C is for con but the good kind. Anime, SF, Comi-cons! I’m a huge fan of the geeky conventions. I’ve been going to them for 30 years and frankly I’ll be cosplaying old women in years to come (Oh to have Lwaxana Troi’s figure…). I thought about how could I use this in my writing because fiction has to come from things I know about and care about if it’s going to be any good.

Years ago I wrote a story about two elves at an anime con, Sion and his blind son, Ioan which are updated versions of characters I’ve been writing for 20 years, mostly for my friends’ entertainment. Sion is an elfin prince, bisexual and has an affinity for humans. Roy is a detective who usually attends all things geek with his partner who was out sick for this con. At loose ends, Roy finds himself dressed as the partner to the character Sion is cosplaying. Needless to say they hit it off. Unfortunately for Roy, Sion is often a target for Dokkalfar assassins (the traditional enemy of the liosalfar like Sion.) Murders start happening at the con and Roy ends up in the crosshairs.

I put this story away for years after it didn’t make the cut for the original anthology I wrote it for. Heck, I don’t even remember what that was. This year ManLoveRomance had an anthology about the fey up for open call and they took the story. I don’t have details yet on when it’ll be out. Haven’t got the first round of edits yet but I’m excited.

I had started a few months back a novel set at a con but this one contemporary, another use for the abbreviation ‘con.’ I’m not a contemporary writer or reader. In fact I actively avoid reading it but that’s where publishing is going. That depresses me as it leaves me a lot less in the way of choices as a reader, not to mention as an author. I decided if contemporary is the wave of the near future (okay it’s always been popular. Maybe I should say the sad decline in genre sales…) then I should at least try it.

I had some ideas for the contemporary. I researched it. I started it. I set it aside. It’s going to take me time to write it because seriously, contemporary fiction doesn’t fire me up. I will have to take it in bites that I can get excited about and break it up with things that burn through me better than normal people doing normal things. The only thing worse than writing contemporary would be to write it badly, No one wants to read a boring story.

I think I might need to go to a con to fire me up.