Day One Report (Posted to SF Signal)
Saturday is generally the most crowded of all the days at New York Comic-Con, but as I said over in my post at SF Signal, Friday was as busy as a Saturday typically is and this year, Friday seemed to be busier this year than Saturday this year. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t fun to be had. Oh no.
This was the second year in a row my wife helped to staff the booth run by the Comic Shop where I get my comic books (and who have become friends over the years). I strolled up and down the publisher’s aisles for a bit before heading over to their booth to say hello.
At the Tor booth, I saw Peter Orullian, who was signing his most recent novel Trial of Intentions, the second installment of his Vault of Heaven series. I’ve been friends with Peter online for a couple of years through twitter and facebook (and even chatted on the phone with him), so it was great to meet him in person. First, I think Peter is a Viking. He is a big man with long hair with Presence… so it shouldn’t be surprising that one of his passions is singing in a heavy metal band. Second, I don’t think Peter sleeps or seems to need sleep. He told me how he was at a last minute meeting the night before in San Francisco, caught the red-eye and arrived at the con shortly before his noon signing began. Had he not told me that, I would have guessed he had a normal night’s sleep.
Back to that Heavy Metal thing…Peter was one of three authors on the “Masters of Unreality: Heavy Metal and SFF” hosted by Del Rey Tricia Narwani panel that afternoon. As I left the Tor booth and strolled over to the Penguin Random House booth, everybody I spoke with about the panel was excited to attend, especially Myke Cole’s publicist Nita Basu. Myke was the second author on the panel is the author of the fantastic Shadow OPS series which you should all be reading. I was hoping my wife would be able to attend the panel, but the booth was too busy for her to leave so I headed down and jumped into line with my pal SheckyX. As we both knew Myke (me from attending this con for years and various NYC geek hang outs) and SheckyX from being Myke’s copyeditor and friend, we made sure to get in one of the two front rows.
The third panelist was Michael R. Fletcher, author of Beyond Redemption. I’d seen good things about the book, I think from Mark Lawrence, but I didn’t know much about the author or the book beyond that. TL;DR – as a result of the panel, I bought Michael’s book.
So, the panel itself was a blast. Each of the authors on the panel were at one time in a Heavy Metal band, the discussion wended its way through things like the subgenre of metal they would be as a writer, who the most metal fantasy writer is, the connection between being a writer and a musician, as well as why we all love the genres of SFF and Heavy Metal. Peter said this was the third (?) time he’s done the panel at a convention and he hopes to bring it back again next year. (So say we all). I also had the opportunity to meet Caroline Perny, the publicist for Harper Voyager (Michael Fletcher’s publisher) and fellow metal fan.
That panel was the highlight of the con for me, to be honest. A lot of what the esteemed gentlemen on the dais were saying echoed my thoughts and feelings. Myke asked us all to do our best Heavy Metal growl (cookie monster vocal style) and Peter asked the crowd to all throw up the moloch or Heavy Metal horns.
After the panel, I strolled over to the signing booth with Peter and Shecky, trading stories of our favorite concerts and bands before the signing began. As I said, I bought Michael’s book so I just needed him and Myke Cole to sign their respective books. I also got a picture with Peter and Myke.
What would going to NYCC be without some comic book related stuff? I was able to get two graphic novels signed by Scott Snyder on day one, so today, I spent a decent amount of time on the higher numbered rows where the comic book dealers were located.
I was looking for some specific issues in the back issue bins. I wanted to round out some of my Warlord comics since DC Comics very rudely decided to publish only one Showcase edition of the series. (The Showcase editions are black and white collections usually collecting 25 issues of a series, much like the old Marvel Essentials). I had no luck with that, I only found very early issues of the series in the bins through which I searched. Admittedly, I didn’t go through every bin at every comic stand.
The other thing I keep my eye out for are the deep discounts. Many comic shops will be selling reduced trade paperbacks or a collection of single issue comics at a reduced rate. This approach worked out well. I snagged Down, the second trade of Kelly Sue DeConnick’s Captain Marvel for $10, but the big win for me was Camelot 3000 by Mike W. Barr and Brian Bolland. This is a 30+ year old series, one of DC Comics’ first attempts at a Maxi-Series. 12 issues, in this case, telling one story, and a maxi-series not featuring any pre-existing characters. In other words, this is what Watchmen was when first released. Anyway, Camelot 3000 tells of the prophesized return of King Arthur in the year 3000 to quell and alien invasion. I knew this was released as a deluxe hardcover from DC Comics recently and has been in print in trade paperback for years. But sometimes, I like to read the actual comics just for the fun of the breakdown of each issue and to also see all the older advertisements. Anyway, I saw this on a table for $10 for all 12 issues! If nothing else, that is an absolute steal for so much art from legendary Brian Bolland. (Bolland is the artist for the seminal Batman story written by Alan Moore, The Killing Joke).
One of the things the SFF publishers smartly do at these convention is to give out books which are the first in a new series. With Naomi Novik doing a signing on Saturday, Del Rey was giving out copies of her first novel His Majesty’s Dragon, they were also giving away copies of Alan Smale’s Clash of Eagles. I was happy to grab a copy of Pierce Brown’s Red Rising which I’ve been hoping to read since it initially published. When you first walk into the Javits Center, the banner for this trilogy of books is the largest publisher banner in the convention center. My wife said when she saw the banner
, he must be a big deal. Considering Red Rising was a mega bestseller, as was the sequel, and the books have been optioned, yeah, big deal. In addition to the aforementioned Red Rising by Pierce Brown, I grabbed a copy of Anne Bishop’s Written in Red, which I’ve seen very good things about on the twitters.
After that more strolling the halls, bumping into people I knew and/or knew from twitter and online. I was initially going to attend two more panels and maybe a book signing later in the afternoon, but I wanted to conserve energy for Sunday when I planned to walk the entirety of the Javits Center with my wife at a nice slow pace. I also didn’t want to wait too long for a train home (and leave my dog Sully home alone too long).
