CONDUIT 2013

My 2013 Conduit experience was amazing. I was chosen as the local guest of honor (my first time being a guest of honor), and had such a fantastic time. I've never been busier at a con, and was on a ton of panels, did a bunch of events, and met up with a lot of great people. The whole weekend served as the launch for my newest book, A Walk in the Abyss from New Babel Books, which features my novelettes: "No-Tusks" about an underdog orc slave, and the story I co-wrote with Shane Moore, "A Kudekah to Remember" which is about a sasquatch (greyshalk). Many of the events promoted this book, and all in all, it was a "Monster" weekend.

Paul's Friday May 24 Schedule:

1:00 PM - Steampunk: More than just a passing craze? (Paul Genesse, Dan Willis, Brandon Almond, Steve Diamond, Shantall Pitman)

The panel went really well and we had a lot of fun discussing the awesomeness that is steampunk. I really need to turn my novelette, The Nubian Queen in Steampunk'd into a full length novel.
 

2:00 PM - Keeping Readers Glued to Your Book (no actual glue required) (Larry Correia, Paul Genesse, Eric Swedin, Adrienne Monson)

Eric Swedin was a great moderator and we had a lot of fun discussing tension, conflict, and ways to keep the readers interested.

4:00 PM - Paul Genesse and Patrick Tracy's Reading. Pat read from "Mungo the Undying" and I read from "No-Tusks." It was lots of fun. I also did a public service announcement: Save the Orcs. (Read it below and the video will be available at some point).

Save the Orcs. Every year, tens of thousands of orcs are hewn down to provide experience points, treasure and emergency rations for heartless adventurers. By making a contribution, you can make a difference. They need all the comfort, support and any small, tasty children that you can spare. Please, think of the orcs.

Find the t-shirt here: http://gamerconcepts.com/catalog/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=22

7:00 PM—A viewing (on DVD and live) of a hilarious reading of No-Tusks by Pat Tracy and Paul Genesse from ConDuit 2011

Watch it here: http://vimeo.com/24400613

8:00-12:00 PM - Orcs vs Giants vs Greyshalks Role-Playing Game



The first big event on Friday was the D&D Game I ran for some all star players. Friday night I hosted: "ORCS VS. GIANTS VS. GREYSHALKS!" It was such an awesome game, with 12 players, plus another 4 more once we got going. The GIANTS of the Bloody Hair Tribe: Patrick Tracy, Larry Correia, Bob Defindi, Jayrod Garrett. The GREYSHALKS: Layne Lowder, Russ Cook, Nate Tooley, Jessica Rice, and Brett Peterson. The ORCS of the Iron Spear Tribe: Steve Diamond, Zachary Hill, Daniel Swenson, Joe Coleman, Don Darling. 


It was one of those games that came out so perfectly. We all had such a good time and it was collaborative storytelling at its best. The game ended up being way better than I had anticipated, and handling that many players was daunting, but it all worked out great. One big highlight was Pat Tracy voicing the dragon, Vermithrax toward the end, and he was incredible. The microphone and amplifier really made it fun.

Getting to play in Shane Moore's world, which we explore in the anthology was so much fun.
Check out the anthology on Amazon here.

Paul's Saturday May 25 Schedule

11:00 AM - Paul Genesse signing with Larry Correia, Patrick Tracy and Zachary Hill

The signing was fun and Pat, Zack and I signed all the A Walk in the Abyss books for the party later.

12:00 PM - Giving your Characters Character: Help for Role Players (Paul Genesse, Bob Defendi, Revan+Joe+Layne from Dungeon Crawlers Radio). 

Great panel on creating characters, and all the guys were so well spoken. I was very impressed.

3:00 PM -The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - a fun, "expert-fan" analysis (Paul Genesse, Blake 
Casselman, Bob Defendi, and Gollum)

We had a lot fun on this panel and discussed the movie with the crowd. We all can't wait for the second movie.

6:00 PM-- Release Party (Here's part of the poster)

A WALK IN THE ABYSS

RELEASE PARTY/MONSTER GAMES!

SATURDAY 6:00-8:00PM

FREE PIZZA!

WHERE? COTTONWOOD II

JOIN A TRIBE!

ORC? GIANT? SASQUATCH?

WATCH THE MONSTER GAMES!

(SKUNK TOSSING, BEST GROWL, COMPETITIVE WORM EATING, BEST HOWL, AND MORE!)

PRIZES AND HONORARY TITLES WILL BE AWARDED!

Author Amber Argyle of the GREYSHALK TRIBE won the growling contest in EPIC fashion. She is terrifying! She was awarded the honorary title of: Chief Grim Throat the Wicked and was named QUEEN OF THE GREYSHALKS!

