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rst i wanted to take the time to do a post about necronomicon providence which was held this past weekend i actually wasn t planning on doing a write up on the con this go around even though it came up earlier in the weekend when the joey zone told me he enjoyed my blog post about the 2013 con that was my first con and it was special in many ways it truly changed my life on sunday the final day of the con i went to see friends in the vendor s room after participating on the future of weird fiction panel more on that later i picked up the dim shores chapbooks i pre ordered and was planning on buying an original cthulhu art piece from dave felton i first met dave at the 2013 con one afternoon we were both in the haven brother s food truck and recognizing we were both attending the same con struck up a conversation dave was familiar with the arkham digest and we had a nice chat so here the final day of necronomicon 2015 i found myself hanging out with dave in the vendor s room he gifted me the cthulhu piece and told me about reading my write up of the last necronomicon and some follow up facebook posts by myself and others he commented on seeing me say somewhere about how it changed my life and that he realized the first con changed his life too he remember how jeffrey thomas remarked on facebook that it felt like the con was still going on via facebook which in a way it really was excitement was running high for everyone and it seemed that none of us really wanted to let go of what was truly a magical weekend dave felton is amazing after we parted i headed downstairs for lunch before grabbing a train home as i sat on the train i thought about the weekend and quite a bit about the conversation dave and i had a few hours earlier and i came to the conclusion that writing about this year s con was something i should take the time to do i remember quite clearly the mix of emotions i had going to the first necronomicon the digest wasn t even a year old and despite having made friends and acquaintances online this would be the first time i would meet many of them excitement and nervousness both boiled so high i could no longer tell one from the other would i just see them on panels would we get to talk much would it be awkward would they be polite but not really want me bugging them my fears turned out to be unfounded and i felt as if i had come home so to speak these were my people a lot has happened in the last two years i ve attended a few more cons the wonderful hp lovecraft film festival portland cthulhucon portland readercon i edited an anthology that was published i started to become a guest at the cons i attended i ve been on panels i ve had a story published another one taken for con exclusive round robin reviews and interviews by me are appearing in other places my anthology was nominated for an award in two years i went from being a fan who wrote reviews to an active participant in the field that i love it s been simply a wild two years future of weird fiction panel l to r moderator sj bagley simon strantzas silvia moreno garcia myself mike griffin joe pulver even though i take pride in each accomplishment everything i ve done so far pales in comparison to the best thing that has come from all of this the friendships i ve been lucky to fall in with some truly wonderful people some of whom i talk to almost daily and this is why cons are so special some people go for the gaming some to see some cool hard to find films or hear their favorite authors read some go to watch some interesting panels and sure all of that stuff is fun but that s not why i go anymore i go to see my friends social media is a great way to keep in touch yeah but isn t even comparable to being able to sit around a restaurant table enjoying good food good drinks and fine conversation with friends you too rarely get to spend time with i m sure i m far from alone with this sentiment necronomicon is cementing itself as the premiere weird fiction convention as sad as i am that it doesn t occur ever year i think having it every other year actually works best neils hobbs and crew should be commended for doing such an excellent job i arrived late thursday night my flight out of philly was cancelled at the last second but i managed to catch a train just in time it was a stressful day but i finally made it just in time for the witching hour as i walked towards the hotel from the train station i saw a group of people on the edge of the small park across from the hotel front directly in my path as i moved closer they began to take on more familiar shapes and i realized that it was several of my friends running into them upon arrival couldn t have been a better welcome in providence a beacon in the dark although i missed out on the thursday night shenanigans i managed to see several readings and panels over the course of the weekend i caught most of the ramsey campbell interview and all of the new weird panel i attended readings by mike griffin pete rawlik david neilsen scott thomas richard gavin tom lynch simon strantzas jeffrey thomas and caught the end of michael cisco reading during the aickman s heirs book launch i also attended and was called upon to get up and introduce the authors readings by scott nicolay anya martin and joe pulver my weekend also ended with a bang when i was invited by moderator sj bagley to take an absent laird barron s spot on the future of the weird panel other panel members included simon strantzas silvia moreno garcia mike griffin and joe pulver and was quite a bit of fun scott nicolay recorded the panel for his podcast the outer dark and i know there is some video footage out there as well while not attending panels or readings i was apt to be found in the vendor s area the hotel bar a restaurant or somewhere else among friends along with all my old friends there were many other online friends i was able to hang out with the for the first time including but not limited to heidi ash scott dwyer matthew warren richey michael wehunt damien walters barry lee dejasu rick lai scott jones christopher patrick burke michael bukowski todd chicione we met so briefly last time ian welke we hardly saw each other definitely a drink next time the weekend was just as magical as it was two years ago and i hope that this con continues for a long time l to r lena griffin erin laroue nathan carson ross e lockhart scott dwyer heidi ash myself tom lynch a final story to end the post in 2013 when i first arrived i dropped my bags off in my room at the biltmore and then went down to the hotel bar for dinner a man staying in a neighboring hotel the omni or hotel providence i believe wandered in and took the seat next to me we exchanged pleasantries and names realized we were both there to attend the same con so had a conversation over beers and dinner i realized then that there was probably nothing to be nervous about i was attending a convention with a bunch of other kindred spirits and would be in good company after we parted i entered the lobby and ran into the group of people who would become some very important people in my life for the rest of the weekend the man i dined with and i didn t cross paths as the future of weird fiction panel wound down several people approached the stage to talk with the various panelists some wanted to remark on something we said they heartily agreed with or thought profound one lady told me she was happy i mentioned