Confluence (Parsec) 2017
Friday, August 4 6 p.m. Superhero movies: Why hasn’t the bubble burst? Commonwealth East JL Gribble (moderator), Timothy Liebe, Randee Dawn, Dame Dahlia “Star Wars” initiated a series of Hollywood sf films, and “Halloween” started a craze for slasher films. But in the end, the bubble burst. We’re saturated with superhero movies, television series, and…
Read More7.08.17 Flashback! Ellen Kushner and Delia Sherman talk Readercon (1994): ‘It’s like Brigadoon!’
In 1994, I had my first brush with science fiction/fantasy conventions when The Boston Phoenix asked me to interview Ursula K. LeGuin, who was to be the Guest of Honor (along with Terri Windling) at the 7th annual Readercon. At that time, I still had an image in my head that SFF conventions were all…
Read More7.08.17 Flashback! Ursula K. LeGuin, ahead of 1994’s Readercon: ‘I just always made things out of words’
In 1994, I had my first brush with science fiction/fantasy conventions when The Boston Phoenix asked me to interview Ursula K. LeGuin, who was to be the Guest of Honor (along with Terri Windling) at the 7th annual Readercon. At that time, I still had an image in my head that SFF conventions were all…
Read More7.03.16 Black Gate Magazine: ‘Strong hints of sinister goings-on’
A little follow-up on Wiscon: I was lucky to be included in a reading with one of my favorite writers, C.S.E. Cooney, and got to meet some terrific other writers in that group — Jeanine Marie Vaughn and S. Brackett Robertson. Well, it turned out we had Black Gate Magazine’s John O’Neill in the room,…
Read MoreReadercon 2017
Readercon, which bills itself as “the conference on imaginative literature,” is meeting for the 28th time in Massachusetts from July 13-16 and I will definitely be there! If you’re planning to attend, please say hello and come to find me at these readings and panels: Thursday, July 13 8:00 p.m. Salon A Broad Universe Rapid…
Read More6.29.17 Just where does ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ think it’s going?
The Handmaid’s Tale is over on Hulu, at least for this season, and I have questions. Allow me to preface by saying I thoroughly enjoyed this rendition, which makes up for the rushed and too-surfacy 1989 film take on Margaret Atwood’s seminal 1985 book about what happens when a nation collectively loses its mind after…
Read More6.18.17 On poker, ghost dads and fashioning your own father figures
Here is possibly my most enduring memory of my father: We are sitting around the kitchen table in the house I lived in from around age 8 until age 11 – the one that’s fixed in my long-term memory as The House. Everyone has a Memory House; it’s the one our imagination goes to when…
Read More6.01.17 On being a foodaholic, and forever 0 days sober
My name is Randee and I am a foodaholic. That sounds funny at first because: food! We all love food! Food is delicious and we have to eat it at least once a day and we focus our social experiences around it and it nourishes us and makes us grow and besides which, did I…
Read More05.26.17 Aziz Ansari, burritos, and why everything is no longer all about you
As babies, we are the center of the universe. We have to be, in some aspects: we can’t do a whole lot for ourselves, and thankfully most of us have at least one parent around to assure us that yes, all life revolves around our wants and needs. And then we grow up. I remember…
Read More5.4.17 With questions like that, it’s probably best if you stay behind
During a civilized conversation about the state of the nation recently a friend said to me (paraphrasing): “Yes, but all of these things you’re worried about that 45 is doing or thinking of doing — how are they really going to affect you?” I have health care, through my husband’s work. I don’t have kids.…
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