Pub Meeting Moved to Next Week

The Turku pub meeting in May has been moved ahead one week, since the first Thursday is May Day, when some of the regulars are at Åcon, and many of the rest probably have other activities too. So, see you at Bremer on th 8th!

Swearing Hedgehog Wins Comics Finlandia

The inaugural Comics Finlandia award was given today to Milla Paloniemi for her album Kiroileva siili (“Swearing Hedgehog”). It’s a collection of comic strips about a hedgehog who—well—swears a lot.

The Hedgehog has taken Finland by storm, and the first album rose to the top of the book sales charts when it came out. Some in the comics circles were pretty upset that such commercial (and popular) strips as Kiroileva siili and Viivi ja Wagner (a srip about a woman and an anthropomorphic pig living together) were allowed to compete for the title of the best comic album of the year. I expect a lot of hand wringing and arty frustration now that one of them has won the award.

Usva Goes HTML

The Usva ezine has started publishing some of its stories and articles in HTML format in addition to the PDF zine itself. This is very welcome for all of us who like to use offline readers (PDAs, ebook readers, etc.) to read the stories without having to print the issues on paper.

Sf Table Hockey Finnish Championship Games

The Helsinki University sf club will organize the “Nth annual science fiction table hockey championship games” in Helsinki on Friday April 25. The place is the HYSFK club house at Hietaniemenkatu 14 B, and the games start at 6 pm. You can sign up in advance by e-mail to Pasi Vihinen (pvihinen at gmail.com).

BaCon

FUI (the Åbo Akademi Society for Strange Interests) will arrange their first minicon, called BaCon, on Tuesday April 8. The place is the University Tenants’ Association’s festival hall (Inspehtorinkatu 4 B, both floors), and the event starts at 5 PM (the program starts at 6). Entrance fee is 3 euros.

The organizers say there will be anime fantasy sci-fi, plus other videos, board games, etc. There will also be food (bacon) for a reasonable price. No alcohol, though, although the organizers promise this will be corrected during the after-party.

More info available from Vilgot Strömsholm (vstromsh at abo.fi).

Biggest. Mafia. Evar.

…well, in Turku, anyway. I counted 22 persons at today’s pub meeting. The room started to feel very crowded at some point (although there were enough chairs for almost everybody).

We were supposed to read the Nebula shortlisted short stories and discuss them, but Ben was the only one who had read them. At least most of them. And even quite liked one. But there wasn’t that much discussion. More like a lot of excuses. Maybe next time.

But as I said, a very good crowd. And a lot of things to talk about, naturally. Like Finncons, Åcon, recent good books, and stuff, but also some really important things like food (and trading chili recipies) and whisky. Probably something else too, but I was too engaged in talking about food and whisky to notice.

You could buy stuff at the meeting too—Petteri brought a couple of copies of the new Fingerpori album with him. (Thank you!) There were a few fanzines on display also. The latest issues of Ansible and Weird Tales, Journey Planet (straight from Eastercon), Seikkailukertomuksia (pulp fiction) and new issues of Kosmoskynä and Turu Mafia Zine. Which, by the way, has a guest column, and also a translated short story in this issue. That almost makes it a real zine, I think.

Pub Meeting tomorrow

You know the drill. First Thursday of the month. Bar Bremer at six. (A new issue of Turu Mafia Zine is coming out, by the way, this time with guest writers. Come and get yours.)