WorldCon Roundup

Dublin WorldCon was our first outing as professional literary type people, which means careful conduct i.e., giving business cards to friends who already knew our contact details and skipping the Hugo awards to watch season 2 of Derry Girls in our Airbnb. It was also the first time either of us had been to a con, which is probably appropriate since WorldCon splits the difference between the two.

WorldCon is half an industry event full of networking opportunities, and half a locus of fannishness full of cosplay and opportunities to buy merch. Navigating the two is a slippery proposition and getting the most out of the week definitely takes skill, careful planning, and a knowledge of your personal limit for how many panels you can sit through in a row. You also need cool friends you can meet for breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, and drinks or you are going to burn out and die very quickly.

Through a level of planning that exceeded the Franklin expedition, we came away with a list of book recs, a chart-topping fairy song (It goes ‘Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday’ and it is a bop), and an amazingly comprehensive rundown on how not to write a romance. And no lead poisoning.

We also came away with the outline for our next book, but that’s a whole other post.

But the really good thing about going to WorldCon is that afterwards, you can go hang out at Emily Tesh’s country estate with cool, like-minded people and be really glad you aren’t there anymore.

And that too, is a post for another day.