Back home, and counting the cost of my visit to P-Con and then to Hodges Figgis and Waterstone's on Dawson Street the next day:

( bookspoils )

I seem to be on a number of panels at P-Con this weekend:

Saturday

10:15 Just a Minute Quiz with Paul Cornell, autopope, Leah Moore (moderated by Frank Darcy)
Panellists must speak on a given topic for 60 seconds without hesitation, deviation, or repetition

13:00 Fantastic! The Doctor Who Panel, with Paul Cornell and Colin Greenland, with me moderating ( Read more... )

6) Accelerando, by autopope

The complete sequence of nine stories in Charles Stross's series about the Singularity And After originally published in Asimov's. As a diligent reader of Hugo-nominees, I had in fact read four of these nine stories before - "Lobsters", "Halo", "Nightfall" and "Elector", respectively nominated for Hugo awards in 2002, 2003, ( Read more... )

3) The Clan Corporate, by autopopeGosh. The best of the "Merchant Princes" series so far. Miriam Beckstein attempts to play the game by her own rules, but there are plenty of her relatives who have been playing it better for much longer... We see more of Miriam the former investigative journalist rather than the startup manager this time, and her ex- ( Read more... )

2) The Hidden Family, by autopope

Yep, the time stamp reveals that I once again sat up far too late reading this, the sequel to The Family Trade. And enjoyed it too. Our heroine from the first book has a business plan, an economic model, three parallel universes to trade between, and a bunch of enemies out to kill her. Some vivid scene-setting, including ( Read more... )

7) The Family Trade, by autopopeI had been looking forward to reading this for some time. Reviews that I had skimmed (and indeed hints dropped by the author) led me to understand that it borrows the feudal and feuding families who can walk between the worlds of Roger Zelazny's Amber series, a firm favourite of mine from an early age. But my anticipation ( Read more... )

( What I got in Glasgow )

We resume on Sunday afternoon, when I returned from lunch to find myself witnessing the official photograph of the official signing of the official contract for the new edition of The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, by John Clute, Dave Langford and Peter Nicholls. I was pleased to learn later from Dave Langford that he is fairly optimistic it can ( Read more... )

Back in D&D days I was always fascinated by the Fiend Folio's descriptions of the githyanki, slaadi and githzerai. What twisted mind, I wondered, could have come up with them?

( Now I know. )

6) Iron Sunrise, by Charles Stross

Rather interesting experience to read this so soon after Banks' The Algebraist. Strong points of comparison and contrast between the two books, most of which I think rebound in Stross' favour. More when I do my mega-meta-Hugo nominees review.