September Events at Side Quest
Hail and well met, questlings!
Now, in a shocking and upsetting turn of events, September is somehow right around the corner. I don’t seem to be able to do anything about that, so I’m attempting to cope by shoving all of these event pages out the door and then staunchly ignoring them until we’re past the Side Fest. (Haven’t heard about that? It’s the festival that we’re throwing for our first bookstore birthday! There’s so much happening! So many shenanigans! Join us!)
So behold: September’s line-up! (Note: the incredible campaigns and one-shots run by Worlds 4 All will have their event pages live tomorrow morning — follow their Humanitix page to be the first to get access to those!)
Now, there are a number of events called out here that don’t require tickets (or at least not tickets from us), but they’re things we’re doing that we wanted to shout about anyway.
Calmer Con Boston! This is an incredible event put on by the lovely folks at the Boston Comic Arts Foundation. It’s a comic/gaming/pop-culture event geared towards neurodivergent kids and teens, and we couldn’t be more honored and excited to be helping out and vending at this year’s con! We’ll be running some D&D character creation workshops and other games in their RPG room, and we’ll also have a table full of nerdy goodies in the vendor alley. For more info on Calmer Con, check out their website.
The Knight Market Carnaval with Brighton Bazaar at the Charles River Speedway! It’s been a hot minute since we’ve done a big market pop-up like this, but I mean, it’s knight-themed. We couldn’t possibly pass it up! If you’re down near Allston-Brighton, come say hi. We’ll be curating our selection to be especially knightly/dragon-y/medieval-y.
FLUFF FEST! If you’re not familiar with this quirky Somerville event, well, you’re in for a treat. Fluff (the marshmallow stuff) was invented right here in Union Square, and for the past twenty years, literally tens of thousands of people have descended on our little patch of Somerville to celebrate all things sticky and sweet. While we want actual Fluff literally as far away as possible from our books and games, Bow Market always goes all out for this, and it’s honestly an absolute blast. I have no idea if we’ll have specials or discounts or some kind of merch thing for this, but you should swing by, if only for the spectacle of it all.
OKAY NOW ON TO THE LINKS. These will all be behind a password until 11am tomorrow (Friday). That password is “sidequestseptember” — very secure, I know. Guard it and use it well, my trusty newsletter folk.
9/2: How to Open a Bookstore. A panel discussion with me, Mila from Narrative and Christina from All She Wrote. Hosted at Upstairs at Bow.
9/5: Game Night, “Sign: A game about being understood.” Run by GM Paula.
9/10: Game Night, “Unincorporated.” A beginner-friendly role-playing game about petty small-town drama. Run by GM Chi.
9/12: Game Night, “Dark AcaD&D.” A Dungeons & Dragons one-shot of desperately tortured souls. Run by DM Caroline.
9/16: Book Club, “The Bewitching,” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.
9/19: The Side Quest PowerPoint Party! Bring your hottest takes and your coldest shade. You must have a ticket to pitch a presentation. 21+ event.
9/23: Game Night, “The Witch of Westmoreland.” A tarot-based Arthurian game of grave wounds and dangerous forests. Run by GM Caroline.
9/25: Stage-Craft Cinema, “Shakespeare In Love.” BYO craft, 21+ event.
9/26: Game Night, “Brindlewood Bay.” A beginner-friendly role-playing game of cozy mystery and eldritch horror. Run by GM Cam.
9/28: Solo RPG Journaling Night. Vote on the game everyone will play (alone, together). Play it and discuss! Game and materials included in the ticket.
9/30: Book Club with author Melissa Caruso, “The Last Soul Among Wolves.”
Truly none of this feels actually real, because my entire brain-space is taken up by the August events still to come — plus my family’s imminent house move. (It’s fine, I’m fine, everything’s fine.) But I’m glad to get next month’s events out to you, my dear newsletter readers, so we can start getting hype about them together!
May colder weather be upon us soon,
Caroline