More Worldcon

I'm not going to even attempt to cover everything that I've seen and done here at Worldcon. That'd take hours, and I'm getting little enough sleep as it is. Suffice it to say that I'm having lots of fun and have met lots of people (and been quite surprised by the number of people who recognize my name from online and/or my habit of purchasing lots of books from them).

I'll just mention a couple things that I haven't seen in other blogs yet. One of the more amusing events of the convention so far: Two Beers & a Story. In a relatively quiet corner of the Sheraton bar, five authors (jaylake, davidlevine, Janna Silverstein, Keith R. A. DeCandido, and Laura Anne Gilman) each attempted to complete a short story in the time it took them to consume two beers. Despite being both the recipient of the most heckling and the most frequent heckler, Jay Lake proved the fastest drinker and the fastest writer, turning in a bizarre whale tale. Keith R. A. DeCandido was the slowest drinker, but his Old West ghost story was the best of the five. An anthology of the stories may or may not be forthcoming.

Second, most of the awards given during the Con have been covered extensively (see Locus Online or the Emerald City convention blog if you've somehow missed the Hugo, Retro Hugo, or Prometheus results), but I haven't seen anyone else post the Gaylactic Spectrum Awards results, so here they are:

• Best Short Fiction
  
  • Winner: "Lark till Dawn, Princess", Barth Anderson (Mojo: Conjure Stories)
  
  
  • Short list:
    • "Down with the Lizards and Bees", Tim Pratt (Realms of Fantasy 8/03; Little Gods)
    • "Kiss", Steve Berman (X-Factor)
    • "Poison", Beth Bernobich (Strange Horizons 1/20/03)
    • "The Tawny Bitch", Nisi Shawl (Mojo: Conjure Stories)
    • "The Golden Boy", Warren Rochelle (The Silver Gryphon)
    • "Living with the Harpy", Tim Pratt (Strange Horizons 10/27/03)
    • "The Riverboy", A.M. Dellamonica (Land/Space)
    • "Walking Contradiction", Nancy Jane Moore (Imaginings)


• Best Novel
  
  • Winner: The Salt Roads, Nalo Hopkinson (Warner Books)
  
  
  • Short list:
    • Hidden Warrior, Lynn Flewelling (Bantam Spectra)
    • Lust, Geoff Ryman (St. Martin's)
    • Storyteller, Amy Thomson (Ace)
    • Hybrids, Robert Sawyer (Tor)
    • Spin State, Chris Moriarty (Bantam Spectra)
    • Trickster, Steven Harper (Roc)
    • Troll, Johanna Sinisalo (Grove Press)


• Best Other Work
  
  • Winners:
    • Angels in America (Tony Kushener/HBO)
    • Gotham Central #6-#10: Half a Life, Greg Rucka & Michael Lark (DC Comics)
  
  
  • Short list:
    • Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Joss Whedon/UPN)
    • Dead Life Me: The Bicycle Thief (Showtime)
    • Carnivale (HBO)
    • Global Frequency #3, Warren Ellis & Steve Dillon