E-Publishing: It used to be that aspiring small-press authors would print off chapbooks of sample chapters of their latest novel and give them away at SF conventions. Nowadays it's floppies. I have no intention of using one of them in my computer but I took a sample floppy from the freebie table as a new type of collectible.

     Meanwhile, at a panel, David Drake mentioned that he thinks too many authors are fretting needlessly about  fiction posted on the Web, or people charging for Website access.  He said it was a form of road rage not worth it to get excited over. "Walk away," he said. Life is too short to be consumed by anger over minor things.

     The Shire: Anthony Swithin made this presentation, a reconstruction of the geography and socioeconomics of the Lord of the Rings books. This included geological maps with fault lines and sedimentology, using Swithin's experience as a  professional geologist. Not that hard to do either; many people don't realize that every mountain range has its fault lines, and if an author mentions in passing that a character fell off a ledge of limestone, you can immediately identify the past history of that mountain. (Limestones are marine rocks, therefore any cliff of limestone was once a seabed  subsequently uplifted by tectonic movements on a geological fault.) From there, Swithin went on to discuss his own books, part of  the Rockall series. He based the geography of this series on his native Shrewsbury, England, and his knowledge of  geology.   

     Guest Of Honor Speeches: The speeches were brief, unremarkable, and not worth reporting. What struck me was that the most science fictional moment of the entire convention occurred at the beginning of the speeches. Toastmaster Cliff Samuels asked audience members to please turn off their cellphones. About half the audience reached for their pockets or purses. Go back to the first SF convention in the world, back in 1936 in Leeds, England, and those attendees would have agreed  that pocket-sized communicators were real SF, right up there with aircars and lunar colonies. Now we take them so much for  granted that convention runners everywhere consider them as a part of the mundane world. Cellphones are science fiction!

     Things To Come: Next year's Con-Version will also be Canvention 22, at which the Prix Aurora Awards will be presented. The Auroras are Canada's equivalent of the Hugos. Con-Version 20 will be on the weekend of August 9-11, 2002.

Capclave
Beltsville, MD
September 28-30, 2001
Report by Martin Morse Wooster

"NO STUPID TERRORIST IS GOING TO RUIN MY CONVENTION." The signs were everywhere, at the first Washington, D.C. sf convention since the notorious 1997 Disclave. The convention even began with a group discussion of the tragedies of September 11. Then everyone ate chocolate and felt better.
     The terrorists did seem to have one major influence on Capclave; the approximately 150 attendees seemed determined to enjoy themselves. Indeed,  a good time was had by all.
     Capclave was held in the Sheraton College Park (which, fanhistorians should note, is  a different hotel than the Sheraton College Park that cancelled the 1998 Disclave). The organizers were determined that the convention would not be a revival of Disclave. Capclave was smaller, but had more programming--and more sf-related programming--than Disclaves had. Instead of a fancy program book, participants were given a pamphlet. And the giant "Discave" con suites of 1990s Disclaves were replaced with a pretty spartan con suite. (And there was no need to card anyone, since Capclaves had no beer.)
     Perhaps the most important difference between Disclaves and Capclaves is that Capclave is trying to be a literary sf convention, a smaller version of Readercon. Given that WSFA has, throughout its history, prided itself on being a party-oriented club indifferent or even hostile to sf, I didn't think they could pull off this transformation, but they did. There was one track of programming, and most of the programs were about science fiction. The small dealers room actually had five book dealers, and most reported good sales. The only media-related item was one Buffy panel; fewer than five of the members wore costumes. (Nor was there a video room or any other media-related activity.)
       The Disclaves of the 1990s were shrinking and ailing; a stronger con would have survived the 1997 debacle.  In contrast, most fans treated Capclave as if it were an old friend who had been in the hospital for a long time, but that everyone was happy to see become healthy again. The convention also served as a WSFA alumni reunion; among the former WSFAns who travelled great distances for the event were Kent Bloom, Jack Heneghan, and Elaine Normandy from Denver, and Avedon Carol and Rob Hansen from England. (No one I talked to had any problems with airlines in getting to Washington.)
       I didn't see many panels, but the ones I attended were pretty sharp. GoH Gardner Dozois was an amiable guest, participating in a funny interview with Michael Swanwick that was in part a live version of their recent book Being Gardner Dozois. Dozois also amiably awarded the prizes for the first 50 members to book rooms in the hotel.
     I also enjoyed a panel on science in sf that featured Catherine Asaro and Charles Sheffield. (Sheffield  noted that his novel Brother to Dragons not only featured a global economic collapse in 2001, but also predicted that the National Mall would be a fortress surrounded by barbed wire!)
     If WSFA keeps Capclave focused on sf and in the same hotel (Disclave's decline was in part due to being in five hotels in five years) they will have created a con worth savoring.   