GRRRRRRROOOOOOWWWLLLLLLLL!


The skunk tossing contest was won by this very excitable young man, I believe of the GREYSHALK tribe. He was named: Chief Stinky Hands the Pungent!




The Competitive Worm Eating contest was won by Dennis Lundstrom of the GREYSHALK TRIBE who ate 22 disgusting grub worms (gummy worms) in only 60 seconds. He was named: Chief Iron Gut the Worm Digger!!

The GREYSHALK TRIBE dominated the competition, shaming the Bloody Hair tribe of giants, and the Iron Spear Tribe. Julie, particularly loud ORC of the Iron Spear Tribe did win the Howling Contest, but it was of little consolation. She was named: Chief Wolf Snout the Yowler.

Fun was had by all and A Walk in the Abyss had a great book launch.

Paul's Sunday May 26 Schedule

12:00 PM - Write About What You Know (Larry Correia, Paul Genesse)

It was the "Paul and Larry Show." We rocked it and had the audience laughing and learning in equal amounts. Good times and I love being on panels with Larry. He's the man.

1:00 Beat the Geeks: Tolkien Trivia. 

I was invited to participate and was crushed by the Julie Andelin, who smashed me with extreme prejudice. She answered four questions and I got zero. The questions were hard. I had no idea what the name of Frodo's mother was: (Primula), or the other elf besides Elrond who counseled Isildur to throw the One Ring into Mount Doom (Cirdan), or the other two questions. Something about Saruman and when he first looked into the Palantir.  

3:00 PM - Paul Genesse: Guest of Honor Address: Becoming a Dragonslayer: Good Career Move or the Dumbest Thing I've Ever Done.

My keynote address was a modified and longer version of the speech I gave at SLC Nerd 2013. It's only 35 minutes long and the video is below.

Final Panel: 4:00 PM - "The Best Advice I was ever Given…" (Larry Correia, Paul Genesse, Eric James Stone, Dan Willis, Kathleen Dalton-Woodbury). I think we were all a little tired, but it went pretty well and I tried to keep the audience laughing. My best advice: "Don't wiz on the electric fence." (said in the voice of Ren from Ren and Stimpy). Seriously, my best advice: Keep going and enjoy the journey.

The end of Conduit was spent being interviewed by Russ Cook and Tom Carr of Residual Hauntings Revived. We spoke about the role playing game on Friday night and had a great time. This pic pretty much sums it up. I had them laughing. The video will follow eventually.

My 40th birthday was a few days after the release party (May 29th) and my buddy, Russ Cook photo -shopped this picture adding in Pinky and the Honey Badger, which are both mentioned in my keynote address video.

REVIEW OF WHEN ANGELS WEPT BY ERIC SWEDIN

When Angels Wept: A What If History Of The Cuban Missile Crisis by Eric G. Swedin

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


CHILLING ALTERNATE HISTORY BOOK


This exceptional history/alternate history book chilled me to the core. Students of the Cold War know how close the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. came to nuclear war in October 1962, and this book describes what could have happened. The author purports to be an Australian historian writing in 1996, which is 36 years after The Fire. The book starts with a description of the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961. The Kennedy administration inherited the plan from the Eisenhower administration, and JFK never fully embraced the invasion, nor thought through the outcome. The seeds of destruction were sown in that poorly planned and thought out attack on Cuba.

When Angels Wept Eric G. Swedin is a very engrossing and readable history book. On page 167 (of 274) the alternate history truly begins. President John F. Kennedy takes the advice of his generals and launches conventional bombing raids on Cuba to destroy the nuclear missile launching pads the Soviets and Cubans were constructing. Bad weather, or one spy plane flight, done a few days later than it actually flew, could have been the whole difference in global nuclear war.

The book does an excellent job of describing the principal characters, JFK, Nikita Khruschev, Fidel Castro, warmongering General Curtis LeMay, and several others. It also describes the run-up to the conflict, especially the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, which JFK completely bungled. What I never understood before was that JFK’s mistakes during that period informed him later so that he did not make the same mistakes during those 13 days in October. In this alternate version he does make a terrible mistake and attacks Cuba, which leads to nuclear war. The U.S. did not know that the Russians had brought tactical nuclear weapons to Cuba and were prepared to use them in case of an invasion, which turns out to be the trigger for the Kennedy administration.

