My 2014 Event Schedule

I go to lots of events throughout the year and some, though not all of them, connect to books in some way.  At the very least, I’m likely to talk about them here, so I thought I’d give you a quick rundown of my events for 2014.

AnachroCon – February 14-16 in Atlanta, GA
AnachroCon is basically about history and geekdom.  Steampunk, alternate history, historical reenacting, time travel… It’s all fair game.  I’m going mostly for the costuming and fabrication panels.  I’m hoping to have a Regency costume finished, but if not, I’ve got plenty of steampunk costumes I can wear.  I’m especially fond of my doctor’s costume.

Photo from the author’s website

JordanCon – April 11-13 in Roswell, GA
JordanCon is a celebration of all things Robert Jordan.  The Guest of Honor this year is Patrick Rothfuss, which is pretty exciting.  Of course, Brandon Sanderson attends along with artist Larry Elmore.  I attended my first JordanCon last year when the guest of honor was Seanan McGuire, who you may have noticed, I’m a fan of.  I very sneakily got myself into their art show, so I could pretend that I wasn’t just going to fangirl.  I fangirled anyway.  But I also gave away some cool Rithmatist swag, so it was totally (semi)professional.

Magic City Art Connection – April 25-27 in Birmingham, AL
MCAC is one of the larger art shows here in Birmingham.  This will be my third year as an attending artist selling my jewelry.  Last year was difficult because I lost my voice on the second day of the show, but I’m hoping for great things this year.  This will be the 31st year for the show, and I’m really excited about it.  Hopefully, this year  I can get someone to work my booth for a while so I can go visit the other artists.  There are always amazing things to see there.

Alabama Phoenix Festival – May 30 – June 1 in Birmingham, AL
This is a great sci-fi convention.  This will be APF’s third year and my third year as a vendor.  I love this convention!  It’s small, but growing.  They’ve just moved from a conference center into the Sheraton Birmingham Hotel this year, which is exciting. Here’s a fantastic video from last year’s APF:

Disney Princess Leia and Steampunk Slave Leia take a moment together

DragonCon – August 29 – September 1 in Atlanta, GA
DragonCon is probably the biggest convention in the south and one of the biggest cosplay conventions in the country.  I go every year and I’ve posted about it several times.  It completely takes over the downtown Atlanta area for a weekend.  Which is especially interesting because the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game is also in Atlanta.  The same weekend.  Thousands of geeks meet thousands of SEC football fans.  It gets a little weird sometimes.
Then there are the costumes…  I love the costuming at DragonCon.  I usually try to have a different costume for every day I’m there.  I cheated this year and recycled one of them because my sewing machine broke.  But I’m still pretty proud of my Steampunk Slave Leia costume.  I put that together in a week.
Past highlights from DragonCon include meeting Dan Wells and Jonathan Maberry.

The Writing Excuses Crew (sans Dan) at the Hugo’s. Photo from Wesley Chu’s website – http://www.chuforthought.com/im-a-guest-on-writing-excuses/

The Out of Excuses Writing Retreat – September 29 – October 5 in Chattanooga, TN
I can’t even express how excited I am about this.  The team from the Writing Excuses podcast (Brandon Sanderson, Mary Robinette Kowal, Dan Wells, and Howard Tayler) are doing their second week-long writing retreat!  And I got in!  I participated in one of Mary’s short story classes back in November and it was incredibly helpful.  I’m so looking forward to spending an entire week with some great writers, and, of course, the authors running the retreat.
Mary is doing another workshop called Writing the Other in June, which sounds amazing.  Two people from my writing group are going to that.  I couldn’t swing the timing this year, but I sincerely hope she offers it again next year.  The instructors she’s working with on that one are David Anthony Durham, K. Tempest Bradford, Mary Robinette Kowal, Nisi Shawl, and Cynthia Ward.  It’s going to be so cool!
(Also, if the necklace Mary is wearing looks familiar, it’s because it’s the same one from further up the page next to the Magic City entry.  I made it.  It is one of the coolest things ever that she wore it.  At the HUGO’S!)

World Fantasy Awards
Photo from Tartarus Press – http://tartaruspress.blogspot.com/2012/08/world-fantasy-awards-2012_13.html

World Fantasy Convention – November 6 – 8 in Arlington, VA
Ok, this one… This is a big deal to me.  This will be my first major professional convention.  This is a small event (relatively speaking.  I think the attendance will equal or exceed my college’s total enrollment) and fairly intimate.  The World Fantasy Awards will be given out.  It’s going to be amazing.  I’m hoping to manage a ticket to the banquet as well, but we’ll see.  Everyone can come to the awards ceremony, so I’ll get to see that regardless.
There’s an art show, which I’ll be applying to when the jury opens in May.  There’s also a WWI Retrospective, which I’m very much looking forward to.

So, that’s my schedule.  Are any of you going to exciting events this year?