I’d meant to tell you about Readercon Saturday on Sunday, the same way I shared about Readercon Thursday on Friday and Readercon Friday on Saturday, because I like to be as contemporaneous as possible in my con reporting. But Readercon was so packed with panels I wanted to see and people I wanted to chat with—far more than other cons—that I was unable to do so. And yesterday’s reentry into real life left no time either.

Today, on the other hand …

I began Saturday by attending, “When the Other Is You,” which featured panelists Chesya Burke, Samuel Delany, Sabrina Vourvoulias (leader), Peter Dubé, Mikki Kendall, and Vandana Singh. This was their mandate, per the official description.

Being part of an underrepresented group and trying to write our experience into our work can be tricky. We might have internalized some prejudice about ourselves, we might not have the craft to get our meaning across perfectly, and even if we depict our own experience totally accurately (as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie observed in her TED Talk “The Danger of a Single Story”), we do so while struggling against the expectation that our experience is or isn’t “representative” or “authentic.” How do we navigate the pitfalls and responsibilities of being perceived as spokespeople? What potentially pernicious dynamics allow us that dubious privilege in the first place? Which works make us cringe with their representations of us, and which make us sigh with relief and recognition?

And here, for those who couldn’t be there, is the panel itself. Well worth watching in full.

After that, I schmoozed in the halls for a bit until my own panel, “The Shiny, Candy-like Zombie: Commoditizing the Undead.” I love talking about zombies, and readers must love hearing me and others do so, because the room was packed. The highlight of the panel for me was nothing any of us panelists did, but rather a comment made from the audience by Faye Ringel, during which she said that the lead story from my all-zombie collection What Will Come After was her favorite zombie story ever. Not only did that warm the cockles of my undead heart, but it caused audience members to shamble to the dealers room to buy copies of the book. Guess I owe Faye a cut of the royalties!

I very much wanted to see the panel on “Portrayals of Code-switching” which immediately followed, but as I was on my way, the people who’d bought my books came up and asked me to autograph them, and I’m still at that stage of my career where I feel an encounter with a reader who’s paid money for a book trumps everything.

Next, I headed off to hear Chip Delany read a story I believe was titled “Eclipse.” I write “believe” because I arrived slightly late, though I did capture the entire reading save for his telling us the title. However, you’ll also need to forgive the fact that the initial moments I captured were slightly unfocussed, as well as there being some shakiness due to my having to stand. But I figure any Delany is better than no Delany at all!

And so—

After more schmoozing, I captured one of the two Guest of Honor interviews. Here’s Mikki Kendall interviewing the delightful and energetic Andrea Hairston.

Once that was done, I changed so I’d be ready for that evening’s wonderful dinner at Journeyman (about which I shall tell you more later in a separate post, so non-foodies won’t nod off), then went to hear Eileen Gunn read the opening section of an extremely intense and disturbing story which I hope she’ll complete soon—because I need to find out what happens next!

By the time I returned from dinner, it was nearly 1:00 a.m., so there’s nothing more to report from the penultimate day of Readercon. But stay tuned—there’s still Sunday video to come …