Capclave for its opening night next weekend, since I’ll be heading off to Manhattan the next morning to attend a memorial for Tom Disch.

But if you’re in Rockville, Maryland, on Friday the 17th, this is where you’ll be able to find me pontificating:

5:00pm: Eureka, Battlestars, and other new television

8:00pm: SF Generation gap
Writers used to believe that most of their audience had read the classics and so had a shared background and that understood Asimov’s robots, Wells’ time travel, Zelazny’s alternate universes etc. Does that common background still hold? And if so, from where—television? Movies? How do you write for audiences, some of whom understand the basic tropes, while others are new?

I hope to see some of you there!

That being said, I’m having trouble finding an affordable hotel room in New York for the night of the 18th. My usual haunts are all booked, and I can’t find anything else under $325 a night. Is that the going rate these days?

Does anyone know of anything less expensive out there, or do I just have to bite the bullet?