A nuclear attack by the Russians in 1962 was suicide for them, though Khruschev apparently did not understand that at the time. The U.S. had a far superior bomber force, and many more long-range missiles, which the excellent author, Eric Swedin points out in great detail. General LeMay was correct in thinking that it was a “good time” to have a nuclear war, as the U.S. would devastate the U.S.S.R., but the cost would still be incredibly high for the U.S. and the world. The U.S. would have been the “winner,” but mainland Europe, Britain, China, Japan, Korea, and Russia would have been annihilated. If nuclear war had occurred in the 70’s or 80’s it would have been so much worse, but even in 1962 the nuclear apocalypse would have been beyond awful.

The last 100+ pages of the book make for gripping reading and are terrifying. Reading about the war plans of both sides and seeing what the collateral effects would have been scared me big time. Also, the mention of civil war in the U.S. after the conflict and the surprising vice president who takes office in the next election fascinated me. The conclusions and the analysis of the whole situation make this book worth the read. I had a hard time putting it down and kept thinking about it when I was not reading.

When Angels Wept won the prestigious Sidewise Award and it deserves all the acclaim it has garnered. If you area student of history, or lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis, I think you’ll find this book fascinating, and horrifying.

The world came so close to destruction in 1962, and examining the potential outcomes helps us all realize how important it is to have intelligent, well-informed, and strong leadership world-wide.

EXCEPTIONAL BOOK, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Paul Genesse




View all my reviews

A WALK IN THE ABYSS RELEASED!

"I’ve already read Paul Genesse’s story, "No Tusks," and it is awesome. It is possibly one of the grossest, nastiest, funniest stories ever, so of course it's about Orcs."--New York Times' Bestselling Author Larry Correia (full review here)


That's the first review of my story, and I personally believe that "No-Tusks" is the most important orc love story of the 21st century. There's toe sucking, bog wine, diabolical plans, bumbling giants, and orc style revenge.

Here's the introduction to the book:

Orcs! Greyshalks! And Giants!

Prepare yourselves, intrepid reader, for three complete novelettes set in the Abyss Walker world of author Shane Moore. In this anthology you shall read “No Tusks” by Paul Genesse, the disgustingly graphic orc story—not for children—(You have been warned!); then a tale about a young Sasquatch, or more accurately, a greyshalk trying to find his place in the world in: “A Kudekah to Remember” by Paul Genesse and Shane Moore; and finally, a truly hilarious story about a bumbling giant in: “Mungo the Undying” by Patrick M. Tracy. You’ll also be treated to a short story from a very unique point of view—an arrow in flight: “Unerring” by Patrick S. Tomlinson; and as a bonus, an excerpt from the novella, “The Wererat’s Tale III: The Collar of Perdition” by Patrick S. Tomlinson, which was written from an outline penned by the creator of the Abyss Walker World, Shane Moore himself. Orcs, greyshalks, and giants (and wererats) will never be the same!

View the book on Amazon.com

The video below is the reason why neither Patrick Tracy nor myself will ever hold public office. We read from "No-Tusks" at the CONDuit convention in 2011.

No Tusks Dramatic Reading from Patrick Tracy on Vimeo.

The World As a Character Presentation from LDS Storymakers

(These are just a few notes, not really what's on my note cards, and I'm not posting the 50 slides).

"The World as a Character," a few notes from my presentation. Most of this is in the world building book Eighth Day Genesis edited by Sabrina Klein. The book has been nominated for a 2013 Origins Award.

*Think of some of the most iconic fantasy or science fiction settings: Frank Herbert’s Arrakis, J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth, Stephen R. Donaldson’s The Land, James Cameron’s Pandora. You can imagine each of those worlds as a character with distinct personalities.

*Reactions are much more interesting than a boring description about a place. They show the character of the setting, and also the main character’s thoughts, which accomplishes the two major goals of character development at once.

*Your job is to show us which face the world takes wherever the characters go.

*Consider very carefully what kind of story, or stories, you want to explore before you craft your world. You don’t want your story to clash with the world and make what you are trying to do seem unbelievable or inconsistent. Think about the common descriptions of plot before your proceed with the world-building.

*Write a bio from the point of view of the world. Just a couple of paragraphs.

*Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch is credited with coming up with a famous list of plots I’ve often heard at writing seminars and are considered the basic type of literary plots: Man against Nature, Man against Himself, Man against God, Man against Society, Man caught in the Middle, and Man & Woman. Make sure your world and your story are compatible. Some plots seem to fit better with certain types of worlds.

*Don’t info dump about the world and expect the readers to keep reading.

