Mostly in the evenings, it looks like so I’ll have to plan my dinners around them. (ugh).

Short Fiction is Dead, Long Live Short Fiction

Thursday 7-8pm, Capital Suite 10 (ExCeL)

Short fiction markets are always in flux, but the changes over the last decade have perhaps been particularly dramatic — a general shift from print to online, the rise of new funding models, and so on. And yet there is more short fiction published than ever: alongside print stalwarts such as Interzone and Asimov’s are online magazines such as Clarkesworld, Tor.com and Strange Horizons, any number of Kickstarted anthologies, and hybrid models such as Arc. For editors, what considerations go into developing a short fiction market for today’s readers? For writers, do the available venues shape what gets written, and if so in what ways? And why do so few British writers appear in online magazines?

Liz Gorinsky (M) , Ellen Datlow, Simon , Keffy R. M. Kehrli , Ann Leckie

 

Stroll with the Stars

Friday 09:00 – 10:00, Front of Aloft (ExCeL)

This will be a nice morning stroll with some of our favourite Authors, Artists and Editors. (And we stress, “stroll” – def: a leisurely walk. This will not be a heart-pounding aerobic activity, it will be a stroll). Join us for some fresh air, a healthy stroll and some good conversation. A leisurely mile – which will take a little more than a half hour but less than an hour. Strolls will leave at 9AM from in front of the Aloft Hotel, and will return by 10AM, rain or shine.

Edward James , Jeanne Gomoll , Lauren Beukes, Pat Cadigan, Paul Cornell, Andy Duncan, Ellen Datlow, Mary Anne Mohanraj

 

Big Anthologies: Bookends or Benchmarks?

Friday 4:30-6pm, Capital Suite 16 (ExCeL)

There’s a genre tradition of doorstop-sized anthologies that attempt to synopsise a period or style: Ascent of Wonder, The Weird, Twenty-First Century Science Fiction, and others. What makes these anthologies successful, or not? Does ‘success’ mean summarising a past conversation, or influencing the conversation that’s still going on? Or are they always and inevitably doomed enterprises? Is it possible to TOC an age, or a genre? Or are these sorts of anthologies in fact arguments, rather than snapshots?

Jo Walton (M), Martin Lewis, Jonathan Strahan , Jeff VanderMeer, Ellen Datlow

 

Kaffeeklatsch

Friday 6-7pm, London Suite 5 (ExCeL)

Jesús Cañadas , Ellen Datlow

 Autographing

Saturday 1:30 pm

Reading: Fearful Symmetries

 

Saturday 8-9pm, Capital Suite 15 (ExCeL)

Contributors to the “Fearful Symmetries” anthology, edited by Ellen Datlow, read from their work.

Pat Cadigan , Ellen Datlow , Rob Shearman, Helen Marshall, Siobhan Carroll

 

A Touch of the Macabre

Sunday 3-4:30pm, Capital Suite 4 (ExCeL)

Somewhere between fantasy and horror lies the macabre, the eerie, the noir. What is it about certain imagery that tugs at the psyche in such a disturbing way?

Ellen Datlow (M), Les Edwards, Galen Dara, Irene Gallo

 

8pm Hugo Awards