FANTASYCON 2006

It's been twenty-odd years since I set foot in Nottingham; that's where this year's FantasyCon (run by the British Fantasy Society) was being held. It was also only the third writers' convention I'd ever been to. The first, so Gary Couzens reminded me yesterday (when I mentioned the shitness of the bar and the ineptitude of the bar staff) was the 2000 FantasyCon in Birmingham, UK. The second, as you all know, was the creative snore-athon known as Horrorfind 2002 in Baltimore, USA.

This year's FantasyCon was held at the Britannia Hotel on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The hotel was near the centre of Nottingham town - just by the Castle there and close to the shops. I went down only for the Saturday. The first batch of people I met complained about the bar staff last night and I suspected this was gonna be a downer. Only later, riding home on the train in utter despondency, did I realise just how much of a downer it would be.

I was very rude to a lot of people.
Not intentionally, that's just the way conventions are. You're talking to someone you've not seen in years, or you've been stopped in a corridor by someone who recognises you, or you're trying to get the ear of some famous, skinny loud person like Joe Hill and it's just the format. People ride all over each other. You're in a conversation with someone and a "Hi, Mike, how you doing?" will intercept your chat. You look around and you gotta take the opportunity to say "I'll find you in the bar later." or something. The person you're chatting with gets offended. Walks off. This happened again and again, through no fault of anyone's. It was happening all over. It's just the way the format crumbles.

What did I expect from this year's FantasyCon?
Well, I didn't take any proposals or materials to woo potential business partners, I merely hoped to put some faces to some names. And I did that. Steve Saville (showing me how not to drink), Allyson Bird (such a brief passing, no vodka exchanged), Tim Lebbon (nice guy, new agent), Tony Richards (always a good buddy), Jonathan Oliver (surprised to see me there), Anne Sudworth (an artist who I'd mistaken for someone from my art school past - that's sorted out now), Allen Ashley (thanks for the Dodo Report), Christopher Teauge and the lads from Wales, David Matthew and his heckling friend from the Terror Scribes 'do' I organised here in Oxford, Robert Rowntree, Pete Crowther, Ramsey Campbell, Allison Davis (great memory story teller), Joel Lane, Mark West... man, the list goes on. The were all in a good mood and cheery and chatty.

But there was always that looking over your shoulder aspect to it. You could see everyone doing it. The roving eye. I guess that's the format, to look important and always be on the lookout for the eye catch. I'm not sure it's a healthy passtime.

Apart from the bar and general dealer-room chin-wagging, I went to a couple of panels - the screen writing one (nothing instructive, just very dull tales of screenwriting calamity - Cive Barker stole the show), the editing one (wasn't really about editing, it was just about what three independent presses will accept as submissions, oh, and Headline had a rep there, too) and the Clive Barker interview. And that, as I'm not a fan of Neil Gaiman, was the one-trick pony of this year, Clive Barker. It sorta made me sick to see the fawning, simpering 'appreciation' of this great writer. The thought that struck me, after hearing all about his woes and tribulations in Hollywood was, "Well, fuck it, if he's having troubles then we're all in the same boat." And this philosophy was reflected again and again from other writers, editors, publishers. Writing ain't easy. It's a real struggle. Then you die.

What was the most depressing thing?
Clive's voice. No, not the west-coast drawl he'd adopted (a certain amount of cultural osmosis is to be expected) but the utter wrecked nature of his Scouse twang. It was like watching someone on the brink of throat cancer (or a really wretched impression of Liberace). The brain-damaged slowness of his delivery was another shocker - he was being interviewed on stage by Pale Kane and. he. was. just. croaking. through. each. word. as. if. thinking. were. a. great. effort. He'd pause and stare for long periods of time to indicate he'd finished. The responses were all over the place and seemed to have no structure or intent on answering the question. It was a very difficult interview, I think, for Paul. Clive was droning on about being in Hell with his latest book, and I could see it. I could see Satan's scaly pecker thrusting back and forth across Clive's noduled vocal chords, it was like a sinister apparition there on stage. Satan had his carbunkled claws round Barker's throat and he was snuffing the very life from him as he talked. Sheer horror.

What do you do after that?
I could stand it no more. I left an hour before the train I'd planned to get. I couldn't return to the bar. I couldn't see any more genre faces. I didn't even want to wander round Nottingham until my scheduled train arrived. I wanted out of that town as fast as posible. I'd been taken to Hell and back thanks to Clive Barker and certainly had to flee. My own sanity dictated it.