It's that time of the summer when I suddenly realize it's time to book my flight to Kansas City for this year's Worldcon (World Science Fiction Convention). If you followed along with all my convention blogging last year, you may remember that Worldcon was the event that left me thinking, "This. This is what a successful convention experience can be. Remember this if you're ever feeling down or left out or marginalized in the SFF community." To be sure, every Worldcon is different: a different location, a different organizing committee, a different slice of the SFF community. But it helps to go in with the confidence that I pretty much know how this thing works and that it will work for me.
In addition to the programming, I'm planning to have some fun Alpennia swag to hand out. (Memo to self: in addition to booking flight, work on Alpennia swag!) And--following an approach that worked well last year--I'm making a list of "friends I haven't met in person yet" to contact about penciling in social plans.
Check out my panel schedule here. And if you're going to be there too, please let me know so we can make sure to bump into each other.