An Evening with Daniel Abraham

So last night Daniel Abraham was in Phoenix for his first ever book tour (a momentous one-stop tour) at The Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale, Arizona (lots of signed books available from there). I managed to tweak my schedule to attend – and I’m glad I did. I got my books signed and chatted with him in a pretty interment round-table setting for nearly 2 hours. Daniel is fun, interesting, funny and very smart guy who was a joy to talk with for a couple of hours. Most of the event is actually available on a web-cast if you’re interested. It covers a lot of ground from his background, the Clarion workshop, to writing, to e-books, to various author stories (including what authors bitch about at the bar), the books, and more. Daniel and I (and another attendee Raul) sort of started the conversation 30-minutes early and that was great (and not covered by the webcast). We talked about the books and quite a bit about the transfer from Tor books to Orbit books. It was a frank and informative conversation and one I’ll not share all of the details for – but Daniel views the move as a great opportunity for his career and I couldn’t agree more. The rest of the interview was at times frustrating since the bookstore employee felt the need to lead the discussion and cover the talking points on his note cards – since he hadn’t actually read any of Daniel’s writing much of that was the generic stuff that always gets asked, that so many find interesting, yet bores me.

Anyway, go watch the webcast – it’s nearly an hour and half long, so there is a lot to see. Oh, and go buy Daniel’s books – I really enjoyed The Dragon’s Path (The Book Depository, Powell's Books, Indiebound) and will make sure that I read more of his books.

Good Times for the Arizona SFF Fan

Living in Arizona I can say that we have few SFF events that I consider worth my time to attend. Even though Phoenix is one of the largest cities in the country, it’s a fly-over for most book tours, conventions are small, book fairs short on SFF authors, and there isn’t really a good bookstore that specializes in SFF books to attract events. The Poisoned Pen makes a reasonable effort, but its focus is mystery with only a handful of SFF events in a year. But, for Arizona SFF fans, times are good with a few upcoming events that I know I’ll try to attend.

First up on Wednesday, May 12th at The Poisoned Pen, there will be a book release party for Sam Sykes, whose debut book, Tome of the Undergates, was just released in the UK by Gollancz and will be released later this fall in the US from Pyr (Book Depository, Powell’s Books, Indiebound). Only the import will be available, but come on out and support Sam – even if he will probably swear at you. I hope to be there.

This weekend starting on Thursday, May 13th and going through Sunday, May 16th will be the local SFF convention, LepreCon 36. While its focus is on SFF art, there is an impressive list of authors who will be in attendance – George R.R. Martin (Author Guest of Honor, Sam Sykes, Emma Bull (who is the Musical Guest of Honor), Melinda Snodgrass, Michael A. Stackpole and quite a few other authors that are local to the area and/or part of Martin’s Wild Cards team. And with Martin as the Author Guest of Honor, the local members of the Brotherhood Without Banners are planning fun, drinks, and the usual shenanigans. I will be at least some of these events – I’m just waiting on the con to finalize a schedule so I can coordinate with work and family and figure what I can attend.

And finally over Memorial weekend is the Phoenix Comicon from May 27-30th. This year they have an impressive line-up of the usual suspects for these sorts of events, including Stan Lee, Felicia day, James Marsters, Ray Park, Levar Burton, John Schneider, Wil Weaton, Mike McFarland, and many others. They also have author guests that include John Scalzi, Diana Gabaldon, Michael A. Stackpole, Sam Sykes, and others. I doubt I’ll make it to this one, but it sounds like a good time.

So, get out of the basement, support Arizona SFF events and have a good time!