*Basic Questions to answer during world creation:
• Stable agriculture?
• Navigable rivers?
• Mountains, deserts, or bodies of water that close it off from other areas?
• Plants that are easily domesticated?
• Animals that are easily domesticated?
• A mild or harsh climate?
• Deadly diseases that are endemic to the area?
• A human population that has been there a long or short period of time?
• Natural resources that benefit the local population?

These questions are huge and if you want to understand the significance of them more read anthropologist Jared Diamond’s incredible book, Guns, Germs and Steel, and also Collapse. The answers to those basic questions above will determine a lot about the people who live in the world, and your bio about certain parts of the setting will answer the rest.

Check out Eighth Day Genesis on Amazon.com and check out all 21 essays on world building.

Review of Allied Zombies for Peace by Craig Nybo

(Allied Zombies for Peace display at Night Flight Comics in Salt Lake City)

Review: I loved reading Allied Zombies for Peace by the hilarious author Craig Nybo. I had no idea that a riot involving zombies, WWI veterans, cops, and the vile KKK at a peace rally in 1967 could be so entertaining. It's written like a screenplay with short, punchy chapters, and told from many different point of views, and covers only 42 minutes of mayhem. If you're looking for a fun read, check out this book.

Here's the awesome book trailer video--errr, I mean news cast about the riot.

Reading about zombies clawing and munching on some vile KKK jerkwads was awesome. There just can't be enough of that in the world. Nybo is a great comedic writer and a rising talent. I can't wait to read what he writes next.

Check it out on Amazon.

Paul Genesse
Author of the Iron Dragon Series
Editor of the Crimson Pact Series

REVIEW OF AT THE MOUTH OF THE RIVER OF BEES BY KIJ JOHNSON

AT THE MOUTH OF THE RIVER OF BEES (short story collection) by Kij Johnson

This is an incredible collection of stories by one of the best short story writers on the planet. She’s won practically every major fantasy and science fiction award and been nominated for all of them multiple times. If you want to read some amazing short fiction, this is a collection you must have. Her work is often featured in the years best collections and her skill at crafting beautiful and thought provoking stories is second to none.

I’ve been a fan of Kij Johnson since I attended one of her writing seminars at Gen Con in 1998 and have read many of these stories before, but I found a lot that I hadn’t read. Having them all in one perfectly packaged book was awesome. Small Beer Press did a great job.

It’s hard for me to describe all eighteen stories in the collection, but I’ll go over a few of my favorites.

26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss was first published in Asimov’s Science Fiction magazine in 2008 and if you haven’t read this Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy award winning short story, you’re in for a treat. The premise is crazy: a woman buys a traveling monkey show . . . because she must. It’s deep, amazing, and will get in your head for a long time. It’s still in mine years after first reading it.





Spar, originally published in Clarksworld in 2009, won the Nebula for best short story, and this one will blow your mind. It’s a science fiction nightmare about a woman who is trapped with an alien for a very long time. It’s a chilling story. I hear people talking about this one at writer gatherings all the time. It’s that good.




Fox Magic, originally published in 1993 in Asimov’s, and won the Sturgeon Award. It became the basis for the award winning novel, Fox Woman from Tor, which I fell in love with. This is the legend of kitsune, the magical fox who became a woman and seduced a Japanese samurai lord. I loved this story and especially the novel. Fox Magic is incredibly beautiful and poignant. If you love it, read the novel for sure.

Wolf Trapping first appeared in Twilight Zone magazine in 1989, and I’d never read it before. The story is about a wolf researcher who meets a strange, feral woman who is trying to become part of a pack of wolves. The ending will leave you sick and in shock.

The Empress Jingu Fishes is a great story about a woman who can see the future, and goes through the years ahead with the bitter knowledge of what’s going to happen to the people she loves. Fascinating.



The Man Who Bridged the Mist won the Hugo and Nubula award for best novella, and I found it to be beautifully crafted. It reminded me of the world I created for my Iron Dragon series a little, with the mists surrounding the land, so I loved that aspect, and was captivated all the way through.

The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change, won the World Fantasy Award, and I can see why. I hadn’t read it before and loved it. The story is about a woman who becomes close to a pack of dogs after “the Change.” Dogs (and all the mammals) gain the ability to speak and it throws off the whole world. Dog lovers will be very touched by this one, I think. I know I was.




Ponies, won the 2010 Nebula award for best short story, and I was fortunate enough to hear Kij read it at World Fantasy soon after it came out on Tor.com. This tale is an allegory about growing up, although this one is in a world where all the little girls get pretty winged, talking ponies, but if the girls want to be part of the popular crowd they have to, shall we say, make some changes to their beloved ponies. This is such an awesome story and when I read it in this collection, I heard Kij, in my mind reading it like she did back at World Fantasy, like she was reading a sweet story to kids, when in truth it’s a nightmare.

