060: kaffeeklatsch
Hullo.
Mum update: she hasn't got the last newsletter, so presumably has been eaten alive by the spam-filter or she hasn't approved it, which means we're safe to swear. Phew.
Contents!
Back To The Start
A Hive Of Scum And Hammery
Catlap
FCBDiary
To The North
Linky
Byeeeee!
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The second issue of Mothering Invention drops, which is all manner of eventful. I'm looking forward to writing the notes on it, as a lot has been coming for a long time. It's less Chekov's gun and more Chekov's armoury after a determined cold war arms race with a rival power. Lots of the final stages of structural calculus coming into play.
Er... that's just how I talk. Stuff goes boom. There is also one moneyshot I've been waiting four years to see.
Preview here. Available from shops, comixology and direct from Image.
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There's a bunch happening in a Galaxy Far Far Away (as conveyed to you by the medium of comics) this week. The third issue of Mutiny On Mon Cala arrives, which is a somewhat playful heist as we build towards disaster and shapechanging actor Tunga hams it up incredibly. Preview here.
It's also the release of the first trade collection of the run, THE ASHES OF JEDHA. It's the seventh volume in the Star Wars run, but it's designed to be a clean jumping on part. Like all my runs, it's conceived as a novel, so if you want to jump aboard, here's the place to do so.
It's best described as the cast of a New Hope getting a chance to deal with the aftermath of Rogue One. As such, it's bleak and emotional, while obviously involving Stuff Going Boom.
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This newsletter is being slowed down by Lemon's refusal to leave my lap. It's possible it may go out until Thursday.
Oh god, now she's done the roll onto her side thing and is impossibly cute. We're doomed.
Yes, we're doomed. This is going out Thursday.
(The gig was Shangela who basically did her Drag Race Writer Notes as comedy. It was very Ascended Fangirl.)
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I was at Eastercon this weekend, which was called Follycon this year. I was guest of honour, which is a little embarrassing, as it's the first Eastercon I've attended, and that's a little like refusing to turn up to a dinner party until they promise to throw you a parade.
Well, maybe not, but that's me. I am propelled by guilt. In reality, it's a case that Eastercon is primarily a literary science fiction con rather than a comics one. Specifically Eastercon is the British national science fiction convention, that's been running since 1948. This makes it the 69th. I managed to go the entire weekend without making a joke, which I suspect counts as character growth.
There is shockingly little crossover between traditional literary sci-fi conventions and comic conventions. They're simply different beasts. Comic conventions are primarily commerce driven – people sell comics there. Comic creators go there to meet fans and sell comics. Conversely, Literary cons have at least comparatively little commerce, and take a often-academic panel-and-social-model. Both have heavy use of the bar, though there's more Real Ale notes.
I suspect it's born of each medium's backgrounds. The comic scene simply didn't have retailers that covered the indie scene to a full degree for a while. As such, turning up to a show may be your only chance to grab many books easily. Conversely, Science-fiction and Fantasy have primarily existed inside the ecosystem of traditional publishing – as such, cons become about other things, not least bringing the tribal and communion aspects forward. Nine Worlds, which is cross-media but primarily based upon a Literary con model has confused quite a few comic creators who don't see the point. “How do you make money?” is the question – and that's born of people being in a system where that's what cons are for.
So it's a different mode, so I wasn't sure if I was going to get on with it. It's four days in a mansion up in the North. It could have turned into the Shining.
This was not the case. I enjoyed myself to a huge extent, and hope I'll be attending next year as a punter. It's not a surprise – I love Nine World, low-stage punk rock, egalitarianism and anything which reduces the distance between human beings. But still – I loved it even more than I hoped. I left, tired and happy. Admittedly, I feel the tired 50% of that all the time, but the happy was fun new notes.
My selection of panels speaks to the con's breadth. I was on a Mechanics vs Theme in games panel. I was on a 200th anniversary of Frankenstein panel. I was on a adapting the classics panel. I was on a working with Artists panel. I was on a Form Versus Content panel. No two panels had any material that overlapped in the slightest, with the exception of my spotlight panel where Roz Kaveney interviewed me across our mutual interests. That was easy, as when you're Roz, that's basically the entire of the human experience.
The other guests of Honour speak too its character. Kim Stanley Robinson (Who I had the least chance to actually meet), Nnedi Okorafor (Whose Lagoon I had finally got around to reading in the lake preceding, and managed to avoid gushing about it) and Christina Lake (Who was the fan guest of honour – which says a lot about how this model of con works.) Christina and Doug Bell also joined me in my own adventure into the heart of darkness.
We DJed.
