Foolscap X Program
All members of Foolscap are potential panelists, so let us know if you’re interested in being one.
This year we’re in a new hotel, and our programming has the opportunity to reflect that. We are looking for things that fit in large rooms, small rooms, location-appropriate space (art panels in the art show for instance) and panels that are of interest to our community.
As always, all our members are invited to be a part of the program. If you haven't yet bought a Foolscap membership this year, we want to make sure you have the opportunity to see what's brewing - you might decide you just have to come! Foolscap hosts many panel and discussion groups, and our Guests of Honor can't possibly staff them all. At the heart of Foolscap's mission is the belief that all members are experts in something, and we know there's something you would love to share with other members of the convention.
Foolscap doesn’t offer complimentary memberships to anyone but the Guests of Honor. We feel that each member of the community contributes equally and we couldn’t possibly comp the entire membership.
We’ve brainstormed and collected a lot of panel ideas and listed them below. Send your choices or suggestions to Sue Mohn so we can put together the program that you want to see at Foolscap this tenth year!
- Welcome to the Monkey House
A Kurt Vonnegut tribute.
- Science fiction as motivation
At its best, science fiction motivates us – does it do that better from examples of how we want to live or ones we want to avoid? How? If it takes both, why?
- SF Mad Libs
We provide some of the words; the panelists provide the rest. Then we get the whips and make them read them – out loud.
- Typography 102/201 For Everyone
Sooner or later, you too will lay out a convention flyer or set up a program book. When you do, here’s what you need to know.
- Cover Art and Other Marketing Gimmicks
Everyone knows that a book’s cover art is marketing, not illustration, but what makes it effective as a marketing tool? What other tools are there to sell a book?
- Getting Published 101 – The Book Query
Essential. Critical. But often badly done. Pick up pointers on writing this important letter.
- Super Volcanoes
Mt. St. Helens was interesting. Yellowstone is likely to be devastating. What makes a super volcano, where are they, and how will they affect us if we’re the lucky generation?
- Change the Rules? Why Not!
Changing the “accepted” rules of how Magic or Vampires work? Can you? Should you? How does it work? Should you at least have a reason for changing the rules?
- Have Vampire Romances Jumped the Shark?
Is the writing anemic? Do the characters lack vitality? Will this subgenre lie peacefully in the grave or can it be brought back to life?
- When Good Series Go Bad
Are all book series doomed to go bad? Can a series survive its own popularity? When do you find that a series has ‘jumped the shark’?
- Researching 201
You’ve gotten well past Wikipedia; you’re pretty good finding things on the net – or even in a library. What’s next? Does it make sense to study maps of a place you don’t live in if you’re writing about it? What about talking to folks who actually live there? How about interviewing people in the profession (or avocation) of your protagonist? When is it research and when is it just wool gathering?
- New Trends and Themes in Science Fiction
We’ve done steam punk, and cyberpunk is so old it has grandkids. What’s next?
- Using Music in Story Telling
What creates a successful use of music in the silent world of the written page?
- Writing in Your Own World vs. Writing in a Shared World
What at the risks? What are the costs? Is it better to solo or to work in a shared world? Why?
- Is The Illustrated Book Making A Come Back?
Computer technology makes it easier than ever to illustrate a book – and a black and white illustrated book costs little more than one without. Add in collectors editions and digital publishing – will illustrations once again compliment the story, instead of serving as marketing devices?
- We All Know What Happened to Harry – What Are You Waiting For Next?
What new book(s) are you waiting for anxiously? If they’re not on a publisher’s announced list, why should they be?
- Alien Pets
We know why we have pets – dogs need family and cats need staff. But what sort of pet would an alien have, and why?
- Selling Your Work
Is it easier if you fit in an existing niche, or does it help to be different? Does it make a difference if you’re trying to sell to a large press or a small press?
- Group Learning vs. Going Solo
Whether writing or illustrating, one can either work solo or join a “support group.” Some groups are there to inspire, others to critique, others to motivate. Is there a rule of thumb for when it’s better to join a group and when it’s better to Go It Alone?/LI>
- This Year’s Graphic Novels
What’s new, what’s hot, what do we have to look forward to?
- Digital Art 201
You got the basics – you can navigate your way around Photoshop and Illustrator. You’ve taken a class or two, and your hardware isn’t holding you back. What next? Can you sell your art? Where and how?
- The Empirical Results of the Clarion Workshops
Are they producing our new writers? Educated readers and critics?
- Young Artists To Watch Out For
New to the fields of writing, drawing, illustrating – who’s out there that we should be noticing
- Architecture In F/SF And Its Relation To The World It Fits In
- When Did you Come to SF/F
What drew you in? Was it a style? An author? A convention? What makes you an SF/F fan?
- Alice’s Children
An examination of Victorian fantasy and literary offshoots of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass
- What Makes Urban Fantasy?
What do you need beyond a city, an elf, and an attitude? Must you have an elf? What about witches, vampires and werewolves?
- How To Build An Art Collection
- What Is the Place Of SF In Education
- Why Pirates?
Why is this a fast-growing sub genre?
- What Would It Feel Like To Be An Alien?
