timwburke

There is a difference between wandering around as an attendee and wandering around as a vendor.

I had thought, “I’ve been to a lot of cons by myself! Three WorldCons! Countless PhilCons, BaltiCons, ConClaves, and ConQuests! I can sell my books at a con by myself!”

Au Contraire, Amigos!

My way of going to a con solo is to wander around aimlessly, attend a few panel discussions and readings, have a dinner, and leave early.

As a vendor, I could do none of these things. I stared at my vendor table. Every other table was heaped high with books and geegaws to sell. I had a skull-patterned tablecloth cut at Michaels not 24 hours before.

(similar to this, but no flowers. And in gold and black. And more crowded. This had skulls, okay?

And a poster of the new “Saints of Flesh” cover.

And a matted print of the vivid yantra by my friend Rachael.

And I remembered that at every con, in every vendor room, there seemed to be one guy with a sparse, if not sullen table, seemingly unprepared. A newbie who exuded an aura like that of a hiding deer.

There I was.

I spoke with my neighboring vendors. Was introduced to friends of theirs. Spoke with a few passersby. Accepted compliments on all the art, even the skull tablecloth.

Within two hours my tank was empty. My head ached. My stomach now percolated from the rather good Breakfast Cuban I had at a nearby Iron Rooster. I packed up and fled. Napped for two hours.

However…

In the past, I would have berated myself viciously for not sticking it out and forcing my charisma on any and all. Now, looking at the long picture, I realized that going solo is not playing to my strengths. I have never been a Top Banana, but always a Second Banana. I am not a Face or a Hannibal Smith, but a Mad Dog Murdoch. And that’s okay.

It was worth the money and time to discover this. I emailed my publisher explaining this and she quite understood, even though I left out the A-Team.

I did attend a reading that hopefully I will recall more clearly later this week, where a writer brought up a resounding point. To connect with readers, authors must be authentic. But the internet is a pit of rabid badgers. No matter what you declare, someone will pick a fight. An author might as well be honest.

So! Any experience can be like an experiment. I did not get the result I wanted, but I did learn from the result I got.

My reading had been at 6PM on Friday. As I expected there were only five people, what with no name recognition between myself and the other author, and the barely-past-rush hour time. But my reading went well. I recorded it and will be posting it soon. I also met a few very cool people, who I will be linking to in this coming week.

All this said, I got my schedule from StokerCon. My scheduled reading: Saturday at 1PM. A great time! I would be sharing the hour with three other authors, but some authors with more name recognition were in the same bind in other time slots. Then I saw this reading would be opposite the reading of the Guests of Honor. That, and I would be doing this alone.

At first, I thought, “Ah I’ll be networking and schmoozing all weekend! And it’s all paid for already!” I looked in my account and saw, no, I hadn’t yet been charged for my ticket. Or my hotel room. Urgh. I had less money than I thought….

Recent developments revealed that no, I probably would not be networking and schmoozing, but rather netslipping and receding. I cancelled my StokerCon ticket.

Maybe in a few years I will build myself up to the bon vivant I had thought myself to be. In the meantime, I will keep myself to the familiar cons crowded with my friends.