 Spoiler: It involves bad photos | Catie Covers Paolo Bacigalupi's Event at The Bethesda Library...or, what happens when a painfully shy person is sent to report on a talk given by a person who became a writer so he "wouldn’t have to speak in front of people.” |  |
Today I set out to attend my very first author event here in the D.C. area and I was extremely excited. Of course, I was even more excited because I got to attend a talk given by one of my favorite living sci-fi authors, Paolo Bacigalupi. Tatiana and I reviewed his latest young adult novel, The Drowned Cities and it was a favorite for both of us.
Of course, humming right along with all of this anticipation was a big ol’ boat-load of dread. I am not really the most…charming…person alive. In fact, most days I spend more time with fictional people than I do with real people. And I think that’s best for everyone involved. Not to mention…I think we all know that Flannery is the undisputed queen of covering book events. I mean, videos? Photos? Quotes? Funny anecdotes? Near perfect recall? Why oh why did she set the bar so very high? But…I vowed to do my best.
The event wasn’t crowded, and seemed to be made up of a lot of really dedicated fans (one man had a stack of copies of The Windup Girl and admitted to buying it whenever he saw one anywhere). I got to chat a little bit with some really nice sci-fi nerds and I was able to provide expertise, re: the correct pronunciation of China Miéville’s last name.
Paolo Bacigalupi chose to stand (and walk around) while he spoke to us which made the talk a lot more relaxed and casual, not to mention exciting. He’s a very animated speaker! He introduced himself by making fun of the various ways that his last name is mispronounced and announcing that he was very nervous to be standing in front of us and giving a talk. He admitted that he sometimes has panic attacks and needs to calm down by watching films and relaxing his mind. This prompted one audience member to quip about his coffee cup, asking if he had coffee in there or if it was chamomile tea or even vodka. (It was decaf!) This also made yours truly extremely shy about taking photos or videos. When a seemingly nice and intelligent person announces that he’s nervous, it just feels rude to stick a camera in his face. But I did snap a few discreet pictures of horrible quality.
Of course, humming right along with all of this anticipation was a big ol’ boat-load of dread. I am not really the most…charming…person alive. In fact, most days I spend more time with fictional people than I do with real people. And I think that’s best for everyone involved. Not to mention…I think we all know that Flannery is the undisputed queen of covering book events. I mean, videos? Photos? Quotes? Funny anecdotes? Near perfect recall? Why oh why did she set the bar so very high? But…I vowed to do my best.
The event wasn’t crowded, and seemed to be made up of a lot of really dedicated fans (one man had a stack of copies of The Windup Girl and admitted to buying it whenever he saw one anywhere). I got to chat a little bit with some really nice sci-fi nerds and I was able to provide expertise, re: the correct pronunciation of China Miéville’s last name.
Paolo Bacigalupi chose to stand (and walk around) while he spoke to us which made the talk a lot more relaxed and casual, not to mention exciting. He’s a very animated speaker! He introduced himself by making fun of the various ways that his last name is mispronounced and announcing that he was very nervous to be standing in front of us and giving a talk. He admitted that he sometimes has panic attacks and needs to calm down by watching films and relaxing his mind. This prompted one audience member to quip about his coffee cup, asking if he had coffee in there or if it was chamomile tea or even vodka. (It was decaf!) This also made yours truly extremely shy about taking photos or videos. When a seemingly nice and intelligent person announces that he’s nervous, it just feels rude to stick a camera in his face. But I did snap a few discreet pictures of horrible quality.
A nice one where his eyes are closed.
Next he spoke a lot about the pressure to follow up Ship Breaker, which was “more successful than [he] had any right to expect it to be.” With the added stresses of deadlines, editors, and reader response – both positive and negative – he felt a lot of pressure to make the book a certain way or to try and tailor it to please everyone. His first attempt at the sequel was a continuation of the story in Ship Breaker, and followed Nita, Nailer, and Pima.
[As a random aside, my roommate in college was named Nita, and I spent weeks and weeks learning to pronounce it the correct way – sort of like “Nee-tha” but with less emphasis on the “th.” I was very impressed by Paolo Bacigalupi’s pronunciation: it was perfect!]
