Events and Appearances

Upcoming Events

April 23, 6:30 PM, SF in SF at The American Bookbinders Museum, 355 Clementina, San Francisco, CA

I’ll be reading a new piece of SF political satire that is uncharacteristically biting. What can I say? The current political situation has me feeling uncharacteristically biting. This event will also include readings by Madeleine Robins and Jewelle Gomez, both fantastic writers. Terry Bisson will be interviewing all three of us. It’ll be fun. (SF in SF always is!)

May 26-29, 2017, Wiscon 41 in Madison, Wisconsin

Wiscon is a  science fiction convention with a feminist/social justice focus.  It’s also a rollicking good time—with the Tiptree Award presentation, the Tiptree Auction, and a dance party like no other. Come & discuss feminism, gender, race, disability, and class — and then dance! I’ll be participating in programming and doing a reading.

Notable Past Events

Time Travel Through Japan (a trip report) 

From July 19 to 29, 2013, I participated in the second International Science Fiction Symposium (ISFS2), an experience in global travel and time travel. The global travel was actual — a group of science fiction professionals from around the world traveled the length of Japan, meeting with Japanese writers and scholars and participating in symposia on a variety of topics. The time travel was virtual — our journey echoed and was influenced by the first International Science Fiction Symposium (ISFS1), held in 1970.

Takayuki Tatsumi, noted scholar of science fiction and popular culture and professor at Keio University, organized this series of discussions, working with the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of Japan (SFWJ). The intent was to take a new look at global negotiations between western science fiction and Japanese science fiction, to honor the 50th anniversary of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of Japan (SFWJ), and to revive the spirit of ISFS1. At ISFS1, science fiction writers from the West (Brian Aldiss, Arthur C. Clarke, Frederick Pohl, and Judith Merril) met their colleagues from the Eastern Bloc and Japan for the first time.

It was an amazing experience.  I toured Japan with  Paolo Bacigalupi (USA), Yan Wu (China), and Denis Taillandier (France), meeting Japanese writers, critics, translators, and scholars, and participated in symposia at Hiroshima, Osaka, Nagoya, and Tokyo. Our final symposium in Tokyo was broadcast on Internet TV in Japan and followed by 37,000 on Twitter. I was treated like a rock star — which was a lot of fun.

At the conclusion of our journey together, participants collaborated to write a communiqué that parallels the communiqué drafted by Judith Merril in 1970 and describes the hopes we have for science fiction, its global impact, and future International Symposia. A more detailed account of our journey and the communiqué will be published in the November 2013 issue of Science Fiction Studies Journal.