Norwescon 40 Roundup

by
This entry was published on May 8, 2017 and may be out of date. For the most current information on this year's Norwescon, please see our most recent blog posts. Thank you!

It’s once again time for our post-convention roundup of links! Over the past few weeks, we’ve been keeping an eye out for your blog posts, photo sets, and videos from Norwescon 40 to see what all you were saying. Here’s what we found — click through, read what your fellow fen did and thought about this year’s con, and relive the memories!

Blogs

  • Amazing Stories Magazine: A FAREWELL; MAR-APR F&SF; AND NORWESCON 40!: “This was Norwescon’s 40th anniversary, and I’m sure a splendid time was had by all…. The con was so much fun we’re probably going back next year…I wish I had space to post all my con pix.”
  • Lycanthropic Tongue Twisters: Can I just say that I love @norwescon for its inclusivity?: “Not just this sign and these fliers, but the panels themselves including: writing lgbt+ characters, lgbt+ meet and greets, social responsibility and ‘othering’ in the horror genre, other panels on racism and diversity in general, a sensory safe space for neurodivergent people, it’s highly disability friendly and everything is wheelchair accessible.”
  • Michael G. Munz: Scenes From a Norwescon: “I had a great time, sold some books, hung out with fellow authors Tiffany Pitts, Camela Thompson, and Janine Southard, went to a few panels, and almost made it to the final round in a gigantic Cards Against Humanity tournament.”
  • Frog and Esther Jones: Westboro Wannabes Picket Norwescon: “So thank you, Westboro wannabe morons. Thank you for proving, by your actions, the value that Norwescon (and all such fan-run conventions) have in this world. Thank you for proving that we can’t be bullied. You gave us all a teachable moment, and we learned something about ourselves.”
  • Jeremy Zimmerman: Norwescon 40, Come and Gone: “The strangest moment of the weekend came close to midnight on Saturday night. I was a little tipsy and utterly exhausted when I encountered two people dressed in bunny-ish costumes. As they passed people they asked, ‘Do you want candy from a stranger?’ In a way, it isn’t too weird for strangely dressed people at a convention filled with cosplayers and SCA types. But I was so out of it, all I could think is, ‘This is the beginning of either a roleplaying game or an urban fantasy novel.’ If I hadn’t been careful, I was sure they’d take me off to Wonderland or something stranger.”
  • Episcopal Café: Speaking to the Soul: Two Visions: “One of my best moments of the convention was seeing Mr Siegel in his ‘Rainbow Dash’ complete with having dyed his beard rainbow hues. While he was walking through the convention I saw one child spot him and squeak excitedly ‘Mom, Look! It’s Rainbow Dash.’ Less than 30 seconds later another child about age 6 came up to Mr Siegel and said: ‘Are you the science-man?’ Mr Siegel said yes, he was. The second child said, in an solemn, passionate tone, ‘I love physics.’ In an instant, two children saw one man dressed as a make-believe pony in two different lights. They were both thrilled to see the embodiment of something they loved manifest before their eyes and their joy lit up the hallway around them.”
  • G. R. Theron: Norwescon 40, I salute you.: “But what does Norwescon mean? Simple. It’s the people. It’s the colored center in the Venn diagram where experienced masters overlap with fans overlapping with aspirants. The wayward spirits find refuge there. But then again, aren’t we all just a little wayward? It is where the creative, quirky interests we keep in check can explore. We can be children again, dream again, where I can once again hear the ‘what if’s’ of my youth mulling over how cool it’d be if I had magic.”
  • Cat Rambo: Nattering Social Justice Cook: Time to Fix the Missing Stair: “This was underscored for me on a Norwescon (a con that does a great job with selecting programming and volunteers and understands the issues) panel that I moderated last Friday, Standing Up to the Mob, with panelists Minim Calibre, Arinn Dembo, Mickey Schulz, and Torrey Stenmark. The description was: ‘How do you support female creators who are being harassed online by the ravening hordes of the unenlightened? Tips for voicing your support in ways that mean something.'”
  • Raven Oak: Norwescon 40 Wrap-Up: “Norwescon is definitely one of my favorite conventions, and Norwescon 40 was no exception; mostly because it’s full of my people: science fiction and fantasy geeks, gamers, scientists, filkers, and cosplayers.”
  • Enid Margaret Crowe: Not a thing you see every day…., Update, and A toast to Norwescon: “First sample of the gin that was in Ian’s welcome pack at Norwescon and it is great. Very distinctive! We are just chatting about the whole trip. Thanks to all for making us so welcome and it was great to see everyone.”
