Author: Don

ReaderCon Shout-Outs

We played the pier on Venice beach
The crowd called out for more
Zappa and the Mothers next
We finished with a roar
Jimi was so kind to us
Had us on the tour
We got some education
Like we never got before

Chicago, “Scrapbook”

I promised myself I wasn’t going to put off blogging about ReaderCon for weeks like I did last year.  So, like Chicago did in this song, I’m gonna start with some shout-outs!


Bart and Kay — thanks for hosting the Broken Slate release party/Crossed Genres reading, and for giving me the thrill of my short writing career by letting me read “Combat Stress Reaction.”  And, Barbara, again, sorry for missing your reading–but I was glad to have met you a bit later.

Carrie — thanks for introducing me to, and letting me share food and drink with Ken Liu, Claude Lalumière and Camille Alexa!  Didn’t I tell you it was going to be a blast?!

Carrie, Claude and Camille, and [edited to add] Lucia — thanks for hanging at the Crossed Genres reading.  Camille, your story was awesome!

Ken — Great to meet you!!

Conni — thanks for letting me be +1 at [redacted].  Thanks for signing Retro Spec for me, and see you at Dragon*Con!

Eric — I have no choice but to bow down to someone who can get three writers I was too intimidated to approach for a second ReaderCon in a row (and others) to read for him on stage!  And not for the first time, either.

Calista — It’d just been too, too long! So great to catch up. 🙂

Next time: I came for the people, but I stayed for the panels!

ReaderCon or Bust!

After tomorrow, I will be in-between jobs.  And during that in-between time, I’ll be at one of my favorite places on earth, ReaderCon!  I’ll be at the July 15th release party for the novel Broken Slate by Kelly Jennings, which is brought to you by the fine folks at Crossed Genres.

The party will also feature readings by folks who’ve published stories in Crossed Genres, such as Camille Alexa, Barbara Krasnoff and, yes, yours truly! 

The price of admission is a tweet, blog post, or Facebook update about Broken Slate.  I’m five chapters in, myself, and I’m finding myself slowly riveted by the main character and his world.  So, if you’re there, click the link for details and come say hi.

Chapter XXXVIII

Today, Chapter XXXVIII of my life began.

After having survived past the midpoint of a year that’s really been more bad than good so far, I got to spend some time with some good friends, and had a chance to take a good look at some stuff on the horizon that makes me smile…

  • I’m starting a new dayjob on July 15th.  I’m working for the same uni health center, and I’ll still be pushing paper.  But, as I joked to a friend today, I’ll be pushing higher-level paper at a higher pay rate!
  • I just submitted my first piece of fiction for 2011 today.  Given that (a) life has made it very hard to get into fiction-writing lately and (b) most of my writing time has been spent preparing for my presentation at this year’s Rod Serling Conference, I think it’s quite the accomplishment.  It’s like a dam just broke.  Which is good, ‘cos I got a lot more fiction planned for this year.
  • In just 11 days–Readercon, where I’ll get to renew some friendships and revitalize my writing mojo like I did last year.  

Y’know, things may just turn out all right.

One of These Is Not Like the Others

I was doing research down a line similar to this–I guess you could call it music video anthropology–and I stumbled on some live performances from the Tower of Power of their classic song “So Very Hard To Go,” performed by various line-ups of the band over 35 or so years.

Now, I’m not saying anything about quality.  Just that one of these is not like the others.


I’m just saying.

“Funny days in the park. Every day’s the Fourth of July.”

More pics from this year’s Ithaca Festival at Stewart Park.  The weather was beautiful, so it was pretty crowded.  I didn’t stay long and didn’t really pay as much attention to individuals as I did the other day.  I visited the drum circle and saw a smattering of bands, but I spent most of my time watching the Ithaca Shakespeare Company’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream.  I’m sure you’ll be able to suss out those pics.

I have to say, I think that was the true highlight of my festival this year.  Not only did I like the performance, but it was fun watching little kids get into it, and reacting to what was in front of them, rather than to “The Bard.”

