Just in from Boskone...

...And I'm posting to let you all know that I had a *GREAT* time. Longer post to come after midnight, when I'm listening to Radio Zero-One; I've got e-mail to read/reply to and a Tinkertoy to tinker with.

An Exile soulbonder at Boskone

Wheee!! I think I had more fun this year than I did last year, but of course last year, I was pressuring myself to find a literary agent and then flogging myself for not finding one.

This year... I actually managed to get to and from Boston on the T without any little glitches in transit (Last year, I got off at the wrong stop and had to hop back on). Attended a nifty little panel discussion on Jane Austen and science fiction, how her millieu is practically an alien civilization compared to our own age, and how it isn't much of a stretch to write fantasy set in that sort of world. Also a very lively panel discussion on graphic novels and where they're headed, featuring among other people, Teresa Nielsen Hayden, who's edited some of Neil Gaiman's stuff. Ooh, heard *THE* best one-man filk minstrel, Steve MacDonald: He did one crazy lullaby about "The Demons Under Your Bed", and a Harry Potter filk based on "Pinball Wizard", and one really touching one he'd written for his fiancee; wish I remember the words, but it was something about wandering the earth until he'd found her and how finding her was like coming home.

Thus I just *had* to get one of his CDs in the dealers' room... And this year's Boskone tee-shirt, which features this lovely painting of an android with a dune and a cityscape behind him... and a pile of books including:

--Neil Gaiman's "Stardust", which I've been meaning to get (faire_damsel, you'd love this book: I highly, highly reccommend it!), also his audio collection of children's stories and "Tales from the Dream Trade", which includes his "American Gods" weblog and a bunch of his introductions to several different books by other people (This one is hard to come by, since only the New England Science Fiction Association published it).

--The other three "Chicks in Chain Mail" collections put together by Esther Friesner. I utterly *LOVED* the first one, so I had to get the next three. What a hoot!

--Terry Pratchett's "Lords and Ladies", which I've been wanting to read ever since Puck used an extensive quote from it in one of her DegSep fics.

And I got some info from an LARP group in the area: seems they're a wildly mixed genre -- medieval, space opera, cyberpunk, one guy even plays a caveman! I asked if there was room in there for a machine intelligence, and the guy in charge told me they had a few characters like that, but unfortunately said MIs are TEH BAD GUIZ!!!11111 Grr... well, if I ever join, I'll see if I can't turn that around a little.

As I said, I was costuming as Flood: at least three people commented on my costume, but -- perhaps thankfully! -- no one recognized who I was supposed to be (Last thing I need is to have some Zion wackies or "rusty Toasters" chase me down a hallway). But one gal did say, "The gloves really help make the costume". Just as well that I didn't dress as Death: I spotted two gals dressed up as her.