video games since she was a game designer a few people came bringing books for the panelists to sign but one stood out in particular it was the man who i shared a meal with when i first arrived in providence two years ago and now our paths finally crossed again two years and a convention later he was with his wife or girlfriend i m not sure who had some questions and he recognized me from before and thought it was very cool that i was now on panels afterwards while i sat on the train i thought about running into this man i thought about my friends i was leaving i thought about what dave felton said to me and i realized cons are more than meet and greets and more than panels and vendors and fancy costume balls cons are about friendships and coming together they change lives weird fiction fans and lovecraftians are often considered a fringe society we are often outsiders spread thin but on weekends like this it all changes we all make the pilgrimage introverts become temporarily extroverted and we all share an experience that is totally different yet the same for all of us we realize that we aren t outsiders at all we are a family we are providence posted by steely j at 3 30 pm 3 comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels necronomicon providence wednesday july 1 2015 interview simon strantzas talks aickman s heirs robert aickman s fiction is often referred to as strange fiction instead of weird fiction whether or not you re a fan of labels they do exist even if they best serve consumers what are the defining characteristics of strange fiction as opposed to weird fiction do the two ever overlap i wrote a whole essay on this topic for nightmare magazine last december so i urge anyone with an interest in this topic to visit that site and read the thing the truth of the matter is these terms are in many ways unimportant horror weird strange dark fantasy whatever dark fiction is written someone will come along and classify it the thing is these terms are to a large extent meaningless the genre is so fluid that there really are no firm dividing lines between them some stories wholly occupy one space some multiple that s how it should be but that said i did write an essay explaining differentiating the two why because i feel that it still serves an important purpose not to chop up categorize and sub genrify horror but instead to identify some of its most pervasive and interesting threads by understanding how the genre works i feel we can better understand the genre itself as writer that understanding is a powerful tool but your question i suppose it s unfair to direct readers elsewhere so the crux of the difference to my mind yours may differ is this the weird seems to be primarily an american led movement and the strange european led the weird is concerned with the effect on us of the extra planetary and the strange the effect of our internal world this is due to a large degree on the mindsets of the two peoples as a whole the americas staring at the stars and exploring the europeans gazing at their shoes and reflecting i think it s safe to say that many horror and weird fiction fans have at the very least heard of robert aickman and with new affordable editions of his work published in the last few years many have had the opportunity to read his fiction what sets aickman s works apart from his contemporaries and those who came before him aickman followed in a less travelled line of ghost story writers whose concerns were of the ambiguously internal his precursors were writers like onions and most specifically de la mare but unlike them he had the influence of modern psychiatric thought and philosophy to bolster his beliefs using them he was able to fashion his thoughts on sexuality poetry and dream logic into something wholly unique at the time it was written and still to a large part it s remained so aickman is difficult to imitate precisely because what he wrote was so uniquely born of his own personality not many writers can claim such singularity what does aickman and his work mean to you how has aickman influenced not only your work but the weird strange horror fields what current authors are currently carrying on his legacy aickman has been immensely influential on my own work by showing me how much of a story can be intuited by a reader by only the scarcest of clues forming narratives that exist on a different plane than the page is fascinating though the danger one faces is some readers are unwilling to follow along the entire way this evokes confusion and frustration but if i ve played my cards right never a sense of aimlessness aickman s work was heralded by only a select few for a number of years but i feel that tide is turning aickman s heirs being i hope of the first of many to champion him what effect this renewed interest will have on the genre remains to be fully seen but already we re seeing writers picking up the baton no one is writing quite like him of course but we re seeing strong threads in the work of steve rasnic tem ramsey campbell lynda rucker daniel mills and terry lamsley to name but a few aickman s heirs is your second time editing an anthology with shadows edge being your first with a third coming in the form of the year s best weird fiction volume three what have you learned from editing is this something you enjoy and will revisit i ve learned that editing is a challenge that demands one s full attention and that there is little more exciting than the discovery of new talent but all that time takes its toll and the more i edit the less time i have for my own work some writers may consider it a fair trade but i m disinclined to agree i think my own fiction has been under attended to for some time now and i hope to remedy that over the coming year for the readers who have yet to read anything by robert aickman what are five essential stories that they should start with and why what makes these stories special my favorite perhaps is the inner room a tale unlike any others in its mystery and symbolism but it s very oblique and not where i d send a new reader instead perhaps i d point them to my first aickman tale ringing the changes it s perhaps the most straight forward of his work yet still maintains that sense that there is more beneath the surface than immediately clear or perhaps i d direct them to the swords a dazzle of sublimated sexuality one that s in turn funny and disturbing it doesn t go in the direction one might expect though like great fiction it s conclusions are inevitable since i m naming the popular tales i might as well suggest the hospice which revels in its bizarre nightmarishness and dislocation and finally a personal favorite marriage a story about the pull of love and lust there are so many more that this though that i could recommend aickman was absolutely fantastic and i m quite pleased to have this opportunity to help highlight his work by showing how its influenced this new generation of writers thanks for your time the thanks are all mine posted by steely j at 8 37 pm no comments email this blogthis share to x share to facebook share to pinterest labels aickman s heirs interview robert aickman simon strantzas monday june 22 2015 review aickman s heirs edited by simon strantzas robert aickman is a name that many readers of horror supernatural weird fiction have probably heard before he didn t have a huge output of fiction in his time as a writer i believe he wrote 48 or so stories that were published but th...