Here are the rest…

“People talking, people laughing. A man selling ice cream, singing Italian songs…”

The weather might’ve slowed the Ithaca Festival down a bit, but once the sun came out, so did most of the people.  The only things missing were some of the bands I’d seen on the Saturday part of the Ithaca Festival for years.  They either just aren’t on the schedule or were playing on different days.  But still, I had my camera, and therefore, more potential story prompts.  More importantly, I ran into some cool folks!

Some friends of mine had a booth for the second (maybe third) year in a row, doing business as Flying Whale Studios.

I’ve talked a bit before about artist Jime Grabowski.  I first saw her work at the local comics show a few years ago.  A print of “The Doll Factory” hangs in my home office, and I can pretty much stare at it for a good hour or two at a time. 

Check out her site Prettylines.  Trust me, just go there now.

Anyway, here’s the lot.  Every year, I want to call the album “Saturday in the Park,” like the Chicago song.  But the park–i.e. Stewart Park–is tomorrow.

“I am an artist. I LOVE a good party. So, truce. Commence au festival!”

Summer in Ithaca has officially started, with the Ithaca Festival Parade, after which will follow three days of some of the best people-watching a writer could ask for!  I realize how prickish that must sound, and I’ll cop to saying/feeling that in a prickish manner when I experienced my first Ithaca Festival.  I’m not sure what changed, but I feel like it was something more than a mere moment of clarity. Anywho, the fact remains that every parade, I get a bunch of potential new story ideas, which is why my camera is my best friend this time of year…

My pals, the Ithaca League of Women Rollers (mostly Bluestockings, with a smattering of Sufferjets), were rolling at the parade, too.  Unfortunately, they were rolling a little too fast for me to get better pictures. 

“I can still hear you saying you would never break the chain…”

All I can say is, never say never… 🙁

I can say, though that May does look a bit better than April, which looks a damn sight better than March.

The life drama of the past few months is sort of heading toward better.  Some potential (good) dayjob drama is coming down the pike.  But life has eased up a bit, leaving me room to put some effort into my writing again.  Fiction, that is!

I’ve put the Serling project temporarily on hold for the rest of the week (although, I’ve already “failed” at this on a couple of occasions) and am working on a couple of short-stories, both for upcoming anthologies.  I almost forgot how good it felt!  After those first drafts done (I have a good 2-3 months for them), I’m hoping to use some of that momentum to finally get more done on my novella project. 

Yup, I think I feel like a writer again for the first time in a long time.

The Seekrit Nonfic WIP — Revealed!

I’ll be giving my first academic presentation ever at Ithaca College’s 2011 Rod Serling Conference in September.  The conference is “an interdisciplinary academic conference dedicated to the works of Rod Serling.”

Here’s my abstract…

Where Else Would You See a Story Like This: H.P. Lovecraft Adapted for Rod Serling’s Night Gallery

Writer H.P. Lovecraft describes “Weird Fiction” as a literary form which focuses on evoking atmospheric and psychological dread, as opposed to the simple description of physical horror.  Adapting this literature for film and television typically relies on the depiction of physical horror as a concession to visual media.  Two successful attempts to adapt weird fiction with its sense of dread intact are found in the anthology series Rod Serling’s Night Gallery, where such weird tales as Lovecraft’s own “Cool Air” (adapted by Rod Serling) and “Pickman’s Model” (adapted by Alvin Sapinsley) found a natural home.  An exploration of Serling’s and Sapinsley’s individual approaches to adapting Lovecraft’s work for Night Gallery will show how, despite allowances that were made for the television medium (and in some instances, because of them), they succeeded to a greater extent than other film and television adaptations of the same material.

Now, I just have to finish writing the paper. I already know that I’m starting the presentation with this video clip…

Maybe I overdid it with the cloak and dagger, but I just couldn’t bring myself to say anything publicly until I got the proposal submitted and received a response.  I did tell a few select individuals what I was up to (Though I accidentally spilled the beans a bit when I was interviewed on Functional Nerds a couple of months ago).  But the folks I told were the ones I trusted to talk me out of this if they felt they had to.  I’m glad they didn’t!