WorldCon Dublin 2019—comments
Dublin was the first Worldcon I’ve attended—in truth I attend very few of these conventions. Given how much fun I had, I’m now wondering whether I shouldn’t attend them more frequently. 4000 people were supposed to attend, but 5500 came (6000 by some reckonings). A second building had to be hired at the last minute to accommodate the multitudes. We all discovered, quite early, that if you didn’t start queueing for an event early enough, you wouldn’t get in. There was a vast number of fascinating talks and discussions on every topic imaginable—and some not imaginable—and a wonderful concert, in a concert hall on top of the conference centre, with a full orchestra, that included a premier of some arias from a wonderful new opera with dance, composed and choreographed by my friends Gary Lloyd and Bettina Carpi, respectively, and based on Mary and Bryan Talbot’s graphic novel, Dotter of Her Father’s Eyes.
My old chum, Alan Campbell, accompanied me on this expedition—he had two trilogies published some years back with some success, but has been writing film scripts and part of my agenda was to encourage him to write a few more books.
I met a lot of old friends, and made new ones. I met some of my fans—which is always a delight.
People who have been going to conventions since before the Flood tell me that they are not what they used to be. I would be interested to know if you attend these conventions and, if so, what do you get out of them?
Would that be the Alan Campbell who wrote SEA OF GHOSTS and THE ART OF HUNTING? I need the third book now! He is an AWESOME writer! If I had known he was there I would have brought my copies of his books.
yes indeed, that is the very Alan Campbell that I know! He’s the one who made the comment below… I shall give him a kick and tell him to come here and talk to you…
tell me, did you have any problems at all this time putting a comment here?
Thanks! 🙂
No, it worked without a hitch this time!
great! I’m sure you must have come here because you received a notification from my site… so, please, ignore what I wrote on facebook and I shall stop stalking you now 🙂
Cheers, Martin. I’ll sign them next time, I promise.
The Gravedigger Chronicles is amazing — fingers crossed for the third book! I even have two different editions of SEA OF GHOSTS since I decided to upgrade to HC after I got the PB. (I’ve got the Deepgate Codex too, but Gravedigger Chronicles is by far my favourite of your works.) Good luck with future writing!
Yes. Great fun, fab friends, and grand beer. And Dublin is wonderful. Whenever you take a bar and surround it with people who have similar interests and don’t need to get up early the next day for work, it’s always a good recipe.