Swecon, alias Fantastika 13, was indeed fantastic ... Belatedly, here's a massive thank-you to everyone there. Massive thanks to Carolina, to Eva who saved my life, Ebba, Helena, Thomas, Tomas and Rebecka.
Stockholm's SF bookshop, SF-Bokhandeln, is terrific, and Glenn and Mats in particular were great hosts. Thanks, guys! Hi to Nene and Lennart also... And in the rest of the convention, Matthias (who can read my books in any order he likes), Socialist-Simon (I will use my diacritics correctly from now on), to Dan and Rufus and Nina and Anna (Gable) and my old pals Anders and Bellis. The chat was great, the panels good fun, and the Dead Dog party wonderful. Did I mention that I love Stockholm?
Everyone was terrific, and I tried not to spend too much time hanging around with fellow Brits, but it was great to see Jo Walton, Mike Cobley, Lavie Tidhar, Iain Sale and John Berlyne, also Chris Barker (too late – you are a writer now). (Mike and I are now officially the oompa-loompas of SF. Apparently.) Back home, hats off to Suzy Jenner at my lovely publishers Gollancz, who flew me out there.
Finally hugs to Saija the Number One Fan Girl! (That's her in the picture.) Cheers to Eemeli... also to Cristal Huff. By sheer coincidence, this where I mention that Scandinavia is great, wouldn't Finland be a great place to hold a con!!!
posted by John Meaney at
15:40
10 Comments:
It was great fun to meet you at teh "författar-fika". Keep up the good work.
Now finishing Transmission and looking forward to Resonance :)
Keep up the good work.
It was lovely to meet you, John! And yes, Finland would be a great place to hold a Worldcon! :)
Thanks so much for the encouragement to the Helsinki in 2017 team. :)
Hi John,
Thanks for all the encouragement you gave this fledgling author, both at Fantastika and it appears on your blog above. It was great to meet you and to discover your fiction -how I missed it before is a profound mystery in itself.
Chris
PS.I have no website as such but have started a humble blog. I'll only post its address with your permission though. This is your space not mine :)
Cheers, all, for visiting the blog. And Chris, please do let everyone know where your blog is located.
Tack!
From a writer formally known as Chris Barker
www.blog.cjohnarthur.com
Its a pen name based on my wife's maiden name, and a promise I made when we got married!
Thanks John, and if you visit the blog and hate it, please delete this link with my blessing :)
It was great to meet you too! Working slowly but steadily on my fantasy-novel, sadly I haven't had the time nor the energy to write a whole lot, but now I'm taking a course in Writing fantasy and sci-fi, and am Writing for that. I'm planning to look my Schedule over to see how and where I might be able to fit more Writing in...
Hey, Nina!
Good luck. I'm sure there's a secret way of doing 100 hours work per day, using WinZip for Reality. I just haven't found the secret yet...
The novel's going to be great!
Dear John! Thanks for a wonderful time at Confetti in Göteborg. I will never forget our good discussion about Nordic Mythology. I have now finished reading Ragnarök and I am truly impressed. A magnicifent ending not least. I have no real objections to your interpretation of the mythological occasions with a slight exeption concerning the mixture between Odinn and Loki but on the other hand both are shapeshifters and besides possibly also twin gendered. Loki is in one way considered a trickster as you say but he is also considered as the darknes in opposite to daylight and as well a spider catching the sun in his net. The unification between Loki as darknes and the universal darkness hence is a good one even if this does nort nessecarily means he is evil. You have used those ingidients well! Thank you for a wonderful reader experience. I hope we meet again soon. Ingemar
Dear John!
I tried to leave a comment but maybe it went lost in cyberspace. I recall our wonderful discussion at Confewtti concerning Nordic Mythology. It was quite stimulating. Now I have finished all tthree volumes of Ragnarök and I'm impressed. Specially the endscene was marvellous and well built up background in the earlier text. You have caught the persons in the mythological context perfectly even if the affair at Holy Island was a bit premature.The identityband between Loki and Óðinn is sometimes hard to follow but you have a point since Loki has so many interpretations. He is, as you say, a trickster, but he is as well a spider catching the sun in his net and he simply also is darkness as opposition to daylight. Both he and Óðinn are also rumoured to be twin gendered. Your connection between darkness and Loki hence is exquisite!Hope we will meet soon again!
All the best
Ingemar
Hi Ingemar!
Both your comments are here now - thank you! I was very honoured to talk to you at Confetti, and I'm so glad that you enjoyed the ending of Resonance, and that I got at least some of the mythology correct.
(And to everyone else... Ingemar is a genuine authority in the field of Nordic mythology, so this is really wonderful!)
Thank you so much, and I do hope we meet up again soon.
All best,
John
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home