Bouchercon 32
Arlington, VA
November 1-4, 2001
Report by Martin Morse Wooster

My father taught me many things, but one of them was that, when it came to popular entertainment, there was no boundary between genres. Sometimes sf hit the spot. Sometimes a mystery would do. Sometimes you read adventure novels. It all depended on what mood you were in.
     So I expected I would enjoy Bouchercon 32, the first Bouchercon I've been to in 15 years. And for the most part I had a good time. But the barrier between sf and mystery fans is much higher than it used to be.
     I only found one other local fan, Patrick McGuire, who decided to go to Bouchercon. Far more went to the World Fantasy Convention in Montreal, even though one convention was in another country and this one was a subway ride away. I found a few vestigial connections to sf, such as an essay in the program book by Len and June Moffatt about Anthony Boucher's widow, Phyllis White, who died in 2000. There were also two couples I met where the husband read sf and dutifully went along with his mystery-loving wife.
     The most surprising tie to our fandom, however, is that "Tuckerization" is now entering the language. I learned this because I overheard one conversation talking about who this Tucker fellow was. They thought he was an ornery fan who pestered the pros into putting him in their books. I did my part by telling them who Tucker was (and that his mysteries are quite good.)
     So what sort of convention was Bouchercon? Well, they're much larger than they used to be. The Bouchercon I went to in 1986 had 300 fans, and Bob Briney told me that a Bouchercon was like the Worldcon in the 1950s. But Bouchercons have grown much bigger, the 1997 one in Monterey was, with 2500 attendees, the largest. This year Bouchercon capped their registration at 1500, although I heard there were about 200 cancellations as result of September 11, and they were accepting some at-the-door registrations.
     Bouchercon also hired pros to run the dealer's room and organize the registration. They even contracted out the Anthony Awards (their version of the Hugos) to pros; winners got a Waterford crystal shaped like the Capitol Dome. Even the "hospitality lounge" only had hotel-supplied tea and coffee (which was paid for by New American Library.)
     The pros did about as well in running a convention as fans do, with the major exception of the Anthony Awards banquet, where some tables were reserved, some were partially-reserved, and some were open. But the pros forgot to tell many attendees (including me) about this peculiar seating scheme, leading to lots of yelling. They would have done better to have full tables reserved and some clearly set aside for fans without connections.
     But the end result of having a professionally-run "fan" convention was that it seemed quite cold and sterile. This feeling was enhanced by the fact that most of the panelists were mid-list writers who came to Bouchercon to sell! sell! sell! their books. Ninety percent of the fliers in the hospitality lounge were from authors trying to persuade you to buy their mysteries. Some of the gimmicks were appreciated; I enjoyed the Reese's peanut butter cups supplied by writer Alex Matthews. Other gimmicks were dumb, such as the writer who put little cards above the urinals saying, "Who the hell is (Jane Hack)."
     Bouchercon was very light on evening programming, but astonishingly opened the day with seven sessions at 8:30 a.m. One of those was the vampire panel, featuring Laurell Hamilton. But at that early hour, it was probably only attended by the undead. And if 8:30 a.m. was too late for you, there were a few breakfasts that began at 7:00 a.m.!
     But Bouchercon did get some things right. Someone had hypnotic power over the publishers; I came home with seven hardcovers, three trade paperbacks, two prozines, six paperbacks and one limited-edition short story, all in an attractive book bag. I thus came home with about $175 worth of books, easily recouping my $100 admission. In addition, Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine dedicated its December issue to Bouchercon, featuring stories by GoHs Edward D. Hoch and Peter Lovesey. (The Hoch story was set at Bouchercon.)
     I also liked the fact that in a Thursday evening ceremony for minor awards (the Barry and Macavity fan awards, and the Herodotus Award for historical mysteries) they also had a ceremony for all Anthony Award nominees. Each nominee got an attractive plaque.
     Some of the panels were interesting. The genre-busting Joe Lansdale was interviewed by Douglas Winter for an hour. Lansdale explained that he decided to write in all genres in part because of a childhood spent consuming large quantities of adventure fiction of all types. The youthful Lansdale was also impressed by Gene Autry and the Phantom Empire, which featured singing cowboys and giant robots. Lansdale revealed that one of the proudest moments in his career came after a Lone Ranger comic he wrote in which Tonto slugged the Lone Ranger on the first page (the Masked Man deserved it). But Rush Limbaugh featured the comic on his television show as proof of America's moral degeneracy.
     Also fun was a panel of mystery editors featuring three British crime editors (who accompanied 20 British writers.) All of the editors explained that they were free to reject what they pleased, but had to get approval from committees for anything they wanted to buy. The editors also revealed what sorts of mysteries they can't stand; one British editor can't stand American books where children suffered because both parents worked. St. Martin's crime editor Keith Kahla was bothered by mysteries "where the cat talks."
     All in all, I had a good time at Bouchercon. But I wish future Bouchercon organizers would attend some sf conventions. Bouchercon would be more fun if it was once again more fannish.
     Anthony Award Winners:
     Best Fan Publication: Mystery News, Chris Aldrich and Lynn Kaczmarek, eds.
     Best Non-Fiction/Critical Work: 100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century, Jim Huang, ed.
     Best Anthology/Short Story Collection: Master's Choice II, Lawrence Block, ed.
     Best Short Story: "The Problem of the Potting Shed," Edward D. Hoch
     Best Paperback Original: Death Dances to a Reggae Beat, Kate Grilley
     Best First Mystery: Death of a Red Heroine, Qiu Xiaolong
     Best Novel: A Place of Execution, Val McDermid

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