire SFF today, and all sorts of ways that readers engage with them. Really, you should have been there. It was a lot of fun.

I finished up by attending a panel sponsored by some of the con committee for next year's Worldcon in Helsinkii on "How to talk to Finns". Lots of humorous presentation of cultural differences and expectations, with a bit of practical Q&A for those expecting to travel from the States for the convention.

I didn't feel like trying to go off somewhere for a real dinner, so I grabbed a sandwich in the bar and hung out with Renay Williams and other folks from the Lady Business blog (who were also finalists for Best Fanzine). And now I'm about to go meet my interviewer. (Someone I met through facebook, not related to Worldcon except by geography.) I'll probably have time to do some more summing up tomorrow since my plane doesn't leave until after noon, but at this point my brain is completely toast.

Oh, and I got an email to expect the editorial feedback on Mother of Souls to be waiting for me when I get home, so there's no rest for the wicked.

In theory, Friday is supposed to be review day, and I have a review partially drafted up. But it still needs some polishing and my brain is rather wrung out, so you just get the continuing con report instead.

Thursday Evening

Maybe I should have talked up my Kaffee Klatsch a bit more because only half the available slots were filled, but we had a good time. I talked about future plans for the series, answered questions, and did a short reading from Mother of Souls. Bringing the special print edition of The Mazarinette and the Musketeer was an excellent idea, because I've been handing out copies right and left, and it has served the intended function of being something I can sign for people if they don't have a hard copy of anything else available. My original idea was to suggest adjourning to dinner afterward if anyone were interested, but it turned out all the likely candidates were planning to head for the File 770 dinner at the Flying Saucer pub, so the two concepts were combined.

An evening panel on how media invite and adapt to various queer "gazes" was on my list to see, so I headed back to the main convention space. While I was killing time before the panel, I ran into Bogi Takács (one of the panelists) who was on my "Twitter people to meet in the flesh" list so we chatted a bit until it was panel time. The panel was one of those contexts where one is reminded of the mild absurdity of lumping together of all the various identities and interests covered under the label "queer". Lively conversation, though.

After that I tried the Marriott bar again, and worked my way through several conversations, both ones I inserted myself into and ones I was invited into. So: success. Very exhausting, though.

Friday

Slept in a little then grabbed breakfast at Starbucks with my roommate Fade Manley on the way to the business meeting. I have to say that WSFS business meetings are a fascinating universe, but I don't know that I'll continue to have long-term interest in attending them. A surprising amount of business got finished up.

Someone at my Kaffee Klatsch had mentioned that Larry Smith Books had sold out of my books, so I swung by and asked if they'd like a few copies to re-stock. It turned out they still had a couple, but did want the additional ones, and the displays had thinned out enough to give me face-out on an end cap. Of such things are authorly dreams made!

My tentative schedule was looked solid from there until 7pm. Took in a very packed panel on keeping track of characters and data in epic fantasy doorstop series (which I attended primarily for Kate Elliott). Then "We Deserve Better" a venting panel on the treatment of lesbian and bi female characters in tv. Finally met up with Twitter friend @Sandstone. There was a panel on cookbooks in the next hour that I'd liked, but decided to hang out and chat for a bit, and then went off to hide in the Green Room and collect up my notes for the panel I was moderating later on supporting characters in steampunk. Which people said went well. But first was my first panel as a particpant on "Queers in Heroic Fantasy" which was quite lively, covering subjects like "does sexuality even matter when you're being epic?" and issues of genre expectations. I tossed off some of my favorite tidbits of classic epic literature.

I thought I'd had some vague plans to meet for possible dinner plans after the steampunk panel, but they didn't materialize and instead I took up an invitation from Cat Faber to join her dinner party. After rejecting a 40-minute wait at our original (noisy) venue, we just got deli & salad bar takeout from Cosentino's, which also had a small area with tables.

And now I'm decompressing a bit before deciding which parties to try. (Haven't made it to the SFWA suite yet, though that's always pretty random in who's there. Will probably stick my head in at the Tor party, since people I know are likely to be there.) The weather forecasts have been promising lightning storms this evening, and I see by my window that they're finally delivering. Fortunately, I needn't stick my nose outside to get to any of the places I might go.

I have no programming commitents tomorrow, so I can finally take in the art show and do a serious circuit of the dealers' area, if I want. Thinking seriously of actually attending the Hugo ceremonies rather than catching them on video-cast, but it will probably depend on whether I get together with other people who want to do that.

