Toronto Spec Fic Colloquium Notes #6

Cognitive Science and The Making Of Fiction
By Karl Schroeder

- cognitive science looks at how brain reads and writes (literature, not software)
- reduce memory of trauma by prolonging experience but at a lower level -> points to how brain is wired toward endings and therefore how it processes narrative

- how many characters can brain keep track of?
- why so few stories with only one character?

- current lit theory says: discourse structures reality
- author as mouthpiece of external force
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Toronto Spec Fic Colloquium Notes #7

Against Realism
by Claude Lalumière

I think this would have made a really interesting essay to read, but it was difficult to follow as a lecture/reading.

Notes:
- was told "be controversial", so this talk is meant to challenge
- realism = comfort of hegemony vs. "pleasure" of challenge of specfic
- red herring of objective reality
- truth is the quest itself
- we remember stories of events, not the events themselves
- meaning lies not in facts
- myths give meaning -> in telling, the event acquires meaning

- non-realist art threatens the establishment

biography => confessional fiction => Canadian literature (CanLit)

- write what you didn't even know you wanted to know
- "leap of empathy"
- mechano-morphism
- Christianity is embedded in science (e.g. in dominion over animals)
- hard SF is art conforming to reality

Toronto Spec Fic Colloquium Notes #8

Making the Supernatural Seem Natural
by Kelley Armstrong

- "urban fantasy" is a marketing genre
- supernatural thriller in urban setting
- example of Charlene Harris Southern Vamps => "our world, but not our world"

- must invoke suspension of disbelief to make supernatural as real as possible
- inspiration -> "that's not how I'd do it" + "what folklore can I believe in?"

- establishing own boundaries of disbelief
- fascination of a possibility

About YA in general:
- dystopian, steampunk, and an abundance of angels right now

SFContario Panel: How to Write a Synopsis

Notes behind the cut. People are attributed by initials; aud -> indicates an audience comment or question. As always, transcribed fast and only vaguely edited, misattributions and errors are my own. Assume everything outside of quote marks is a paraphrase. (?) indicates something that I missed.

How to Write a Synopsis
Panelists: Karl Schroeder, Erik Buchanan, Stephen Pearl, and Michael Martinek (mod).

Description: A synopsis is an important part of the submission package you will use to sell your novel. But what is a synopsis and how is it developed and polished? Is there an ideal length? Panelists discuss common problems and errors.

MM - moderating because he's written so many bad ones
- what do you think are worst mistakes?
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SFContario Panel: Pissing on the Grave of Post-modernism

Notes behind the cut. People are attributed by initials; aud -> indicates an audience comment or question. As always, transcribed fast and edited only vaguely, misattributions and errors are my own. Assume everything outside of quote marks is a paraphrase. (?) indicates something that I missed.

Pissing on the Grave of Post-modernism
Panelists: Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Peter Watts, Chandler Davis (mod), Fiona Patton, Michael Swanwick

(This panel was very chaotic and I very quickly gave up on taking notes. It was more of a random chat with giddy people than a moderated discussion.)

(some discussion of what does panel title mean? nobody really knows...)

From the program: Does anyone really care about subgenres or literary movements? Does cyberpunk really mean anything anymore? How are categories of science fiction used by readers, writers, editors, reviewers, and academics? How can authors associated with certain movements remain relevant when literary fashion changes?

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SFContario Panel: Shorts Stories & Novellas - Where's the Love?

Notes behind the cut. People are attributed by initials; aud -> indicates an audience comment or question. As always, transcribed fast and edited only vaguely, misattributions and errors are my own. Assume everything outside of quote marks is a paraphrase. (?) indicates something that I missed.

Short Stories & Novellas: Where's the Love?
Panelists: Stephanie Bedwell-Grime (mod), Leah Bobet (Ideomancer), Michael Swanwick, Hayden Trenholm

Description: Sure, we say we love reading shorter works, but it's the novels that sell, and awards for shorter fiction tend to go to successful novelists. Why don't short stories and novellas get more respect?

Definitions:
novellette = 7500 to 17500
novella = 17500 to 40k
novel = 60k +

Where's the love? well... ( Read more... )