World Horror Convention – short report
Arrived in NOLA on Wed, went to vampire shop with Nancy Kilpatrick, then hit one voodoo shop. Dinner was so-so, a mountain of fried whatevers, the best of the whatevers being the french fries. We hung out with Mandy Slater at her palatial suite at the Hyatt, where she had free wine and cookies. Ran into Ramsey Campbell and his wife, enroute to the swamps to see alligators. The Carousel Bar was like being on an elevator, with my stomach dropping whenever I dared to focus on the fact we were literally spinning – is it a good idea to have a spinning bar when people’s heads are already spinning? Rio Youers kept spinning past with different walls behind him – very strange. With one-night-only third roomie, Denise Dumars, went to voodoo cultural center, where she taught me everything I’d ever want to know about voodoo. Then several of us went to Lafayette Cemetery in the Garden District. I was dying to see Anne Rice’s house, and we swung by one of her houses and took some photos. Also stopped at a former orphanage, where she housed family members at one point. After registering for the con, a bunch of us went trolling in the French Quarter. Included were Nancy, Mandy, Sephera Giron, and a couple of people from Toronto (Rebecca and Bob), had absinthe (tres fine), and obtained strange super-sweet yet oddly peppered neon blue drinks in flashing skull mugs. Everyone except Mandy and me disappeared into a chicken shack. God only knows what they were doing in a chicken shack, presumably eating the birds but one never knows with a horror crowd. Mandy and I ducked into a place to spend an hour listening to a great Cajun band.
Hung out with ST Joshi, Jason Brock, Bill Nolan, Caitlin Kiernan, Kathryn, and Jerad Walters, and spoke to Cait about Drowning Girl. In the dealers’ room, I ran into Tim Waggoner and chatted a bit, also Laura Hickman. I made quick work of the dealers’ room, mainly because people were hawking books so aggressively that I was uncomfortable. I ended up at the glorious Centipede Press table, where Jerad didn’t have to hawk anything aggressively. His books are beyond beautiful, and I snapped both the Hannes Bok collection and the HPL whopper art volume. Naughty me, but I couldn’t resist. Dinner was super-fast the following night due to the signing. Lovely meal with ST, Mary, and Nancy. Attended Heather Graham’s party, and at some point, I talked to Jason and Sunni Brock for an hour – I think it was approx 2 am. Great seeing people like John Palisano, Ellen Datlow, Lisa Morton, Yvonne Navarro, many others.
My 9 am panel, something about rules of the horror genre, went well with Norm Rubenstein, Alexandra Sokoloff, John Urbancik, John Little, Jay Wilburn. Lunch with Dana Fredsti and David Kilpatrick, then off to the French Market where they had to pick up pralines for a friend. Dana pushed me toward a gorgeous red dress, which David insisted I buy. I wore it to the HWA banquet. Somebody told me about a secret dealers’ room, where I discovered all the books I might have bought… but didn’t. Snagged a last-second banquet ticket from Lucy Taylor, and afterwards, hung out for a few hours with ST, Mary, Jason, Sunni, Bill Nolan, Erinn, Cait, and Kathryn. Went to bed at 2 am, then awakened at 6:30 to catch my flight home. Whew.
