Sirens recap: Thursday and Friday
Since I was able to leave home (well, school) at 10:30, and it only takes four hours to drive to Stevenson, I decided to take the opportunity of going to Powell's. The up side of going by myself is that I could browse to my heart's content without worrying about whether anyone else was bored (though G. is always very patient, Liam is a little less so); the down side is that I couldn't carry as many books. Wait, maybe that's another up side.
Anyway, I left Portland around 4pm, promptly got caught in traffic, and didn't get to Stevenson until around 5:30pm. I checked in and registered and then went out to get Subway for dinner, planning to go to the dessert reception and Nalo Hopkinson's keynote speech in the evening. Anxiety won the day, unfortunately, and I ended up missing them and going to bed early.
Friday I started out worried about the anxiety thing (lord, anxious about anxiety, what a mess), but I girded my loins and went down to the first panel of my day, "Women Who Run with Wolves and Dance with Dragons" (good recap here by
rachelmanija, who moderated; ETA: other panelists were Cora Anderson and Janni Lee Simner). Lots of interesting talk; I especially liked the discussion of subservience vs. equal partnerships. The very friendly and book-talk-filled atmosphere helped a lot, plus
rilina noticing me and saying hi after this panel, and I felt much less anxious the rest of the day.
The next panel I went to was "The Female Gaze and Female Desire in Fiction", with Nalo Hopkinson, Malinda Lo, Sarah Rees Brennan, and Kate Elliott moderating. If you haven't read Kate Elliott's guest post on this subject over at SF Signal, I highly recommend it. In a weekend full of great panels, this might have been my favorite. I’m really sorry I didn’t take notes on it (other than to write down book recommendations) and am hoping someone else did and will recap.
I took a break to deal with some school issues that had come up during the morning and then came back down for lunch, which was delicious; actually, all the food was very good. I didn’t eat at either of the Skamania Lodge restaurants, but maybe I will next time. Malinda Lo gave her keynote speech at lunch, about her writing process for her novels and their inspirations and backgrounds. I liked Ash and liked Huntress more, and now I’m quite looking forward to reading her latest, Adaptation, and its sequel, though I think I’m going to wait until said sequel is out.
Another break after lunch, and then a panel on “Retelling History”, with Marie Brennan moderating and Andrea Horbinski (and two other panelists whom I’ve forgotten, as their names aren’t in the program - Mette Ivie Harrison might have been on this one?). I love historical fiction and historical fantasy (in fact, I was in the middle of rereading Brennan's Onyx Court books), and I was particularly interested in their discussion of the ethics of retelling history as fiction, and where you draw the line when it comes to portraying a historical character.
There were evening events, but again, I missed them, this time partly due to needing to catch up on email and not feeling well (sinus infection which won’t quit).
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