starpilotsix

Can we have a new stretch goal?: Tabletop, HARDCORE... a few games that aren't good introductory games but still a lot of fun. ;)

Big fan. I haven't ordered Echopraxia yet, but I will very soon.

So, some semi-random questions for you are, answer one or all or none if they strike your fancy.

1) Do you ever feel the dark allure of succumbing to market research and writing a YA-targetted dystopic SF in the hopes of turning it around into a blockbuster movie series?

2) Where do you see Canada in the next few decades?

3) You're granted the power to make or remove one law for the betterment of mankind, as you see it, that will remain in effect (to the abilities of the legal system to enforce it) for at least the next 50 years. What's your pitch?

4) Do more Toronto cons! I suppose that's not a question so much as a hope. But I'd like to see you.

5) Oh, speaking of Toronto cons reminded me, as one this week is celebrating the 25th anniversary, and you're a Canadian author, did you ever watch Prisoners of Gravity and imagine yourself being interviewed (or were you and I just never noticed)?

I already write Young Adult. At least, the stuff I write is no more challenging John Brunner or Stanislaw Lem, and I started reading both of those in my teens. Surely teens haven't got dumber since then?

Dumber? I don't think so, but more aggressively marketed to but only within a very small range of tropes: teen protagonists, coming of age, sometimes mary sue abilities, love triangles, etc. Possibly because it seems to work even better on attracting adults than kids and in getting adapted to movies.

But I think that there are certainly bright enough kids who not only can but want to read more challenging books, including yours, there's, now as then, a wide range of teens (and adults) who wouldn't unless it's perceived as being geared more towards their interests, only these days, there's a whole industry looking towards that demographic with hungry eyes and willing to take a risk in the hopes of becoming the next big thing.

Anyway, the question wasn't so much that I thought you should (though I enjoy a good YA now and then, and I'd certainly give it a look if you did) it just amused me to imagine publishers trying to egg you towards that market and I wanted to see if they had.

I dunno. I didn't have much fun at the last couple of Ad Astras I've been at, and last time I checked SFContario not only charged their panelists for the privilege of putting in time and effort, they weren't even equipped to take that money in any form other than straight cash. Polaris is way the fuck out in the boonies, and besides, they haven't invited me back since I refused to stop saying "fuck" on panels even after a particularly prudish woman objected.

That's a shame, but I certainly wouldn't want you somewhere you didn't enjoy. I didn't realize SFC made it so difficult to participate, that's crazy.

I know you've been at occasional SpecFic Colloquiums and if you continue that trend hopefully I'll catch you at one of them sometime (so far they've always been scheduled on days where I just didn't feel like going anywhere, or they didn't make it clear whether you can just pay at the door)

Are there any other local cons out there I should know about?

None that spring to mind, aside from Toronto Fan Expo which is this weekend (where they've got a panel celebrating PoG's 25th anniversary), but, they're really a SF celebrity/comics geared con, although in the SF side they have a few panels that might work with authors and have, on the guest list, a section for "SF Authors." However, they mostly seem to be either fairly low-profile or niche (RPG tie-in fiction, so they were probably already here for the Gaming part of the con), and they may well be a "pay for a table you can sit behind the whole con and maybe you can up your profile and sell a few books" type deal, which doesn't sound like your thing. I'm planning on bringing Blindsight anyway, for reading in the line, so you'll be there in spirit at least! :)

While I liked Embassytown a lot, I thought the whole "they have to listen to two voices speaking at once in order to understand and it has to be two real voices saying them at the same time and mentally linked... recordings/transmission are fine but as long as they're recordings of them doing that in exactly that way, not artificially generated! They can't listen to androids!" bit to be handwavy pseudo-fantasy that makes no real sense, about on the same level as "genes that code for luck." I mean, I can get past it, because, again, story was great, but it really hurt believability for me.

But then, I'm not a scientist, so maybe I just missed something subtle that makes it makes more sense.