This week, I’m going to pause in the chapters and go back to one of the concepts I discussed at the beginning of this series of posts: moral accounting as a literary analysis technique. To reiterate, it’s a concept that came out of the field of cognitive linguistics, and specifically the sort of conceptual analysis of metaphoric structure pioneered by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson. In brief: the use of the langauge of accounting (debts and payments, balances and sums) to talk about how people’s interactions--and especially a series of interactions over time--reflects an underlying concept of “moral balance”. That is, that people who do good things (or who have bad things happen to them for no reason) are “owed” a good outcome, while people who do bad things (or who have unearned good things happen to them) accrue a moral “debt” which can be balanced either by disaster or good deeds. That fact that we use the language of accounting to talk about such things is both a symptom and a motivation for actually thinking/believing in the reality of "moral balance". (It is, of course, not the only metaphoric model we have for morality and ethics.)

A Little Princess has always struck me as a supreme exercise in moral accounting. Sara begins with an “unearned” balance (i.e., a debt) due to her social and financial circumstances and her happy family situation. All these are taken away from her so drastically that she shoots right past balance into severe credit. That is: a state of being “owed” good things by the universe. Then she is driven even deeper into credit by the combination of continuing to do good deeds as best she can, and experiencing unwarranted bad experiences (e.g., the persecution by Miss Minchin). It is only by this continued accrual of credit that Sara can “earn” the eventual conclusion of the story where she becomes wealthy beyond imagination and once again achieves a happy and loving family situation.

But before she has earned that, she has to hit bottom. First, we’ll see Sara perform a significant “good deed” (the part of the accounting under her control). Then we’ll see a series of external bad deeds done to her (e.g., deprivations of food and comfort). And then, when it seems that complete disaster has struck, the balance will begin to assert itself. Not all at once--that wouldn’t be satisfying. Rather in a long, slow build-up to the final climax.

Mr. Carrisford's moral-economy arc is in a different place. Like Sara, he begins the story with what we can assume is a moral debt due to unearned life circumstances. This debt inflates greatly by the good fortune of the diamond mines and by his failures toward Captain Crewe during the supposed crash. His brief brush with the threat of financial loss can't really be treated as a payment toward that debt because it's so quickly neutralized. One might say that Mr. Carrisford's illness is something in the way of paying "interest" on the debt. (A different symbolic understanding of morality might view the illness as a physical realization of his moral weakness--that he won't be healed until he makes good.) Carrisford will work toward balance by a combination of taking action (performing charity for "the little girl in the attic") and experiencing failure (the unsuccesful quest to find Sara). But when you look at the magnitude of these events compared to his wealth and good situation, one can see that he may be carrying a debt load even past the end of the story.

Compare all this to Becky's moral account books. One might think that she begins with a credit due to her economic circumstances and the hardness of her life. It's clear that she is treated much worse as a school employee than Sara is. One might think that she increases this credit by the way she supports Sara through her difficulties. If one's absolute situation were what mattered, one might think that she is owed a larger payoff than Sara is. But the story dynamics of moral debt appear to place a stronger weight on changes than on static experiences. Or, to put it another way, Becky's plot/accounting arc is "damped down", with smaller movements around a lower balance point. One could either see this as an implicit, invisible difference in how their experiences are valued, or one could see it as defining the difference between a protagonist and a supporting character. (When you look at changes in accounts, pretty much the only minor characters who have any activity in their moral ledger at all are Becky and Anne the beggar girl.)

The most frustrating thing about they way the Alpennia books fall between genres and between markets is trying to figure out how to bring them to the attention of readers. It will be interesting to see the ways that the StoryBundle promotion that finished up last week will address that question. Of course, not everyone who bought the bundle will read Daughter of Mystery. And not everyone who reads it will love it. But that's true of any path by which a book comes into someone's hands. And the undeniable truth is that the Storybundle has come close to doubling the number of people who have Daughter of Mystery on their e-readers. I've already started to see reviews and mentions trickling in from it. More importantly, this is a far more tightly targetted readership than my publisher's default category "readers of LesFic", many of whom are looking primarily for contemporary romance. I have high hopes. A girl can dream.