There are a lot of other great stories in this collection, and I’ve savored them, letting the beauty of the words, and the expertise of the writing wash over me. The technical brilliance is one thing, but the way some of the stories stick with me is uncanny.

The title story, At the Mouth of the River of Bees, was a new one for me as well, and I saved it for last. It was about a woman (the same one from the Trickster stories) who is on a journey across the country with her old German Shepherd dog, who is dying. They run into a roadblock, the Bee River is flooding, but it's unlike any flood you've ever heard of, and the main character is drawn to find the source of the flooding. It's a journey of the heart and the mind.

Kij Johnson has a way of getting you to believe 100% in whatever world she creates, and then slips in some fantastical concept, like a river of bees stopping traffic, and it makes perfect sense.



Learn more about this amazing writer here or find this collection on Amazon.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED 5/5 STARS
Paul Genesse, Author of the Iron Dragon Series and Editor of The Crimson Pact Series

FUN YOUNG ADULT SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL

Fire Season by David Weber and Jane Lindskold


(very minor spoilers)

This is the second novel about Stephanie Harrington and her treecat companion, Lionheart, set on the fascinating treecat home world. I hadn’t read the award winning first book, A Beautiful Friendship by David Weber, and came to this novel as I’m a fan of author Jane Lindskold’s short fiction and her novels (Through Wolf’s Eyes, Thirteen Orphans). You don’t need to read the first book in this series, A Beautiful Friendship, to understand this one, as I was never lost, but I’m sure it would be good to start at the beginning.


A Beautiful Friendship on Amazon


If you’re a reader of David Weber’s Honor Harrington novels, I think you’ll enjoy this prequel novel series. Fire Season is set a few hundred years before Honor was born, and this is not a space opera with lots of the big battles Mr. Weber is famous for. It’s a coming of age novel, mostly written to appeal to teenaged readers (12 and older), about a brilliant young woman growing up on an alien planet, who just happens to be the first person to ever bond with a treecat. The telepathic, empathic, six-legged (hexapedal) catlike creatures with long tails—two of their six legs have actual hands on them—are the stars of the book.

I found the most fascinating aspect of Fire Season to be the relationship between fifteen-year-old Stephanie and the treecat who adopted her. Lionheart is what Stephanie calls him, but his true name among the People (the treecats think of themselves as The People), is Climbs Quickly.

The treecats are telepathic with each other and empathic with humans, so communicating with humans is quite difficult for them, though they can read human emotions very easily and affect them in some minor ways. The treecats think that humans make all sorts of funny mouth sounds, use hand gestures, and isn’t it sad they can’t speak to each other with their minds and have to rely on such poor communication methods?

It was hilarious and awesome when two treecats were communicating telepathically with each other and one treecat noted how well the human (Stephanie Harrington) had been trained by Climbs Quickly. The big question in this book is if the treecats are intelligent enough to be considered sentient by the human scientists.

Climbs Quickly can read Stephanie’s emotions and enjoys her “mind-glow” very much. I loved reading the chapters from Climb’s Quickly’s point of view, and it was fascinating how the human scientists are trying to determine if the treecats are a sentient race, while the treecats are trying to understand if they should avoid the humans who have come to their world, or if they should interact with them more.

The book has the feel of an un-contacted tribe of native Americans first coming into contact with a highly civilized group of Europeans. That would be Europeans who are not trying to enslave or destroy them. What a concept. There are a lot of great messages in this book that will get younger and older readers thinking.

Fire Season is naturally set during the dry season when forest fires often rage across the mostly tree-covered world. Stephanie Harrington, and her big brother friend Karl, are provisional rangers with the forestry service, and they participate in watching out for fires and sometimes fighting them, and of course rescuing animals caught in the path of the flames.

Much of the book is dedicated to Stephanie becoming an adult. She has to learn to interact with kids her own age, a very difficult thing for a genius introvert, and of course deal with her well-meaning but socially clumsy parents. I think teens will easily connect with Stephanie, as she’s a very well drawn character.

I highly recommend this book to teen animal lovers—especially young women—and to fans of the Honor Harrington series who want to see where the treecats came from. This is a good starting point for younger readers, and I think this would be a great gift to a friend or relative that you wanted to expose to science fiction. It kept my interest throughout, had a good conclusion that wrapped up nicely, and I’m excited to read the sequel, Treecat Wars.

View it on Amazon: Fire Season by David Weber and Jane Lindskold
Highly Recommended, 4.5 out of 5 Stars

Paul Genesse
Author of the Iron Dragon Series