  • K. M. Alexander: A Norwescon 40 Debriefing: “My first panel was a return from Norwescon 39: The SF/FANTASY BATTLE ROYALE. It was wondrous, and as expected, it was my favorite panel. They moved us to a bigger room and we nearly filled it. Once again, Matt Youngmark hosted, Erik Scott de Bie and I returned, and we were joined by newcomer Jason Bourget. We made a good team. It was hilarious and raucous. In the end, I regret picking Malcolm Reynolds over Robin Hood the Cartoon Fox. I feel like it set up a chain of events that propelled us toward a painful outcome. Much to my chagrin, Deadpool won.”
  • Geek Girls Rule: Geek Girls Rule! #362 – Norwescon 40: “Feminism in Fandom. This one I’ve done before. We talk about the history of Feminist SF, including Joanna Russ. And the fact that there have always been female nerds. We have never not existed, no matter what the He-Male Woman Haters club and much of mainstream media would have you believe. The first Star Trek convention was organized by women, the novel credited with starting SF (Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein) was written by a woman. We have always been here. From authors like James ‘Alice Sheldon’ Tiptree and CJ Cherryh, there have always been women getting cooties on your SF.”
  • That Bacon Girl: Update: “I just got back from @norwescon, where I cosplayed as Sans and had the freaking time of my life. I found a few other Undertale cosplayers, and seriously I have never had more fun talking about Undertale or singing the “Down To The Bone” fan song or making funny videos or just making each other laugh. I went to a dance and I’ve never danced in my life and I had fun. I don’t usually do that.”
  • Sheri J. Kennedy: M is for Marvelous – Norwescon: “Norwescon is Marvelous in the old-fashioned sense of the term. Marvels await around every turn. I spend most of my time in panels and workshops, honing writing skills, exchanging ideas, listening to readings by incredible authors and speculating on what the future holds.”
  • The Wolf Dream Books: NorWesCon 40: Over the Hills and Far Away: “In ‘Horror’s Role in Perpetuating Fear of the Other,’ Arinn Dembo moderated a panel, which included Tegan Moore, J. F. High, Evan J. Peterson and Jason Bourget, in a discussion about how minorities—of all kinds, including racial, religious, disabled— have been portrayed in horror as the evil. This has been done both openly and through metaphor and allegory, to create an Us vs. Them narrative. The panel talked about how that has rippled out into a larger cultural narrative.”
  • Michael Hanscom: Norwescon 40 Wrap-Up: “I got to see (if not always as much as I might have liked) many friends, run around being silly in an inflatable T-Rex costume (and I wasn’t the only one this year), take a few thousand pictures, fanboy and chat with Pillow (renowned both as a burlesque performer and as an Alaskan), and generally thoroughly enjoy my annual geek vacation.”
  • Liv Rainey-Smith: Reporting back from Norwescon: “Since my first panel was at noon I had to check out of my room and stow my luggage (including all of my art packaging) ahead of it. I stopped by the art show afterwards to check my print bin (prints get put back upside down and staffers don’t always notice), and was deeply surprised to find a ribbon hanging next to one of my framed prints! The ‘red’ Tsathoggua artist proof was voted ‘Best Horror’ by attendees!”
  • Claudia Casper: Attending a Literary Award Ceremony Held in An Alternate Universe: “The whole conference was a basket of adorables–weird and gentle folk who loved science fiction and dressing up, who had degrees in advanced physics from Harvard or personal, comparable inner degrees. It was as though a throng of introverts had magically transformed for the Easter weekend, come out of their hiding places, and bloomed in radiant, ultraviolet expression. If one had to go through a gauntlet, this was the place to do it.”

Photo Galleries

And, of course, you can also view (and add your own photos to) the public Norwescon 40 group on Flickr, or check out the (still being updated) official Norwescon 40 photos collection from our convention photographers.

Video

Podcasts

  • Black and a Half: Black And A Half Podcast Episode #29: Norwescon: “This is another special live episode of Black and A Half that we recorded at Norwescon as another guerilla podcast. They walked around and recorded the fans, authors and other random strangers at this 40th annual science fiction and fantasy convention. Manny and Silas met a lot of really interesting people at Norwescon and some of their favorite cosplay they have seen yet.”
  • The Gamemaster’s Manifesto: Put Your Phone Down! – A Norwescon 40 Live Recorded Panel: “We went to Norwescon 40 in SeaTac, WA and recorded three panel discussions on three different gaming topics! This is the first of the series and it’s all about the ways technology interacts with our gaming group and our games.”

And that’s everything we’ve found so far. Do you know of any blogs, photo galleries, videos, or podcasts that we haven’t listed here yet? Drop us a line and let us know!

Norwescon uses Accessibility Checker to monitor our website's accessibility. Read our Accessibility Policy.