Unfortunately, that first sequel attempt was “very bad” (in his words). His editor apparently told him that it had “six major themes” and that he “hadn’t developed a single one.” He described it as his written search for “a purpose” for the sequel - picking up, examining, and discarding each one unfinished. (Still seems like a worthy exercise if it led him to The Drowned Cities!) He ultimately decided to throw it out and start all over again, keeping only a single sentence about the drowned cities, which I think evolved into this scene:
[As a random aside, my roommate in college was named Nita, and I spent weeks and weeks learning to pronounce it the correct way – sort of like “Nee-tha” but with less emphasis on the “th.” I was very impressed by Paolo Bacigalupi’s pronunciation: it was perfect!]
Unfortunately, that first sequel attempt was “very bad” (in his words). His editor apparently told him that it had “six major themes” and that he “hadn’t developed a single one.” He described it as his written search for “a purpose” for the sequel - picking up, examining, and discarding each one unfinished. (Still seems like a worthy exercise if it led him to The Drowned Cities!) He ultimately decided to throw it out and start all over again, keeping only a single sentence about the drowned cities, which I think evolved into this scene:
“Doctor Mahfouz used to say that living in the Drowned Cities made people crazy. Like it came in with the tide. When the water came up, so did the killing.”
Tool laughed at that.
“Nothing so mystical. Human beings hunger for killing, that is all. It only takes a few politicians to stoke division, or a few demagogues encouraging hatred to set your kind upon one another. And then before you know it, you have a whole nation biting on its own tail, going round and round until there is nothing left but the snapping of teeth.”
Tool laughed at that.
“Nothing so mystical. Human beings hunger for killing, that is all. It only takes a few politicians to stoke division, or a few demagogues encouraging hatred to set your kind upon one another. And then before you know it, you have a whole nation biting on its own tail, going round and round until there is nothing left but the snapping of teeth.”
| He mentioned that he’d been watching and listening to a lot of Rush Limbaugh, Anne Coulter, and Sean Hannity (seriously…it would be abnormal not to have panic attacks when listening to that lovely crowd) and also following coverage of the Wisconsin State protests and he was amazed by all the arguing, feuding and stalling that was (and still is!) going on. All of this disagreement and vitriol just bogs us down and consumes us, so that we aren’t focusing on the real problems that our world will soon be facing. | |
He then related an experience that he had in Texas, while taking part in Armadillocon, during the ongoing horrible droughts that have been occurring there. Ranchers were having to kill off their cattle and were losing crops due to lack of water. Rick Perry was publicly praying for rain. He said that he felt like he was living the future, and that we’d “given up on solving problems” and were instead “relying on superstitions.” He then seemed to laugh with a bit of chagrin, saying that this world was already a “perfect dystopia” and that he had plenty of material for his writing. His next adult book, titled The Water Knife will center around major droughts and the fight for water.
Then we were treated to a reading from The Drowned Cities. He is a great reader: he does voices, makes facial expressions, and seems to really enjoy his own work and his characters. When reading a description of Mahlia’s missing hand and stump, he held his hand behind his back. I’m not sure if that was intentional or not but it was really interesting! I wish that I had a video to show you but I totally chickened out on taking one. Luckily, someone else was *ahem* brave enough to take this video of him reading at another event (thanks internet!):
Then we were treated to a reading from The Drowned Cities. He is a great reader: he does voices, makes facial expressions, and seems to really enjoy his own work and his characters. When reading a description of Mahlia’s missing hand and stump, he held his hand behind his back. I’m not sure if that was intentional or not but it was really interesting! I wish that I had a video to show you but I totally chickened out on taking one. Luckily, someone else was *ahem* brave enough to take this video of him reading at another event (thanks internet!):
After the reading there was a short Q&A. The first question was, “how were you inspired to write Ship Breaker?” He said that he was very depressed after finishing The Windup Girl and that he wanted to write something more upbeat – an adventure story. His wife is a teacher, and she has a lot of students who are resistant to reading. He wanted to write something for them – something like the stuff that he enjoyed as a child.
He also related a concept from Slovenian philosopher Slavaj Zizek – that as adults there are uncomfortable, distasteful things that we know about but don’t want to know about, so we set them in the background and pretend they aren’t happening (he mentioned, for example, the carbon footprint of his book tour). With Ship Breaker, he said that he hoped to reach the people (children) who still had a chance to change this world and make a difference. He also mentioned the inspirational nature of sci-fi: how certain concepts created by science fiction authors can inspire real world invention (he gave the example of Neil Stephenson’s metaverse and the real world Second Life). He said that he was attempting some of that with the creation of the clipper ships in Ship Breaker - with their wind power, parasails, and hydrofoils.
