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2004 HISTORY

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2003


January
18
Author
Robert J. Sawyer reads the "Vietnam War Memorial" chapter from his novel Humans, due out in February.

February
8
Robert Sawyer and Carolyn Clink host a party for SF writers and fans.
15
Costumers Barb Schofield and Caroline Julian talk about the history of carnivals and masquerades.

March
15
Georgina Miles gives a talk on "ghosts of Toronto."

21–23
The Ad Astra XXII convention in Toronto. Guests of Honour are authors David Brin and Tanya Huff, artists Robert Gould and Brian Froud, and former Bakka Books owner John Rose.

Pictured above left are Julie Czerneda and David Brin at the Ad Astra launch of Julie's Orbiter anthology. Photo by Lynda Ciaschini.

April
12
Double passes (kindly donated by MGM) to a promotional preview of the Chow Yun-Fat martial-arts movie Bulletproof Monk are handed out.

Brian Upward teaches a communications exercise that involves filling out a questionnaire to determine personality type (assigned one of four colours: red, yellow, blue and green) and the best way of communicating with each type. Most of the meeting attendees turn out to be greens, whose qualities happen to include an interest in science fiction!

As a bonus, aspiring author Mel Vavaroutsos reads his comical fantasy parody "Ralph Pickle and the Dragon: An Anti-Fairy Tale," which he intends to start submitting to professional magazines.

Coincident with the meeting is the EerieCon 5 weekend convention in Niagara Falls, NY.

May
10
Edo van Belkom reads from his April 2003 novel Scream Queen. Photo by Lynda Ciaschini.

See also a recent interview with Edo.

17
Hudson Bay members help out at the masquerade at the Anime North convention.

June
14
Julie E. Czerneda reads from Species Imperative: Survival, a novel she told us "is the first of a two-book set, coming in hardcover from DAW in May 2004 (the second of the pair is Species Imperative: Migration, May 2005), that will look at the impact of a species' innate biological drive, in this case migration, on a future where humans and other intelligent species coexist peacefully across a wide area of space. It's a bit of a mystery, bit of a thriller; definitely SF. Unrelated to any of my previous stories."

July
11–13
The Toronto Trek 17 convention takes place. Media guests included Garrett Wang, Anthony Stewart Head (see transcript of his guest speech on July 12), Nana Visitor (pictured right; photo by Lynda Ciaschini), Gil Gerard, Erin Gray, Felix Silla, Julie Caitlin Brown, Jason Carter, Chris Owens, Leni Parker and Anita LaSelva. Among author guests were Derwin Mak, Edo van Belkom, Julie Czerneda, Isaac Szpindel, Kat Hankinson, Nikki Stafford, Karin Lowachee, Jennifer Porter, Robyn Burnett, Stephanie Bedwell-Grime, Michael Adams and Gemma Files.

August
28–September 1
Torcon 3, the 61st World Science Fiction Convention, takes place in Toronto. Among the thousands in attendance were authors/editors Kelley Armstrong, Catherine Asaro, Scott Bakker, David Brin, Hal Clement, Jack Chalker, John Clute, John Robert Colombo, Julie Czerneda, Candas Jane Dorsey, Gardner Dozois, Esther Friesner, Neil Gaiman, James Alan Gardner, Tanya Huff, Guy Gavriel Kay, Nancy Kress, Karin Lowachee, Donna McMahon, China Miéville, Larry Niven, Terry Pratchett, Jeanne Robinson, Spider Robinson (pictured above; photo by Lynda Ciaschini), Robert Sawyer, Karl Schroeder, Caitlin Sweet, Peter Watts, Allan Weiss, Michelle West, Connie Willis, Robert Charles Wilson and Edo van Belkom.

Numerous awards are presented over the convention, including the Hugo Awards on August 30. Robert Sawyer (pictured left; photo by Lynda Ciaschini) is delighted to win his first Hugo, for his novel Hominids. Earlier that day, the Aurora Awards for excellence in Canadian SF&F are presented. The winners: Best Long-Form Work in English, Permanence by Karl Schroeder; Best Long-Form Work in French, Le Revenant de Fomalhaut by Jean-Louis Trudel; Best Short-Form Work in English, "Ineluctable" by Robert Sawyer; Best Short-Form Work in French, "La Guerre sans temps" by Sylvie Bérard; Best Work in English (Other), Be VERY Afraid by Edo van Belkom; Artistic Achievement, Mel Vavaroutsos; Fan Achievement (Fanzine), Made in Canada Newsletter, Don Bassie, ed.; Fan Achievement (Organizational), Georgina Miles (Toronto Trek 16, IDIC); Fan Achievement (Other), Jason Taniguchi (pictured right; photo by Lynda Ciaschini), one-man SF parody shows.

September
20
The entertainment is a trivia game, in a modified Wheel of Fortune style, with an SF/fantasy theme. Contestants were heard to ask whether buying the vowel "a" meant they got "eh" instead.

October
4
Robert J. Sawyer holds a "Hey, I Won a Hugo!" party for fandom at his condo in Mississauga.
18
Derwin Mak (pictured right at Toronto Trek 2003; photo by Lynda Ciaschini) reads excerpts from (1) the story "The Siren Stone," in the 2003 anthology Space Inc; (2) the novella "All Dancers Go to Heaven"; and (3) the story "It Came to Eat Our Chicken Wings."


November
15
Caitlin Sweet reads from her fantasy novel A Telling of Stars and from the forthcoming (2005) prequel, which has the working title of The Silences of Home. Silences tells the story of the real Queen Galha, whose myth so obsessed Telling's heroine, Jaele.

Also present at the reading is musician and artist Martin Springett, who did the cover illustration for Telling.

(See a recent interview with Caitlin.)

December
13
The Christmas party has its usual good attendance.


2004 History


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