“We’re living in a time of walls,” said filmmaker Alex Rivera when introducing Sleep Dealer at the start of the 43rd Williamson Lectureship April 4-6, 2019 in Portales NM. “It’s a global obsession. How do we tell stories in such a world? In my film, I try to cross the consciousness of walls by looking at them, through them, and beyond them.”

Trans-border fantasies and nightmares were timely subjects for ...Read More

The 40th International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts (ICFA) took place March 13-16, 2019 at the Orlando Airport Marriot Hotel, with a theme of “Politics and Conflict.” Academics, writers, publishers, editors, artists, students, independent scholars, and more participated, with about 480 people attending (up from 457 last year) and about 285 either presenting a paper or appearing on a panel (down from 306 last year). G. Willow Wilson ...Read More

The 2019 Friends of Genre convention (FOGcon 9) was held March 8-10 at the Walnut Creek Marriot in Walnut Creek CA. 227 memberships were sold, plus an additional 61 day passes. The theme was “Friendship”, with honored guests Becky Chambers, Karen Joy Fowler, and Ursula K. Le Guin (posthumously).

Programming included 66 participants and 32 items, with panels on science, writing, publishing, literature, politics, and more, such as “Creating With ...Read More

The 44th World Fantasy Convention was held November 1-4, 2018 in the Renais­sance Baltimore Harborplace Hotel in windy and rainy Baltimore MD. Guests of honor were Kaaron Warren, Scott Edelman, Tom Kidd, and Michael J. Walsh, with special guest Aliette de Bodard, and toastmaster Linda D. Addison. Life Achievement Awards winners were Charles de Lint and Elizabeth Wollheim.

Attendance was up from the prior year, with 757 warm bodies and ...Read More

One of the perils of themed conventions, as most conventions in Israel are, is that the program might be one-dimensional. For a convention like ICon, which is aimed at large and diverse audiences, it can be particularly problematic. Avoiding this requires choosing the right theme combined with hard work of the programing team, and the ICon team did a great job this year. The theme, “Love,” meant that the possibilities ...Read More

Dragon Con 2018 was held August 30 – September 3, 2018 across five hotels in downtown Atlanta GA. There were roughly 80,0000 attendees, about the same as the 2017 event. Steven Barnes was the literary guest of honor, and Brom was the art show guest of honor. The scores of guests included numerous actors from genre films and television, screenwriters, video game creators, editors, and writers. SF writers on programming ...Read More

Readercon 29 was held July 12-15, 2018, in Quincy MA. Guests of honor were Ken Liu and Nisi Shawl; E. Nesbit was the memorial guest of honor. There were an estimated 740 attendees over the entire weekend. The focus of Readercon is “imaginative literature” – literary science fiction, fantasy, horror, and their intersections. Programming was, as always, carefully organized and curated, with topics ranging from casual book-club style discussions to ...Read More

WisCon 42 was held May 25-28, 2018 at the Concourse Hotel in balmy Madison WI, with Saladin Ahmed and Tananarive Due as guests of honor. 924 full memberships were sold, plus 71 single day memberships. Programming offered 140 panels, solo presentations, and roundtables, focused on SF/F literature, diversity, feminism, disability, criticism, and more. Other options included 19 reading slots with 68 authors, 23 writing workshops, 12 kids’ items, 10 gaming ...Read More