Notes on the Inaugural Meeting of the Humber SFF Society

Me reading.

I do like the word "inaugural", and it's not often I get to use it, even less often I get to use it correctly.  So that made it all the more of a pleasure to be invited to read at the inaugural event of the new Hull based genre meet-up group Humber SFF, along with fellow author Daniel Godfrey, whose Titan debut New Pompeii came out a mere couple of months ago.

It occurs to me only now that I've inaugurated two of these things now; I'm pretty sure I read at the first York event too, which is nice but makes me feel kind of old.  (Although, at least I got to type inaugurated, so that's something.)  Anyway, this one was put together by the brilliant Shellie Horst, with a great deal of energy and enthusiasm and the common sense to realise that Beverley would provide a much nicer venue than Hull would.  (In fairness, this may have something to do with the fact that Shellie lives in Beverley.  Still, credit where it's due.)  The Monk's Walk pub was very cool and medieval, as you can sort of see in the pictures, though a bit on the noisy side.  I suspect Daniel got the worst of that, but his reading still got me excited for New Pompeii - because who doesn't love time travelling Romans? - and afterwards I regretted not buying a copy when I had the chance.

Daniel Reading.

For my part I read from my soon to be announced next novel - code-named Super Secret Project Andromeda for no other reason than that's the name I just made up - instead of The Sign in the Moonlight and Other Stories like how I was supposed to.  But no one seemed to mind and I had fun, because I've been itching to field test this one for a while now.  I'm comfortable enough with these reading things now that I've started trying to differentiate the characters a little, and of everything I've written Super Secret Project Andromeda is just right for that, because it's absolutely all about the characters.  At any rate, people seemed to enjoy it, and I got some good questions afterwards, which is always nice.

Of course, about half of those questions came from Alex Bardy, who you may know as the raconteur and dilettante behind the York incarnation of these things, or from one of the other hats he wears; oh, and while I remember, Alex, huge thanks for giving me a lift home!  Generally it was a good crowd, and I got talking to some interesting people, whose names I of course immediately forgot - but at least one of whom I think I persuaded to give this year's Fantasycon a go, so that's something.

Hopefully this will be the first of many meetings for Humber SFF, and I urge anyone who's at all interested to give the next one a try, this and the similar groups in York and Sheffield are always a great deal of fun.  I'd also suggest that you pick up a copy of New Pompeii, from what I heard it sounds very good indeed.  And while I can't exactly encourage you to buy Super Secret Project Andromeda, at least not until it gets announced under its actual, proper title, I may as well end by pointing out that you can pick up my collection The Sign in the Moonlight and Other Stories in paperback, e-book and hardback.

Upcoming Appearances

I haven't been out and about quite as much as I'd have liked this year, because money basically, and I'm sad to be missing my first Nine Worlds this weekend - everyone have fun without me, and please spare no thought for me slaving away at a hot word processor! - but I do have a couple of things coming up that are worth a mention.

First up, I'll apparently be on a panel at Fantasycon-by-the-Sea.  It's called Wanted: Dead or Alive and the topic is "Is the anti-hero the new hero in fiction?"  To which the answer is, of course, no, and so I suspect that myself, Adrian Faulkner, Carrie Buchanan, Neil Williamson and Georgia Duffy will just use the question as a springboard to discuss how neat anti-heroes are, because anti-heroes are definitely neat.  I should probably talk about Easie Damasco, but I suspect I'll get distracted by Dime, the protagonist of my current edit-in-progress, a glorious son of a bitch who makes poor old Easie look like a good Samaritan by comparison.

But Fantasycon isn't for a couple of months, and my other event is a whole lot sooner: two weeks away, in fact.  That would be the inaugural meet of Humber SFF, which I'm honoured to be one of the two guest speakers at, along with Daniel Godfrey, whose debut New Pompeii came out just a couple of months ago.  There aren't many things that would lure me so close to the city of my birth, but I'm looking forward to this: Shellie Horst has been organising with a deal of enthusiasm and I'm a fan of the template set for these things by the similar events in York and Sheffield (and isn't it time for another one of those?)  I'm supposed to be reading from my collection The Sign in the Moonlight and Other Stories, but I did that at Edgelit, and now I have a longing to go instead with something from my unannounced next novel and then swearing everyone to secrecy afterwards.  So that's one more reason to come along, together with the fact that the Hull area is long overdue a group like this and it's in a pub - a really good pub, from what I hear - and that Daniel's book sounds particularly interesting: you might get to hear a chapter from a work in progress that doesn't officially exist yet, unless I chicken out and just go with a story from Sign in the Moonlight like I'm meant to.

Anyway, the details are here - wait, is that a real deer's head? - but basically it's a case of being at The Monks Walk pub in Beverley at 4pm on Saturday the 27th of August and then drinking alcoholic beverages and listening to writer words, followed by more drinking alcoholic beverages and hanging out with like-minded folks.  Hopefully I'll see you there.