But even with all of these topics (sustainability, inspiration, adventure), he said that he was surprised and pleased that Ship Breaker ended up being a family story – how we define our families, who we rely on, and who we have to cut out of our lives.
He spoke a bit about breaking free of ingrained writing and reading prejudices. He was really excited to make Nita an Indian princess (he mentioned that his wife is Indian) but admitted that while writing her, he couldn’t help continuously picturing her as a blonde/blue-eyed stereotypical Disney princess, because of all the conditioning that his brain has received over the years. He was eventually able to bring his mind around by writing repeated descriptions of her on the page.
Another funny thing he mentioned was that Kanya (from The Windup Girl) was originally a man! And apparently, after he changed her character to a woman, he suddenly felt compelled to describe her physically more often than he had before. He described having to break through his own mental pattern and resist treating her differently than her male counterpart.
He also related a concept from Slovenian philosopher Slavaj Zizek – that as adults there are uncomfortable, distasteful things that we know about but don’t want to know about, so we set them in the background and pretend they aren’t happening (he mentioned, for example, the carbon footprint of his book tour). With Ship Breaker, he said that he hoped to reach the people (children) who still had a chance to change this world and make a difference. He also mentioned the inspirational nature of sci-fi: how certain concepts created by science fiction authors can inspire real world invention (he gave the example of Neil Stephenson’s metaverse and the real world Second Life). He said that he was attempting some of that with the creation of the clipper ships in Ship Breaker - with their wind power, parasails, and hydrofoils.
But even with all of these topics (sustainability, inspiration, adventure), he said that he was surprised and pleased that Ship Breaker ended up being a family story – how we define our families, who we rely on, and who we have to cut out of our lives.
He spoke a bit about breaking free of ingrained writing and reading prejudices. He was really excited to make Nita an Indian princess (he mentioned that his wife is Indian) but admitted that while writing her, he couldn’t help continuously picturing her as a blonde/blue-eyed stereotypical Disney princess, because of all the conditioning that his brain has received over the years. He was eventually able to bring his mind around by writing repeated descriptions of her on the page.
Another funny thing he mentioned was that Kanya (from The Windup Girl) was originally a man! And apparently, after he changed her character to a woman, he suddenly felt compelled to describe her physically more often than he had before. He described having to break through his own mental pattern and resist treating her differently than her male counterpart.
Then we got to stand in line and Paolo Bacigalupi was nice enough to sign alllll of our books (even the tower of Windup Girl!). He was very nice to everyone there, and didn't even laugh in my face when I said that I thought his books were hopeful. And look! A halfway-decent picture! Also, coincidentally, the only one I'm not responsible for....
Because I got to meet the lovely Sash from Sash & Em! And she was sweet and funny and cute and she took the best picture of the night. Later, I really wanted a picture of the two of us, but we were in the parking lot and there was no one around (except this weird guy muttering random women's names behind us). I admit that I totally chuckled on the way home, imagining this hypothetical scenario:
Imaginary Catie: Thanks for coming to talk to us today! I really enjoyed it!
Imaginary Paolo Bacigalupi: Oh, sure. Did you want...a picture? *gestures at camera*
IC: Yeah, would you?
IPB: Of course...maybe your friend there could...?
IC: OH, actually what I meant was...would YOU take a picture...of US?
IPB: ...
~AND SCENE~
Sadly, we were left with the last refuge of the desperate photographer: the awkward self portrait, taken by your own weirdly stretched arm. And that's how we got these beauties:
Because I got to meet the lovely Sash from Sash & Em! And she was sweet and funny and cute and she took the best picture of the night. Later, I really wanted a picture of the two of us, but we were in the parking lot and there was no one around (except this weird guy muttering random women's names behind us). I admit that I totally chuckled on the way home, imagining this hypothetical scenario:
Imaginary Catie: Thanks for coming to talk to us today! I really enjoyed it!
Imaginary Paolo Bacigalupi: Oh, sure. Did you want...a picture? *gestures at camera*
IC: Yeah, would you?
IPB: Of course...maybe your friend there could...?
IC: OH, actually what I meant was...would YOU take a picture...of US?
IPB: ...
~AND SCENE~
Sadly, we were left with the last refuge of the desperate photographer: the awkward self portrait, taken by your own weirdly stretched arm. And that's how we got these beauties:
 A keeper for sure. |  Sasha looking adorable as ever! |
Today, we are also giving away one copy of The Drowned Cities! This book is excellent, so please do yourselves all a favor and enter! Contest begins today and ends on Friday, May 18th. Best of luck! US only.