For reference, see (Becoming Alien/Being Alien)and (Slan/AE Van Vogt)
- Kitchens Of The Future
How will we eat? What sorts of “must have foods” are there likely to be? Could your great-grandmother even have conceived of a microwave or an induction cook top? What’s down the road 100 years from now?
- Homework Of The Future? Schools Of The Future?
First education was for the rich only, often by private tutors or church schools – then for the masses, but primarily to prepare them for factory work. Many say public education is necessary for a healthy democracy; others disagree. In the last 20 years, homeschooling has exploded – and church schools have had a resurgence. What’s education likely to look like 100 years from now? What do we have to do (or not do) to get it there?
- How To Sell An Orange Peeler
You’ve been given 2 crates of orange peelers. What are you going to do with them? What are you going to do with them? Will you write about them? Will you do visual art with them? Will you create music around (or with) them?
- Should There Be Consequences?
Should the deeds of your characters always have consequences? How much is too much? When is it okay to give ’em a break, and when you do you need to drag them through hell?
- The Telltales of Teen Tales
Young Adult novels are selling like mad, and not just to teens. What’s the attraction?
There are differences between novels written for mass consumption and those written for the young adult market. So why are the YA books flying off the shelves to adults?
- Let Me Entertain You
But first I need to know how you get your entertainment. DVD, cable, books? What do you chose, how much time do you spend on it, and why?
- Alien Hobbies
Surely buzzing Terrans in UFOs isn’t their only one. What about rock watching, comet trajectories, and interspecies rugby?
- Drawing X
We pick the object; the artists do the work. The object will be physically present.
- How Long is An Idea’s Half Life?
When is that really cool idea you had passé? Can you give it new life? How?
- The Parody Constant
We’re looking for the mathematical formula that determines when a work or person will be parodied. Terms may (or may not) include fame, folly, novelty, and contemporanity.
- Cartography Of Science Fiction
How do you map a star empire?
- 8 Years of President Gore: Alternate Histories
Did President Gore succeed in his terms in office? How did he handle the Arabian Plane Plot and the Korean Crisis? Will he hand things on to another Democrat or is the McCain/Bush team ready for a come back?
- 8 Years of President Gore
How do you feel about how President Gore has handled his terms in office? His handling of the Arabian Plane Plot, and the Korean Crisis? Will he hand things on to another Democrat or is the McCain/Bush team ready for a come back?
- What Does SF Have to Say to Millennials?
Each generation has had its “new” things to say, and SF is no exception. What’s this new generation of writers sharing with us?
- Why Not Dogs?
Do you have days when it seems like every writer, artist, and fan owns (or is owned by) one or more members of the feline species? Whatever happened to dogs?
- Malls of Tomorrow
On the ’net or on the Ave, where will you go shopping? Will the wares be more similar, or will they be different? Or will (gasp!) shopping lose its preeminence as the great American pastime?
- Fashion In Fiction
Er, not fashions in fiction, but clothes – if the clothes make the man, how clothes are handled can tell us a lot about a character and their culture. What books have you read where you’ve noticed this done?
- What's a Handicraft in 2200?
Two centuries ago, what we know count as crafts (candle-making, quilting, weaving) were essential parts of everyday life. In another two centuries, what parts of our daily life will be practiced as aesthetic crafts?
- Itsy-Bitsy - When is Small Too Small?
Can tiny gadgets be too small? Too easily lost, too hard to work with? Who determines what too small is, and how do they do it?
- Who Eats Whom?
If you have talking animals, or a planet with more than one intelligent species, how do you address the etiquette, morality, and legality of who can eat who when? (For example, Blorks taste quite good, but you must never eat one just for a snack – it’s rude to the Blork.)
- The Buddy Story
Partners In SF
- The Chill Factor
What creeps you out? Spiders? Snakes? That sensation that the person behind you?
- Characters that Don't Fit
When kids don’t fit in, they often either change to do so or become outcasts. What about characters in books or in pieces of visual art? Must they either fit in or become outcasts? Is there another option?
- Stories That Should Neither Be Told Nor Written
Even with the First Amendment you can’t yell “Fire” in a movie theater and it’s not a good idea to be rude to your boss. How would you judge which stories to quietly quash based on subject matter, incidents, and language?
- Seattle 2050, 2100, 2150
What changes can we expect to see? Will the suburbs shrink or grow? Will Alki sink beneath the waves? Will the Mariners ever win the pennant?
- The Many Ways SF Predicted Global Warming
Or did it? Do you feel better prepared to face climate change because you read science fiction? Did you read something that caused you to change your behavior?
- A Decade of Foolscap – What Should We Do Next Year
Next year will be Foolscap XI – what would you like to see?
- How Do You Write the Other?
We’re often exhorted to “write what we know,” and yet we’ve all seen examples of writers that handle opposing genders, aliens, other cultures well. So how do you write male protagonists if you’re female (or vice versa)? How do you write aliens if you’re from earth? How do you get a feel for that which you are not?
- Acceptably Offensive
Why you should offend people with your work and how to do it properly.
- The Business of Art
Making a living as an artist – things you need to know.
Past Programming
Interested in past programming? Check out the Foolscap IX program here, the Foolscap VIII program here, or the Foolscap VII program here.
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