My characters have dreams that take off in a lot of different directions. Antuniet will soon turn her dreams to something beyond applying her alchemical talents to the service of the state--or at least, the service of Princess Anna Atillet. One of those services is to devise protective gemstone amulets for Princess Anna's son Efriturik, who is departing to learn something of diplomacy with the Alpennian embassy in France. Jeanne, too, is casting about to find something to turn her hand to. Perhaps something that will refresh her appeal to the leaders of Rotenek society. And the other Anna--Antuniet's apprentice, Anna Monterrez--is beginning to dream beyond her current role...

* * *

[From Mother of Souls, Chapter 6]

The building in which the workshop was located had been surrounded at one time by the old kitchen gardens, but they had fallen into riotous chaos. Only the herb beds were still kept in order as part of the pleasure garden. Now in October the flowers were well past and the weather uncertain, but just for today the afternoon sun still warmed a few small stone benches. There was a delicate wrought-iron table and chairs, not yet taken in for the winter. It served for the moments when Antuniet was able to tear herself away from the work.

Jeanne poured the tea, saying, “Was it only last summer we’d take our picnic to the river wall down on the south bank! How much has changed.”

“How much indeed,” Antuniet echoed. “Have some cake.” She picked up a tiny almond pastry and playfully slipped it into Jeanne’s mouth.

They caught each other’s eyes as she savored it, and when her mouth was free again she said softly, “I still love my bread the best.” But Anna was there and serious flirtation would have to wait for later.

Their visitor’s approach was heralded by Anna’s quick scramble to her feet to curtsey. Jeanne rose with more dignity to greet the bright-uniformed figure who strode along the path toward them.

“Mesner Atilliet,” Antuniet hailed him. “I hadn’t expected you until later. Do you have time to join us or only enough to collect your talismans?”

The cavalry uniform did much to set off the person of Princess Annek’s son, Jeanne thought, as he lifted the hat from his auburn locks and bowed over her hand with that charming Austrian mannerism that he’d chosen not to shed. She approved of the addition of a small moustache. She was not so old or so settled that she couldn’t take pleasure from the attentions of a handsome man.

“A little time, yes,” he said.

Antuniet received the same greeting and then he turned to Anna, bowing over her hand and whispering something that sent her into blushing confusion. Really, he shouldn’t tease the girl, for all that they’d spent long months working side by side last year like brother and sister.

Jeanne said, “Anna, go fetch another teacup if you would.” That would allow her to regain her composure. She returned with alacrity as if unwilling to miss a word.

“Are you back to your regiment for the winter?” Antuniet asked.

“No, my mother sends me off to Paris with Albori. I’m to be apprenticed in diplomacy, it seems, though officially I’ll be nothing more than an aide.”

“Ah, that would explain some of the particular stones she requested.”

Jeanne had been paying only slight attention to the current projects in the workshop, but there had been something about a special commission from Her Grace. The alchemical gems Antuniet created went far beyond the techniques DeBoodt had developed two centuries earlier. Careful layers of enhanced crystals magnified the natural properties of the gems, lending the wearer their strengths. No wonder at all if Annek wanted to send her son off into the world as well protected as possible.

The conversation turned to lighter matters: gossip of the court, the latest sensational novel, the news from France. Jeanne handled the reins without thought, drawing him out, bringing Antuniet out of her habitual taciturnity, allowing Anna her shy silence as she watched the conversation move back and forth, like viewing a play on the stage.

And then, without giving any hint of impatience, Efriturik rose and Anna was sent off to fetch the set of gems. He tucked the case inside the breast of his waistcoat and took his leave with a broad compliment and a wink that encompassed all three of them.

It was no more than a matter of habit for him. In the last year, the attractions that arose from being personable and well-fashioned and a likely heir to the throne had been augmented by leaving behind the brashness of youth and by the cultivation of wit and charm. Efriturik was developing quite a reputation for the careful and gentle breaking of hearts. Some day a bride would be chosen for him, but for now any girl he smiled at could dream. And even a middle-aged widow with no interest in young men could enjoy the game.

It would soon be time to clear away the remains of the tea, but they sat for a while yet after their guest had gone, enjoying the birdsong. Jeanne saw a pensive look settle over Anna’s face. Something softer than the usual moodiness of youth. “What do you want to learn next?” Jeanne asked her.

The question seemed to startle her. “I want—” She glanced over at Antuniet, as if looking for permission.

Without need for explanation, Antuniet nodded in assent. Yes, she understood what it was to wonder if you were allowed to want things.

“Mesnera de Cherdillac, I want to learn to be like you.”