Christina and Doug had never done it before, so I was training them live in the art of “pressing play” and “cross-fading” close to live. Of all the things I was doing, it was the one I was least confident about. I can comfortably sit on a panel and have opinions. I was professionally opinionated for fifteen years, y'know? But as much as I love playing music for people, so much of it is just the act of curating. With a crowd I know, I can play to them, and what they want. But Eastercon isn't my crowd. I had no idea if any of my usual blows would land. This was especially worrying in that it is a much older (and wider) crowd than my usual gigs. That's best shown by the Kaffeeklatsch I was on. Kaffeeklatsch is i) a word I failed to pronounce correctly even once ii) a forma-casual social gathering where you get together with a bunch of con-goers around a table and just chat. I liked the structure a lot – once again, making things a bit more human, but the age-spread was from 15 to 70. However, generally speaking, it's a con where I'd say the over-sixties outnumber the under twenties. The real ale was me foreshadowing that.
I suggest Christina and Doug go first for many reasons, but certainly including Gathering Information On What People Want. They lean a early-new-wave and 80s-post-punk set. Hell, Magazine's Shot By Both Sides goes down well, which is a song I love, but never play out of fear. So I'm putting together a set that skews a little earlier in my music love than I usually do. However, I have to perform a few experiments. I split the difference and go for a 2010 Robyn Call Your Girlfriend, press play and observe. It works. I then decide whether to use that as my basis, or press it further. I go to Azealia Banks' 212. It works. I laugh, and with my critical sensors aligned, I basically engage in my typical set, though I wimp out of playing Clear My Throat which I've been dying to.
It's an odd feeling that despite everything else I did in the con, when I was playing records I felt I most actively useful. Which probably says more about me than the con.
I met a bunch of people, some I knew already vaguely and others only through their work, plus veterans from many cons. I would segue into a list, but I suspect this has just cemented my reading list for the next six months, so I'll be mentioning people as and when I hit their work. There's a lot of new books I have to read from people I met. Or saw on panels. Hell, there's an author I want to read because they had such amazing shoes. Much reading.
(Don't under-estimate the power of shoes for sales. I'm not sure if I didn't wear the evil-Ruby-Slippers for the WicDiv announcement whether that book would have been a hit. Admittedly, at the time, it did feel that the articles were “Kieron Gillen announced new shoes (also, comic.)”
Finally, I'd like to say the con itself couldn't have welcomed me more. I was humbled with every interaction.
Oh – I also managed to squeeze in a playtest for the role-playing game I'm working on. Have I mentioned that I'm developing one? I don't think so, though I suspect some of you may have read between the lines.
Much like the con, it went incredibly well.
In conclusion: I like the company of real-ale drinkers.
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What are you doing for Free Comic Book Day? We're doing this.
Come see.
Oh - GOSH has more events, as listed here.
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Paul Duffield, who you’ll probably best know as collaborating with Warren Ellis on Freakangels, has just started his Kickstarter for the physical edition of his The Firelight Isle. You can back it here. If you need more convincing, look at the bloody stuff on the kickstarter page, that’s what it’s for. If you need more convincing than that, here’s the quote I gave him: “Duffield brings you a world on paper, alive, bright, dark and inspiring. Support this for the best of all possible reasons - because I want a copy in trade, and if it doesn’t fund, I can’t have one.” That’s the sort of self-serving angle I like to take, as I am terrible. As said, go nose.
Image’s new set of theme covers is interesting on a formalist basis. It’s hailing colourists. Eight of them take the same image and do their magic on it, which shows exactly what they bring to the work. Go nose and flick through the gallery.
Talking about Kickstarters, was interested in this fulfilled one. See the twitter thread. Self-contained Ebook containing all 10,000 pages (count ‘em) pages of Fist of the Northstar. Stuff to think about.
I’m namedropped in this piece by Evan Narcisse over at io9, but don’t hold it against it. Journalist and Critic Evan is writing about his experience in writing comics versus consuming them, and what he got from that. This stuff is always just fascinating. Hearing Nnedi Okorafor talk about her parallel experiences on a panel at Follycon was similarly fascinating.
I strongly recommend watching CUNK ON BRITAIN before someone (possibly me) spoils the jokes by quoting them tediously in the pub.
When writing the intro stuff for the newsletter, I just lobbed up To The North, thinking I was nodding towards Electralane. Except I then realised I was actually referencing incredibly obscure Sunderland indide-band Spraydog’s best track. Ah, memories of pritstick and stealing printer herein for me.
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Work wise… well, it’s been a couple of weeks which started terribly and then picked up as I got my head together by the simple method of going out and staying out too late at Tara Ex-Titan’s leaving party. I am a simple human. Still, work is pummeling, and I’m only just on top of my deadlines. That eases again shortly, but until the end of the week, it’s hard.
It remains hard for everyone else on WicDiv as well. I’ll tell you how the next issue is going next time – we genuinely have hired a researcher for it, which has been a fascinating experience. We’re also just about to finish our strip for the Where We Live benefit anthology. Dee Cunnliffe is going to colour Jamie’s pages, and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou to handle the lettering. Which reminds me Hassan has just dropped a new issue of beautiful comics craft journal Panel x Panel, which is always worth your attention.
In short, the end.
Byeeeeee!
Kieron Gillen
London
5.4.2018