Day Two of Gen Con 2024 — 

Woke at 4:50 am again. Looks like this is a trend. Got a letter written to my son and bride again. Tried to creep in to fry some eggs and sausage but turns out my housemates are sleeping at that time of evening. Morning. Whatever they call it.

Showered, wrote 500 words, read a little. From then the others stirred enough I started on sausage, eggs, protein, fat, persuaded them all to get going. Carbs are kerosene, protein’s fire, fat is the logs. Avocado FTW.

Anyways.

9am — Did a one-on-one at this bubble tea shop with an author.

10am — Fascinating panel of agents that contrasted wildly with the Writer’s Digest con. Met Brady McReynolds of JABerwocky, having already met Joshua Biles and Susan Velazquez (both lovely in their own rights) during the World Fantasy Convention in Baltimore. James Farner was also there, And since they’re exclusively speculative fiction, it reminded me of a conversation I had with Joshua Bilmes at World Fantasy Convention in Baltimore 2019. I remember thinking: this man is an actual nerd, he’s not merely making money off of nerds. Dude’s website is literally AwfulAgent.com — those details are important to me.

11am — Short fiction panel. Confirmed pretty much what I’ve been feeling: acceptance rates plus pay rates plus Amazon scams lead me to the conclusion that in the current climate, it’s almost inverted from the way the genre used to work. Short fiction and poetry is for later career (unless you need to write something for fun, for practice, or as a palate cleanser). I’m going to switch entirely to novels and using full length screenplays as a palate cleanser if needed. Or a single poem. Was able to thank Jason Sanford for his brilliant reporting on the Hugos in China. Also to meet some of the BookRiot crew.

12pm — Caught up with several folks in the exhibition hall. Met some authors. Bought some art. I think I might hoard potential cover designers.

1pm — one-on-one with a potential patron outside downtown

2pm — Back to wandering the halls for a bit. Ended up getting some pulled pork and talking to some pro streamers. These guys are EVERYWHERE now. Like way more than some of the other cons — they’re live streaming every single thing. Honestly makes the camera averse like me really on edge. I don’t mind performing in front of one but just crowds and crowds of live film gives me 15-year-old-DJ-Lance-has-dead-air vibes.

3pm — Speculative poetry. Got to hug Linda Addison again — haven’t seen her since pre-pandemic when she introduced me to Kaaron Warren, who ended up in OGAG 2. Happy to do the poetry open mic with her, she’s like a mom to poets. Tons of awards under her belt. We’ll be interviewing her in the future here.

4pm — met up with the boys who are deep, still, in the Arkham asylum thing.

8pm — A pro ventriloquist is lending me his puppet for the

9pm — puppet open mic. This is a new one for me. A man just walked by with a cauldron-sized pipe. People are playing lutes. There is a Tak tournament. All Gen Con 2024 — I’m going to post the puppet video soon.

I think I need to bring my fam.