Comics in Turku on Saturday

Necrocomicon is an event for everybody who’s interested in comics. Organized by the Turku comics club (“resurrected like a zombie, just for Halloween”), it promises to tackle all kinds of comics with an underground bent. You can meet comics artists, buy small press comics & zines, follow the programming, participate in comics-themed quizzes, etc.

The event is held at S-Osis (Rehtorinpellonkatu 6) and the doors open at 10 (in the morning, that is, if you can believe any comics artists are up by then). The comics-themed evening party starts at 8 at the same location; there’s a cover charge of 2 euros for those coming in after that. There will be live music, performed by Veltto Virtanen, Verde, Freakenstein, and Jumalan ruoska.

Update: If you want to get a head start, there will be pre-con-festivities on Friday night at the Cosmic Comic Café. (The comics club has an extra meeting at the same place on Thursday also, but the readers of this blog will be at the sf mafia at Bremer then—right?)

Turku Pub Meeting on Thursday

Welcome once again to Bar Bremer on Thursday at 6. Agenda is as usual: an open pub meeting for everyone interested in science fiction and fantasy to meet others interested in similar things and discuss everything (yes, even sf) over a few beers.

Science Fiction Sunday

The Helsinki Book Fair starts today. On Sunday, the Helsinki sf societies arrange the traditional “Sf Sunday” programming at the Fair center (Katri Vala auditorium).

The speakers are:

• 14:00 Leena Krohn talks about what you need fantasy for
• 14:40 Steve Aylett (interviewed by Iida Simes)
  
• 15:00 New weird, surrealism, magic realism; a panel discussion on current fantasy trends (Jan Hlinovsky, Hannu Blommila, Jukka Halme, Elli Leppä, Juha-Pekka Koskinen)
• 15:40 the “Kuvastaja” award for best Finnish fantasy book of the year
• 15:50 Pasi Jääskeläinen (interviewed by Kanerva Eskola)
• 16:10 Anu Holopainen (interviewed by Aleksi Kuutio)
• 16:30 J. Pekka Mäkelä (interviewed by Toni Jerrman)
• 16:50 Vesa Sisättö talks about Finnish science fiction and fantasy literature
• 17:20 How to get published; a panel discussion (Jukka Halme, Anne Leinonen, Tuomas Sorjamaa, Kimmo Lehtonen)

The doors are open on Sunday from 10 to 18. Day ticket is 12 €.

More Notes from Friday

The program book of the con is nice. And the excellent bar spent a lot of the evening playing Iron Maiden. The spirit of fandom was released during the opening ceremonies. After a recount there are fifteen Finns here.

At Swecon

Arrived in Sweden very early in the morning.Shopped at Comics Heaven and Sf Bokhandeln, and ate a very nice pub lunch.

Imagicon is well organized for a Swedish convention. Everything was in place, program items start on time, and there even are a con newsletter and helpful signs outside pointing the way to the con site.

GoH sightings. Joe Haldeman stopped being conforming after he realized people weren't going to throw hand grenades at him for being different any more. Geoff Ryman wanted to talk about sex because he thought it would be more interesting than talking about writing.

The current panelists are talking very quietly, so I'm sitting in the back, blogging instead.

Off to Swecon

That’s it for this week—at least when work is concerned. I—along with quite a few others—am off to Swecon. The ferry leaves tonight.

The last couple of years, the Swecon delegation from Finland has been pretty much Ben, Jukka & me (Ben and Jukka were there before that, too). We’ve had fun—and also told others here so. Maybe partly because of that, and no doubt because the Swedes came to Finncon in force this year and had a visible Swecon presence, there are now thirteen Finns going to Imagicon. That’s right, count them, thirteen! That’s quite a leap from three. The Nordic fandom is coming together, and I’m very excited about that.

See you in Stockholm!

Thursday Things

• zombie lemons are scary to some
  
• Åcon will be great and have many participants; we will probably have to fend off all the people wanting to join at the door; this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t join up right now, though
  
• people have strange experiences with the customs office, having tried to bring things like lightsabers or indian chief head gear into the country
  
• it can pay to pose as a royalty when traveling abroad (even a Finnish royalty)
• understanding the thing about the 30 euro bills can be difficult

Yes, today’s mafia was one of those evenings. In addition to the topics above, I present you some speculative fiction from our guest book; that is, titles for the Risto Isomäki bestseller book from alternate realities:

• Sarasvatin miekka (the jolly sword and sorcery romp)
• Sarasvatin keikka (the noir crime story in the style of Donald Westlake)
• Sarasvati breikkaa (the music industry–themed YA novel)
• Sarasvatilla leikkaa (the detective story)
• Sarasvati meikkaa (the chic lit book)
• Sairas vaatii Kreikkaan (the gripping drama)
• Sarasvuo feikkaa (the cynical analysis of trendy business world)

There were many more, but my fingers are tired, so I’ll spare you. Good night.

Tomorrow Is First Thursday

First Thursday of the month tomorrow, which of course means it’s time for another pub meeting!

So come to Bar Bremer at six to swap stories about the loot from the Book Fair, inquire about Åcon, ask about going to Swecon, or just talk about whatever else comes to mind!

Åcon in May 2007

Åcon will be held from Thursday, May 17 to Sunday, May 20, 2007 in Mariehamn, Åland. It will be a convention very different from a Finncon; a smallish (the target size is 100 members) convention, with a membership fee, and focus more on the fannish community and less on the general public.

Åcon’s guest of honor will be Hal Duncan, a British author whose debut novel Vellum has gotten quite a bit of attention in the sf circles. His second novel (and the other half of “The Book of All Hours”), Ink, will be published in February. Mr. Duncan should prove a very interesting guest to meet, I think.

The membership fee of Åcon is 20 €. All paid members can join the con info and debate e-mail list (if they want) and participate in planning the convention, so it pays to pay up early (more details on how to do this to be announced quite soon, hopefully). The con web site will also be up soon.

The Åcon committee is Eemeli Aro (chair), Jukka Halme, Ben Roimola and myself.

Update 2006-10-05: Added link to the con web site.