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My upcoming Orycon schedule

Hey y’all,

I’ll be doing panels and giving a reading at Orycon. Here’s my schedule!

Friday

Social Media and the Modern Writer

Jefferson/Adams Fri Nov 8 12:00pm – 1:00pm

Websites, Facebook fan pages, email lists, contests, twitter, tumblr,
Pinterest, ads, blogs and that annoying thing called a “platform”: what
works, what doesn’t, and why you need to care (spoiler: you do).

Grá Linnaea, William Hertling, Jason Andrew, Aaron Duran, Cat Rambo,
Peter A. Smalley

Pitch it to Me: The Art of the Elevator Speech

Morrison Fri Nov 8 1:00pm – 2:00pm

Hone your skills for pitching to literary agents, editors, and film agents
and managers. Bring your pitch questions and learn how to pitch
one-to-one.

Grá Linnaea, Steven Barnes, Todd McCaffrey, Linn Prentis, Blythe
Ayne

Effective Readings

Morrison Fri Nov 8 3:00pm – 4:00pm

You may be a good writer, but reading aloud is a separate skill. Learn to
make your words on the page sound great.

Liz Argall, Anne Bishop, David D. Levine, Grá Linnaea, Sonia Orin
Lyris

Horror and Dark Fantasy

Ross Island Fri Nov 8 5:00pm – 6:00pm

What makes the story horror or dark fantasy? What is the inspiration?

Jason V Brock, Grá Linnaea, Paul Groendes, William F. Nolan

Write Your Own Constitution Workshop

Roosevelt Fri Nov 8 6:00pm – 7:00pm

Bring your laptop. The colony ship has landed and the settlers have
disembarked. Or the revolution has succeeded, the flames of the palace
dying, the tyrant`s family fled to exile (or worse) and gunfire in the
streets becoming sparse and the taverns are en fete. Now what? Here`s your
chance to be a Founder of the Nation: write your own Constitution of laws.
How would you choose to govern and be governed?

Grá Linnaea, Katie Lane, Amy Thomson, Guy Letourneau, Bob
Kanefsky

Writing for Graphic Novels

Hawthorne Fri Nov 8 7:00pm – 8:00pm

You’re a writer, not an artist! How to approach storytelling with an eye
for graphic novels.

Blake Hutchins, (*)Grá Linnaea, Liz Argall, Aaron Duran

Saturday

Political Systems in SF

Hawthorne Sat Nov 9 11:00am – 12:00pm

Why don’t writers get it right? What to think about when developing
local, national, global, and interplanetary governments. How governments
with different cultural values really operate and (fail to?)
interact.

Brenda Cooper, Grá Linnaea, Kamila Z. Miller, Rory Miller, Jay
Lake

Gra Linnaea Reading

Grant Sat Nov 9 2:30pm – 3:00pm

Gra Linnaea reads from own works

Grá Linnaea

Freaking me out, not grossing me out

Hamilton Sat Nov 9 3:00pm – 4:00pm

Are intense descriptions of bloody death and torture really necessary to
scare the pants off your audience? Discussion on how to terrify without
all the gory details.

Grá Linnaea, Jason V Brock, Paul Groendes, Mike Chinakos, Ru Emerson

The Creative Commons

Madison Sat Nov 9 6:00pm – 7:00pm

All rights reserved, some rights reserved, public domain; copyright isn’t
simple, nor universal. Why some authors offer their work for free while
others insist on fair pay, who can get away with printing your material
without permission, and how (and when) to defend your copyright.

Katie Lane, (*)Grá Linnaea, Mary Rosenblum/Mary Freeman, MeiLin
Miranda

Whew! Two weeks running around.

rainbow! I managed to consistently put out episodes of Miranda every Tuesday and Thursday every week since I started the project.

*Ahem* that is until two weeks ago.

Because, reasons. Lot’s of exciting stuff going on. A bunch of travel, then I hosted a week-long profession novel critique workshop on the coast. As far as I can tell, it went great!

I’ve also been slogging on this novel. I ended up needing to restructure the whole thing (thanks for the crits, Coastal Heaven!) which meant throwing away a ton of words, but I think it’ll be a much stronger book in the long run.

Also the usual, work, life, relationship, etc etc etc.

Anyway, this is all a long way of saying… Miranda is back! A new chunk is going up tonight, the exciting conclusion is coming within the next month. We should be back on track for every Tues/Thurs. Watch for new artwork and more!

How organizations get poisoned from within.

I’ve joined Amal El-Mohtar in calling for Theodore Beale‘s expulsion from the Science Fiction Writers Association.

The whole mess with Beale is well outlined by Jim Hines. The short version is that Beale is a racist, a misogynist, and seems to generally enjoy pissing people off. He’s launched a number of personal attacks on other SFWA members, most recently using SFWA’s official twitter stream.

*sigh*

I’ve seen people like Beale poison a number of groups and organizations. The only way I’ve seen groups survive this kind of behavior is to address it directly.

Anyway, here’s the letter I wrote to SFWA:

Hey all,

I want to add my voice to the folks who think the time has come to
take a hard look at Theodore Beale’s membership in SFWA. His recent
attack on N. K. Jemisin (and using the SFWA twitter feed, no less)
would seem to more than qualify as a violation of Article IV Section
10.

I know this is a potentially divisive and sticky path, but I feel like
the long-term damage of having a member like Beale far outweighs the
trouble that will come from addressing this issue directly.

Along the same lines, I wonder if the board, or the membership in
general should be looking at SFWA’s policy on hate-speech. While I
appreciate Article IV, Section 10, we would be better served by more
specificity.

I see from Section 10 that SFWA isn’t responsible for circulating a
petition for this type of decision. After looking through the forums,
I see some discussion circling the Beale incident, but nothing
directly discussing Amal El-Mohtar’s suggestion that Beale be removed.
I’m curious if such a petition has been started already?

Thanks for listening,
Grá Linnaea

I’m hoping that this ugly incident can inspire us to take a hard look at what kind of organization we want to be and how important inclusivity is to us.

And the discussion continues …

I’m never sure if I’m hilarious or a jerk

Hey Kyle,

I don’t hold you personally responsible for this. I imagine CapWest has written guidelines as to how often to contact someone who’s filled out your mortgage form.

Apparently its twelve times in nineteen days.

Maybe you have an app on the computer in front of you, and my name and number just keep popping up. And you’re required to keep at me.

I empathize. I’ve had some crappy jobs in the past.

Anyway, if you could pass this up the ole corporate ladder for me, I’d appreciate it:

—

Hi, someone-higher-up-than-Kyle,

Wow, twelve calls and emails in nineteen days! That sure seems like a lot, doesn’t it?

It is.

If this were a dating situation, I’d be calling the police about now. But, seeing that it’s about a low-interest mortgage, I guess you should know that this many calls feels a bit desperate and I think I’d rather see someone more confident and secure with themselves. I hope you understand.

—

Oh, hey, Kyle, after you do that, could you take me off your contact list?

Thanks,