Fantasycon 2014 - York

This weekend I attended my first Fantasycon convention; I've been to a few cons now but this was the first 'overnighter' and so I was slightly nervous as I am often am in groups of people I don't know. But it helped that I knew good friends from other cons were going to be there, in particular my fellow 'failed to find an Indian restaurant in Birmingham' partners Mark West, Phil Ambler, and Steve Byrne, who I knew could be relied on to draw me out of my shell if needed. (Backup plan: beer.) But any nerves were misplaced for it was one of the most friendly, welcoming events I've been to, and all the people I met or re-met over the course of the weekend made it so.

Some specific highlights:

Book Launch: No One Gets Out Alive by Adam Nevill
What I was saying about people above? Adam Nevill is a case in point - a thoroughly friendly and welcoming guy, and fellow Robert Aickman fan to boot. (Anyone who likes Aickman is alright in my book.) Adam's one of the most successful horror writers out there at the moment, and I'm a big fan of his work, so a chance to get a signed copy of his new book well before release day was too good to pass up.

A Tribute To Joel Lane
Unlike many people present, I never met Joel Lane, but his short stories were always excellent and if it wasn't for his tragically early death he would undoubtedly have been one of the authors I'd have spent ages trying to pluck up the courage to speak to. A number of authors including Simon Bestwick and Ramsey Campbell read from Joel's work and shared some memories of him. Despite the crap acoustics and loud people at the bar behind us, it was a really very special.

Reading: VH Leslie
VH Leslie's short stories are some of the finest I've read this year, a real class act. For this event she read her story Namesake  (you can find it in Best British Horror 2014) and her reading really brought out both the humour and the unease in the tale. I was lucky enough to get the chance to chat with Victoria a couple of times over the weekend; another damn friendly fellow writer.

Book Launch: The Spectral Book of Horror Stories
This was by far the most packed event I attended, and no surprise: the number of authors who were present to sign the book was massive, the signatures & messages in mine not even all fitting onto one page. Here I said hello to online friends Alison Littlewood and Stephen Volk for the first time in person, and finally overcame my stuttering awe to tell Ramsey Campbell what an inspiration he was and is.

Book Launch:The End by Gary McMahon
There was so much going on on the Saturday, but no way was I going to miss the book launch for a new Gary McMahon book. No way. Regular readers will already know how good I think his work is. I also got the chance to buy a copy of his forthcoming chapbook from Knightwatch Press, The Night Just Got Darker directly from Gary in the bar. Given the prices in the con bar, I think it was the cheapest thing I actually purchased in there...

Book Launch: Boo Books/Knightwatch
This was the event where I read from The Place Where It Always Rains from Worms, which seemed to go okay. There were also readings from K.T. Davies (a pleasure to meet, as always), Simon Bestwick (ditto), Allen Ashley, and Reggie Oliver reading Anna Taborksa's stories from Worms.

Food:the weekend also didn't disappoint on this score. Two fabulous pub lunches in The Maltings, which was an nice old fashioned pub (with decoration that included an old sign about where to get treated for VD). A scrumptious evening meal in The Yak & Yeti, apparently Britain's only Gurkha restaurant. And a Saturday curry organised by Phil, where the only thing bigger than the size of the guest-list was the size of the naan breads. Epic naan.

More People: I probably won't remember everyone, but in addition to those above it really was great to chat to Steve Mosby, Jim McLeod, Johnny Mains, Lynda E Rucker, Ruth Booth, Stephen Bacon, Ross Warren, Alex Davis, Terry Grimwood, Paul Holmes, Dion Winton-Polack, Neil Snowden, Sue Moorcroft, Steve Chapman, Neil Williams, Graeme Reynolds, Simon Marshall Jones, Christopher Teague, Robert Shearman, Dave Jeffery, Adele Wearing, Jasper Bark, John Travis...

If I've not mentioned you it's due to my own crapness, don't worry. Or because your pass was on the wrong way round when we spoke, or because you were someone I met exclusively between the hours of 1am and 3am on the Saturday when things were a bit hazy. And speaking of Saturday night:

A Summing Up: The penultimate song at the Fantasycon disco was Elbow's One Day Like This, which finishes with the repeated refrain Throw those curtains wide, One day like this a year would see me right. Which about sums it up - writing can be a lonely business, with the doubts and rejections and long nights, and even the most sympathetic non-writing friend or family member is unlikely to want to talk about our weird stories for more than a few minutes at a time... So chances like this to speak to fellow writers and editors and reviewers feel like something really special to me now, a chance to recharge my creative batteries and go back into the real world all fired up. A chance to remember how lucky I am to be part of a genre I love in some small way.

Okay, the lyrics don't quite fit, but yes: days like this, and all you fab people - you see me right.

