maryrobinette

At Readercon, someone asked me if I had ever made a puppet show from one of my stories.  Two.  Sort of.  Beauty Will Come is something I did for Pixel-Stained Technopeasant day last year and is not really a puppet show, though it might look like one for a moment.

I used toy theater technique to create moving illustrations for an audio story.  If it were a true puppet show, I’d have cut the narration and shown with action rather than words.  Still, it’s the closest thing I’ve got recorded.

I’ve written for stage, but always adapting someone else’s work.  My only original script was for Willamette Radio Workshop’s Murder of Crows.  Huh. I just remembered that Shades of Milk and Honey started as a radio script for a serial.

The other puppet show from my fiction is a monologue by a talking dinosaur, which was a short I wrote in first person, so it was kind of a no brainer about adapting it for stage. Most of my short fiction is ill-suited to puppetry either because it’s an all human cast or because there are too many scenic locations to work for stage. Hm… Evil Robot Monkey and Clockwork Chickadee are the only ones that I can think of that might make the transition. Everything else? Too many people and very little reason to need puppets.

maryrobinette

I’ve been a professional puppeteer for almost twenty years now and I’ve never seen anything quite as disconcerting as ventriloquist, Todd Oliver and his dog Irving.

That’s right. A ventriloquist with a real dog.

maryrobinette

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I have my official schedule for World Con now.

Launch Pad: Astronomy for Writers
Wednesday, 11:30 a.m.
Launch Pad is a week-long crash course in modern astronomy for writers founded by Mike Brotherton and held each summer at the University of Wyoming. NASA foots the bill with the goald of increasing the quality and quantity of astronomy reaching the public. Come hear instructors and participants discuss the experience.

Schmoozing 101
Wednesday, 1:00 p.m.
Conventions offer a chance to meet some of the top names in the field. How can you take advantage of that without coming off like a weasel? Learn about the etiquette of talking to editors and how to effectively ‘work a room.’

Survival Tips for the Beginning Writer
Wednesday, 4:00 p.m.
Once the story is written, what happens next? Panelists talk about cover letters, manuscript tracking, rejectomancy and other blunders that they learned about the hard way.

Reading
Thursday, 4:00 pm
I haven’t decided what story I’m going to read yet.

How to Give an Effective Reading - Workshop
Friday, 10:00 a.m.
You may be a good writer, but reading aloud is a separate skill. Learn to make your words sound as great out loud as they do on the page. Using both demonstration and audience participation, we will explore voicing, narration and pacing.

Strolling with the Stars
Sunday, 9:00 a.m.
To encourage a healthier, more active environment at Denvention 3 we are scheduling a 9AM walk every morning. We’ll leave from under the Big Blue Bear at the Colorado Convention Center, and we’ll stroll for a leisurely mile through downtown Denver. Each day’s walk will be led by a Famous AuthorTM, Artist, Editor or Scientist who will not only lead the walk but will interact with the participants. Join luminaries like Frank Wu, David Brin, Jay Lake, Ellen Datlow, John Picacio, Lou Anders, Paul Cornell, Scott Edelman, Mary Robinette Kowal and Stephen H. Segal for a gentle, friendly stroll to get the day started on an upbeat note.

maryrobinette

io9 covered our panel on steampunk design.

One of the most interesting panels at this year’s Readercon was an exploration of the steampunk design movement, as it emerged into the mainstream with May’s New York Times Style article. Writer/puppeteer Mary Robinette Kowal, YA fantasy novelist Holly Black, Tor editor Liz Gorinsky, and speculative fiction writer Sarah Micklem gathered to show off their steampunk creations, discuss steampunk’s literary origins, share their favorite steampunk websites … and, of course, to design a Gibson chair for the fannish masses.

I told someone that I had been tempted to take an easel and pad and draw the chair as we designed it, using a Morris Chair¹ as the base. Ha! Like I’d have been able to do that and participate in the discussion at the same time.

But… I did do it this morning over breakfast, after a commenter in the thread at io9 suggested that such a thing might be made if only there were a design.

1. The title of the panel relates to Gibson Girls, William Gibson and the Morris Chair [↩]

maryrobinette

I spent the train trip alternating between writing a new short story and reading Ekaterina Sedia’s Alchemy of Stone. I say “alternated” by which I mean that I took a break from writing the story, read half of Alchemy and then we were in NYC.

The apartment is empty without Rob, again, but he left me a note¹ and dinner in the fridge.  I caught up on SFWA stuff over cold sesame noodles and now I’m headed off to bed.

1. No. That’s private [↩]

maryrobinette

Saturday I went to fewer panels and spent more time hanging out with friends.

The morning started with the Codex breakfast, which featured a completely different group of Codexians than we had at the retreat. It was good to see Elaine Isaak, Doug Cohen, Joy Marchand,¹ Cat Rambo, David Walton, Erin Underwood and Will McIntosh, who brought his lovely wife. We also had the special guests Kris Dikeman and Justine Graykin² joining us. It’s fun to catch up with writers who I know online but only get to see at cons.

After that, I headed for a panel, walked into the room which was FREEZING and decided to go get a sweater and, um, took a nap instead of returning.

Had lunch with Amy Tibbets, John Joseph Adams, Chris Cevasco, Doug Cohen and then two people whose names I should remember in full because I really liked both of them. Amy Eastment, the mask making engineer, and John the horror writer. ³

I listened to Ekaterina Sedia talk about how she wrote Alchemy of Stone. The book sounded fascinating so I picked up a copy and the first chapter is great. I’m looking forward to continuing the book on the train trip home. The main character is a mechanical girl! Sweet.

I also got to spend a lot of time hanging out with David Anthony Durham,⁴ who is one of my new favorite people. On Friday he hosted an interesting discussion about crossing over into SF. The gist of which is that there’s not that much difference between writing a historic novel and a fantasy novel, in that you are still having to let the reader know about customs and lands with which they are unfamiliar. Still have to create compelling characters and dynamic plots. The difference comes in how it’s marketed.

Let’s see… Sunday I went out for coffee with Mary Hobbson and Genevieve Valentine then headed off to the panel on the Aesthetics of Online Magazines. They spent way too much time talking about the market forces of online magazines. Granted, that informs the aesthetic, but I wanted to hear more about the aesthetics of content and form.

My panel on podcasting was similar, I think. We covered some interesting topics, but mostly it devolved into a “please use your microphone responsibly”⁵ with some brief flourishes of “this is where podcasting can go.” Liz Gorinsky had some good things to say about how other fields handle podcasting, but we kept tangenting away from those points so I’ll have to find her later and see what she had to say that we skipped.

On the whole it was a grand time. Highlights include: sushi with David Anthony Durham, drinks with Jenn Jackson and Michael Curry,⁶ the Codex breakfast, reading with my Tabula Rasa group — who had rocking stories that I’d never heard, and Friday’s steampunk panel.

Tomorrow, I leave all this behind and build that springer spaniel.

1. Did not get enough time with Joy [↩]
2. who was in Shimmer’s Pirate issue [↩]
3. I should start taking notes, because I am such crap with names. [↩]
4. Campbell nominee and author of Acacia [↩]
5. I am guilty of causing one of those tangents [↩]
6. not the award-winning puppeteer [↩]