An interesting panel at Readercon on, essentially, the age-old (and probably overly simplistic) distinction between “plotters” and “pantsers,” those who plan everything ahead of time and those who just, well, write and find the work as they go. Dale Bailey, Peter Dube, Stacy Hill, Cecilia Tan and James Patrick Kelly (our talented moderator for this panel) had a fun discussion, with more metaphors crammed into an hour than is strictly socially appropriate. One big caveat–I almost didn’t post this because of how bad the audio is, a function of a big room and an echoey sound system, so be warned that this is often difficult to hear.

Another fun panel from Origins 2013, again grouping me with Pat Rothfuss (two panels and a reading this con) and Jennifer Brozek, whom I’ve known for quite a while. This was a nuts and bolts panel about strategies for getting a novel completed; lots of great questions and discussion here, though I have to say it was amusing to have Pat, who took something like fifteen years to write his first novel and went on to become a #1 New York Times bestseller, on a panel with us, whose paths to publication were quite different. I think the audience was relieved to learn that the route to publication didn’t necessarily demand a fifteen year lead time!

One of a number of great panels I got to be part of at Origins, which has clearly become a convention staple for me now. Here I joined Addie King, Kelly Swails and the inimitable Pat Rothfuss to talk about handling sexism in writing speculative fiction–how does one keep from reifying sexist tropes and (subtly or otherwise) re-engaging with sexist themes while still representing a potentially sexist society realistically? The answers are many, and this only began to look at a few possibilities–but everyone was in agreement that respectful, thoughtful and mindful writing was critical, as was proper research and careful listening. We were a bit less in agreement about how much something like Buffy The Vampire Slayer actually represents those things, but at least we were able to avoid a full out pie fight!

This was an interesting nuts and bolts type panel on podcasting, with good perspectives from fellow panelists Angel Leigh McCoy and Tina Connolly and good questions from the audience. I really liked the Norwescon attendees, who were engaged and enthusiastic the whole weekend, and this convention is definitely on my list to attend in the future if my schedule allows.

My one panel at World Fantasy Convention 2012 (the Toronto edition) was one of my favorite ones of the year–mostly because of the audience, which was large (the room was packed with well over a hundred people) and highly engaged, and the other participants, who brought a real diversity of perspectives to the question of how fantasy can become more “realistic” and vice versa. Ably moderated by L.E. Modesitt, Jr. and including agent Sally Harding and authors Isobelle Carmody, Karl Schroeder and me, this panel covered topics like genre definitions, magical realism, consistent magic systems and worldbuilding among other subjects…which was a good deal to discuss in an hour. I really enjoyed this panel, which capped off a great WFC for me.

My last panel at Gen Con 2012 was also one of my favorites, involving two of my favorite people. Kelly Swails, Brad Beaulieu and I worked through a number of topics related to the subject of the unglamorous grind of writing, and since this subject has been on my mind a bit over the past few months this was a great way to wrap up Gen Con for the year.

Again from Gen Con, this was one of the panels that I had been most interested in even before the convention. I joined Jerry Gordon, John Helfers, Kerrie Hughes and Steven Saus in talking about what drew me to language, writing, and communication in all its forms, and despite the ungodly hour (8 a.m. for a convention panel is…rough) really enjoyed both the conversation and feedback from the audience.