My friend Amy ended up with two tickets to this year’s World Fantasy Con in Columbus, Ohio.  I couldn’t get any time off of work to go, but with I ended up driving out bright and early yesterday morning.  I met up with Amy, plus two other friends from Kansas, Sarah and Judith.  

I finally got to meet Neil Clarke, who runs Clarkesworld magazine.  He was super nice.  We went to a few panels, and John Joseph Adams’ reading yesterday, then went to the Tor party, where we chatted with Paulo Bacigalupi and John Scalzi.  They were both very nice and funny.  

This morning I went to a panel about giving effective readings by Mary Robinette Kowal.  I’m really glad I stuck around for that, it was super cool.  

I also ended up with over $300 in free books.  

I’m glad I went, but it was a little strange to me.  The only con I have a lot of experience with is Gen Con, and World Fantasy is just so much smaller.  It was strange to have all of the programming happening one hall.  And there were tons of people around who weren’t affiliated with the convention.  And there was no gaming.  

I know, I know.  It was just strange to me.  And World Fantasy Con doesn’t have the same spirit of community that Gen Con does.  Instead, it has a very professional feel.  It seemed like everyone there was either an author or editor or agent or copy editor or something.  It was very impressive and a little intimidating.