Category Archives: Appearances

Readings, workshops, conventions–if I’ll be there, it’ll be here.

Buncha Blog Posts

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Alyx-self-portrait2I have been gadding around the Internet rather a lot lately. Speculating Canada asked me to talk about the books I read this year, so I have written up ten of them, a Good-Bad-Ugly List of sorts. Not all of the books are new, or even novels, but I did read them and they are noteworthy.

I will, of course, post my annual books read list on December 31st… I’m hoping to knock off two more titles between now and then.

This is the Story of My Reading Life featured me in an interview and review on Wednesday. I was at The Book Wars on Tuesday, and Cherry Blossoms and Maple Syrup on Monday.

Meanwhile, some of my fellow writers on Facebook enriched my pool of frequently asked writer questions with the following entries:

How long have you been writing?
How long does it take you to write a story/novel?
Is there a good instruction book one can learn to write novels from?
Do your characters come from real life, and since I totally believe they did, who did you base them on?
Do you ever regret putting _______ together with ______, romantically? Wouldn’t they have been better off with _________?

Seven short sleeps until Sophie sets sail…

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(null)One short week! It’ll surprise none of you to hear that I am spending a lot of time right now doing interviews and writing guest blog posts as I gear up for the release of my fourth novel, A Daughter of No Nation.

There’s going to be a launch on December 5th at 3:00 p.m. at Bakka-Phoenix Books… let me know if you need more details. If you are in Toronto, or can get here, you’re most cordially invited.

Three other things of the book:

  • Tor.com, as you may recall, has an excerpt up for your free reading pleasure.
  • Kirkus Reviews praised both the main character, Sophie Hansa and the worldbuilding on Stormwrack. “Fans of Stormwrack will welcome another chance to set sail with Sophie.“
  • Publisher’s Weekly liked it, saying “Dellamonica expands on promising worldbuilding and delivers a fantasy tale of messy family politics and social justice with plenty of action and suspense.“

My current earworm is the Skyfall theme…

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photoToday I have finished up a guest blog entry on ecofantasy for Charlie Stross, which you can read here.

I have also prepared for tomorrow’s thoroughly fabulous launch of License Expired: The Unauthorized James Bond, by making sure my reading of my Moneypenny story, “Through Your Eyes Only,” comes in under the five minute limit. I’ve booked a Send My Hair to the Sixties appointment at a place called Blo, and now I’ve also reminded you all that if you happen to be in Toronto, you really would be very very welcome to this shindig. (I tell you this even though, according to math, it increases my chances of winning the bespoke suit ChiZine Publications is giving away as a prize if you don’t come.) It’s at the Pravda Vodka House on 44 Wellington Avenue East. If you don’t want a bespoke suit, you can put my name on the raffle ticket.

(Are contributors even entitled to enter the raffle? Do I know? Don’t burst my bubble, okay?)

Earlier today, Iposted critiques for the last round of the Writing the Fantastic workshop at the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. Next up: revision exercises! (I do still have a few slots open in the winter session of Creating Universes, Building Worlds, by the way).  I have worked on a novel called The After People, fetched food from two separate groceries, and written out some questions for the SFContario panel on economics in genre fiction that I’ll be moderating next Saturday.

I made a salad, drank coffee, ate a persimmon before it had a chance to liquefy and contemplated my upcoming Tor.com review of Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff in Simple Words by Randall Munroe of XKCD fame. Contemplated in this context is indeed a fancy term for “But she didn’t write a single word yet.”

Emails have been answered. Dishes have been washed.

And, since all this virtue and productivity means I am ignoring my young, I have refilled the bird feeder, which is the modern equivalent of slapping the kids down in front of Sesame Street with some Ritz Crackers.

CZP-LicenceExpired-INVITE

SFContario, the enScheduling

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A. M. Dellamonica, 2014, photo by Kelly Robson

A. M. Dellamonica, 2014, photo by Kelly Robson

Here is every single tiny thing I will be doing at SFContario next weekend…

Friday, November 20 – Mass Signing
All authors, all signing, all the time… well, from 8 to 9 PM. Bakka-Phoenix will be on hand to sell books.

Saturday 11-11:30 AM, Room 207 – Reading
Some of you have heard me read my favorite chunk of A Daughter of No Nation, so this menu item is officially still called Alyx Surprise!

Economics in SF – Saturday 12 PM, Gardenview
Economics is frequently overlooked in SF. Do the adventurers simply live on nuts and berries and what they can kill? What do they pay with when they visit an inn or buy a drink? What’s the economic base of different regions? How is trade carried out, particularly between species? Is there still a struggle for resources or has science advanced to the point where anything can be fabricated?
Alyx Dellamonica(M), Michael Martineck, David Stephenson, Hayden Trenholm, Jo Walton;

First Contact in Real Life – Saturday 2 PM, Gardenview
It looks so easy in Star Trek but how could we really establish a common conceptual base to communicate with another species? Sure, we have numbers and the hydrogen atom in common, but how far would that get us with a world of beings who share none of our sensory apparatus
Stephanie Bedwell-Grime, Alyx Dellamonica, Neil Jamieson-Williams(M), Peter Watts;

Author Guest of Honour Interview – Saturday 5 PM. Courtyard
That’s right… I will be grilling Saladin Ahmed about all the things.

QUILTBAG in the media – Saturday 6 PM, Courtyard
Our media may be starting to feature more characters and situations from the queer/questioning, undecided, intersex, lesbian, transgender/transsexual, bisexual, allied/asexual, gay/genderqueer (QUILTBAG) perspective, but there’s still a long way to go. How do we move from tokenism to full inclusion? We’ll discuss favorite characters, new challenges, and available resources for writers and readers.
Alyx Dellamonica, JF Garrard, Bob Milne, and…. Kelly Robson! That’s right. My beloved and I shall be quilting our bags together.

And on Sunday I shall be attending the Aurora Awards.

Today instead of Heroine I give you Bondage

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CZP-LicenceExpired-INVITEThe Heroine Question is on hiatus for a week, maybe two, as I reboot from World Fantasy Convention, gear up for SF Contario/Canvention 35, and figure out all the things I want to accomplish before A Daughter of No Nation is out on December 1st.

One of the very exciting things on that list is attending the launch of Licence Expired, The Unauthorized James Bond. As you see from this cunning invitational postcard, it will be at the swanky Pravda Vodka Bar. The publishers, World Fantasy Award winning ChiZine Publications, also offer this important info:  Costumes and Bond-themed dress is highly encouraged, and there will be prizes for the best costumes.

Drinks! Costumes! Prizes! Incredibly warped fiction with a License to Kill! My story is about Moneypenny, and is called “Through Your Eyes Only.” Kelly’s is an alternate ending for From Russia with Love, and it is sick beyond all measure. How can you pass this up?