deborahb

On a day which can only be described as ‘on the cruddier side of cruddy’, I discovered that Dexter Season 4 is even darker than previous seasons. It unnerved me so much that at least one point I had to stop eating my dinner.

… Hurrah!

I also discovered, in the mail, my custom-made 2010 Demotivators calendar. Who knew you could build these suckers with all your own favourite demotivational posters, hand-chosen for their most appropriate month?! (And why did you not mention this earlier?)

In other good news, Conflux 6 was damn good fun. It began, alas, with a bus ride so bad I spent the 3 hours composing a complaint letter in my head (it began with ‘Dear Fucking Murrays’ and ended with ‘the worst bus ride ever!’ Until I realised it wasn’t the worst bus ride ever, it was only the second worst.)

(Since we’re on the topic, the worst bus ride ever was the bus ride from, I think, Vienna to Amsterdam. It took somewhere over 10 hours & it crammed the majority of people on the SMALLER bus while leaving the BIGGER bus over half empty. It stopped once in 10 hours — at a German airport — not counting a couple of border crossings, & wound up in Amsterdam well into the dark of night, when the hostel was booked out & only a handful of us got in, leaving the others to seedier & seedier options as the night progressed. At which point we all decided that, fck sleeping, we were gonna see what all the fuss was about. And — Nige, do you remember this?! — we came across a striking hooker in a blue-lit window, & her eyes — I kid you not — were electric. Those eyes GLOWED brilliant blue. I remember hardly anything else about that night, but I remember her eyes.)

Anyhow. Murrays can still expect a letter from me, yes.

At Conflux I hung out for a few hours Saturday afternoon, taking part in the mass signing — which could have been awkward & embarrassing, but was made excellent fun by the company. And then even more fun when Chris Barnes announced, “I’m going to go get your book and bring it back and announce loudly, ‘Where is that wonderful writer, Deborah Biancotti?!’ And then bow obsequiously when I pretend to spot you for the first time.’”

And, of course, it proved to be even more hilarious when he actually did it. (Thanks, Chris!)

After that, it was laughs in the bar, & then I forlornly left the rest of the con to attend the banquet, & I took the bf off to a more low-key dinner at Mecca Bah. Which was also excellent, but honestly? Lacked the thrill of a Polack-inspired menu.

The next day was a leisurely breakfast at Gus’s, of course (every Canberra trip needs breakfast at Gus’s), then off to the bar & dealers’ room for several hours of ’strategising’, then more bar time & lunch with some of the gang (Alisa, Rob, Alan, Chris). And then helping the awesome Karen Herkes with the cake for Nick Stathoplous while fending off several rather vain attempts with the icing pens by con-goers (though several other attempts were brilliant — obviously the trained painters in the group). I also got to tell Nicole Murphy that she’s my hero.

AND THEN it was nothing but chilling, grabbing extra copies of A Book of Endings from ‘the publisher’ as I like to call gj, dinner with the bf (who was avoiding the con through ample application of fishing), & popping back to the Marque to find Nick Stathopoulos, give him a birthday present & catch the beginning of the birthday festivities.

And so — as they say in the classics — to bed.

Thanks to the Conflux team for making this such a fun, chilled con.

An update!

Firstly, my program items for Continuum include just one confirmed very cool, event:

Reading with Sean Williams!
Sunday 2.00pm Sun Sphere

Yes, reading WITH Sean, who graciously agreed to my cunning plan to avoid reading my own stuff.

The idea was planted in my head years back by Simon Brown, who listened sympathetically to my comment that I don’t like reading my own stuff. Simon said, ‘Next time we’re both at the same con, let’s swap.’ And then he fled to Thailand.

So, filled with a sense of uneasy duty re. the promoting of my first book, A Book of Endings, I approached the ever-gracious Mr Williams with the inherited plan and he, graciously, agreed! Which means Sunday from 2pm, he’ll be reading some of my stuff & I’ll be reading some of his, & we might swap back & forth or whatever fits in with the timeslot(s).

There is another unconfirmed event, of course, which is the launch of A Book of Endings (now available for pre-order) by the eminent Jonathan Strahan. This is the rogue, off-campus, programme-defying plan to have a glass of champagne to celebrate the fact the book is (hopefully!) printed and available for sale. But if it’s NOT printed or for sale, there will still be champagne, although we may all have to buy our own ‘cos the publisher will be in tears. (We shall buy drinks for the publisher, too, in that event.)

We DID have one of your standard programmed launches, but for various reasons that timeslot didn’t work out* & the programmers have been very accommodating in letting us do some kinda rebellious off-grid whatever-we-want thing instead. We don’t yet understand what that thing is because we are miles away from Melbourne, but we need a venue within very, very short stumbling distance who’d accommodate us for an hour probably on Saturday at 5:30pm. Perhaps we shall even do a launch-&-run, by turning up in a bar, ordering drinks, sending up a rousing cheer, & then running like hell before the owners of the establishment work out what in god’s name we’re doing there.

And once we have THAT plan in hand — whatever it is– by god, there’ll be a celebration!

—–
* The chaos of the launch does not phase me. Once we decided to go with the title, A Book of Endings (now available for pre-order), a whole bunch of things turned upside-down & so it is only to be expected that crazy, arse-about stuff is gonna happen with this book from woe to go. Or, go to woe, whichever is set to happen last…**
** Plans for the Sydney launch of A Book of Endings (now available for pre-order), however, are tracking well. Keep 3pm Saturday 10 October free for a launch by the awesome Garth Nix!