Review Contest: AFTER HOURS: TALES FROM THE UR BAR

So, my short story 'The Fortune-Teller Makes Her Will', which is about love and magic and poisons and intrigue and Paris in the reign of Louis XIV, came out last month in the fabulous anthology After Hours: Tales from the UR Bar, edd. Patricia Bray and Joshua Palmatier, from DAW. There are a whole bunch of great stories in there, by all sorts of great writers, including Tricia and Ben Tate, and Seanan McGuire and Juliet McKenna and Laura Anne Gilman and many many more.
Now, you have chance to win a limited edition bag of UR BAR M & Ms in a review contest: the details are here.

Signal Boost: Vera Nazarian

Vera Nazarian, a wonderful writer and the publisher of Norilana Books, has lost her house to the bank. You can find out how to help here.
Please do click through and do what you can.

Pant, huff, pant, huff

Laundry done. Gym gone to and new (very hard) programme completed with only one minor tweak. Various things posted. Various emails sent. Mooncat brushed. New scene for rewritten Grass King written.
Cats telling me they need feeding....

Collapses in heap.
Skirt of the day: denim

Eastercon.

Eastercon is almost upon us once again. The marquis and I shall be there from late-ish on Thursday to Monday evening. He has managed to escape programme responsibilities. My schedule looks like this:

Friday 4.30 'Great Women in SF' -- who are the most memorial female characters in sf?

Saturday 4.30 'Did Star Wars change science fiction to speculative fiction?' -- For many years our genre was Science Fiction, something that Real People looked down upon. Nowadays the term Speculative Fiction is often used to make the genre appear less geeky. When did this happen? Was it because a lot of people who would never admit to enjoying SF rather enjoyed Star Wars?

Sunday 10.30 'Women in SF (vs fantasy' -- There is arguably a perception that fantasy is a more feminine genre, as opposed to SF. Yet look at the lists of best-selling writers, it's manifestly not so. Why is this?

Sunday Noon 'Diana Wynne Jones Memorial' -- The recent passing of Diana Wynne Jones has left a large hole in the landscape of current British science fiction and fantasy. Several of Diana's friends and admirers read some of her works in tribute to an exceptional creative talent.(moderator)

Monday 3.00 'Great Women of SF' -- SF has a reputation for being a genre full of male authors, yet there are many excellent female authors out there. Who should you be reading?

The rest of the time, I'm scheduled to help with the Witchcraft Shop stall in the Dealers' Room, and I will be helping in Green Room, too, if they need me. I might end up in a bar, too. I'll keep you posted as to which skirts are going with me.