Fantasycon 2014 - Reading

It's my first Fantasycon this year, which I'm immensely excited about. And I'm also very pleased to say that as part of it I'll be reading from my story The Place Where It Always Rains as part of a combined launch for Worms, X7, and After The Fall.

It will take place at 7pm on the Saturday, and as well as me they'll also be readings from:

Simon Bestwick
K.T. Davies
Mike Chinn
Anna Taborska

so it should be a great event. Hope to see some of you there, or just about generally over the course of the weekend. I'm shy as heck during these kind of things, so do come over and say hi!

Fantasycon 2014 book launches.

Edge-Lit 3...

This year's Edge-Lit was a convention of firsts for me for a number of reasons, the main one being that I was actually on the bill, albeit in a small way - Worms from Knightwatch Press was being launched at the convention, and I was scheduled to read from my story The Place Where It Always Rains. Of which more later.

It was also the first convention where I'd specifically arranged to meet people there - indeed within 2 seconds of walking through the door I'd bumped into Phil Ambler. After signing in and getting our goody bags we went to the cafe at The Quad where we briefly caught up with Paul Holmes from The Eloquent Page. 

Phil and I then headed up to the first panel we liked the sound of - Ghost Stories Today with Andrew Barker, Johnny Mains, Marie O'Regan and Niki Valentine. This was certainly interesting, with the conversation referencing many of my favourite stories and authors, including The Turn Of The Screw, Dark Matter, The Willows and Afterwards. For me, those was a slightly awkward part where members of the audience were invited to share whether they had ever seen a ghost in real life, and one lady told a story about her child dying, but moderator Johnny Mains handled it really well.

After that, we finally meet up with Mark West and Steve Harris/Byrne, who introduced us to Alison Davies, John Travis, and Christopher Teague. Phil, Mark, Steve, John and I headed down for a few drinks, and we exchanged stories about the worst rejection letters/emails we'd received in the same manner as that scene in Jaws when they're talking about shark bites.

Mark West, Alison Davies, me, and Phil Ambler.

Then back upstairs for a slightly unusual event - Theresa Derwin (who runs Knightwatch) was having her head completely shaved to raise money for a cancer charity, as well as auctioning off a few books.The fact that she had the guts to do this, not even getting in too much of a flap when the cutters ran out of power, certainly put any nerves I was feeling about having to do my first ever reading into perspective.

Then a few of us went out for a quick lunch, our gang now including Richard Farren Barber and Ross Warren. Somehow we ended up in a cafe that did pensioner specials and cheap liver & onions. Myself and Phil then had to hoof it back to The Quad in order to be in time for our reading - it was also Phil's first time, reading from his story in the Potatoes anthology. The Worms launch and my own reading seemed to go really well, at least as far as I could tell. Phil did a good job too, although I think we both felt upstaged by KT Davies (who it was lovely to meet again) and her excellent reading from Worms; she did different voices and funny swearing and everything. Now the reading was done I helped myself to the free launch wine and olives, as well as signing a few copies of worms. My handwriting is truly shit, so I drew a little worm cartoon character in each copy too.

Then it was back down to the bar again for more drinks and chatting - we met up with Paul M Feeney, and I also had a nice talk with Andrew Barker about his book The Electric. Then it was time for the raffle - we didn't win as many prizes as at Andromeda One, but on the plus side that meant we weren't scared of being lynched on the way out this time.

Phil had to leave at this point, which left the rest of ready for 'Operation Curry' - we found somewhere that had been recommended and had a lovely, if slightly pricey meal. It was a nice end to the day, talking about books and drinking beer and eating nice food, with friends both old and new.

'Operation Curry'

Despite not having superhuman luck in the raffle this time, I still came back with a fair few books, including The Electric by Andrew Barker, Best British Horror 2014, Potatoes, a Gary McMahon novella The Harm, and of course Worms.

"Events, Dear Boy, Events"

So this is cool: two books that I have stories in are being launched this month, and pleased to say I'll be at both events:

First up it's Worms from KnightWatch Press, edited by Alex Davis - Worms is being launched at this year's Edge-Lit convention at Derby on the 19th July. It contains my story The Place Where It Always Rains.

Secondly, my story The Man In Blue Boots will appear in Hauntings from Hic Dragones; Hauntings will be launched on the 31st July at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation in Manchester - I am assured there will be free wine...

Be lovely to see any and all readers of this blog in person, so if you're at either event do say hi.

Edited 10/07: the other writers who will be reading are: Tracy Fahey, Mark Forshaw, Hannah Kate, Sarah Peploe, Michael Hitchins, Daisy Black and Rachel Halsall. Although it's a free event it would be helpful to the publisher if you could register via the thingy below. And yes there's definitely free wine.

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