Upstate Steampunk dining out at Fitzy's and more

Busy weekend, getting to see Mark at the new

Coffee to a Tea, attending the Upstate Steampunk dining out at Fitzpatrick's where we had a turnout of 44 people and I hung out with lots of friends, Cindy, John, Lindy, Bethany, the irrepressible Ben of IFB, Tara and Elizabeth, Gypsey, Marla, Sarah and Braxton of Valentine Wolf and met new friends as well, including, Shelby and Eddie.  Lots of great Irish food and good conversations, talking about books and science, music and the upcoming plans for the Upstate Steampunk Con next November at the Garden Hilton Inn in Anderson,SC.  Gypsey is already setting things in motion for indie films, a late night Victorian costume swimming party in the indoor pool.
Gypsey is hard at work setting things up and has already planned our next Upstate Steampunk dining out for March 5, 2011 at the new hotel so we can check it out and see how to use every inch of it's space to our advantage.Check the hotel out - it looks lovely in the photos.
Beware all!  Ben and I are putting our off-kilter heads together and plotting the crazy tea party, picnic, scavenger hunt,for some day in the spring at a park.  Ben has experience with a mad hatter tea party and I have scoured the steampunk empire for ideas, so it will be a jaunt into Wonderland for sure!  Details to come!
 It was wonderful to see so many people at Fitzy's dressed up in new and amazing new costumes. These people are dedicated. We freaked the mundanes downstairs and inspiration was offered all around. I came up with something at the last minute. It was cold outside! So I stuck with a sweater skirt and corduroy jacket. I did wear my poisonous plant necklace and the watch fob watch I made with copper and beads, and had fun fixing up the hat with the goggles I won from Nick Valentino. He offered them in a contest for tweeting etc. about his book Thomas Riley.  Which I didn't even know I'd entered, I was just tweeting because it's a fun book. I jazzed the goggles up at the last minute out of desperation and for fun used butterflies.

And while it was fun playing on facebook, more plotting, exchanging book ideas with new friends, I had to settle down and focus and finish writing the article I'm writing on the psychology of steampunk for the Upstate Steampunk Anthology, Gypsey is editing to be published by Cambridge University Press in England.
I think it's written, may need a bit more organization and some copy edits.  So I'll put it aside for a day or two and then check it over and hopefully have Brian do a critique before I submit it.

    Photos by Pher Reinman of Touch of Grace Photography

Thomas Riley by Nick Valentino - a wild ride

When I first met Nick Valentino at the SC Literary Convention, I knew just a little about steampunk. I recognized his connection with the genre by his goggles and became enthralled by the genre after our conversation. I've never read a YA novel and was surprised at how involved Thomas Riley was in plot and steampunk technology. The novel is a fast paced wild ride through varied landscapes and near scrapes for Thomas and Cynthia, who are a likeable pair, with their odd little quirks and dedication to their mission. I was constantly surprised by the cool weaponry and alchemy touches, all the little details that make a story rich and memorable. The interplay between the two characters is fun and lively and adding the third imprisoned character of the princess (I won't say how and ruin the plot) makes for a complexity which challenges the hero and heroine both from within and without. Quite an interesting twist in the steampunk genre. Nick and his story inspired me so much that I've since become very involved in the steampunk community, started my own steampunk novel, and attend regular steampunk meetings and cons. Nick makes a rather confusing and off beat world fun and creative and I learned a lot about the odd technical aspects of steampunk weapons, visual devices, and airships from Thomas Riley.

Nick Valentino in Dreams of Steam

Good news in the publishing and Steampunk worlds!  A new steampunk anthology has just been released,  Dreams of Steam and is available at Barnes & Noble.  What makes it even better is it features a story by my friend Nick Valentino.  Engine 316 is  a story where he takes a weird west steampunk angle.  I can't wait.  I've been looking for a new steampunk anthology which features contemporary writers with new works as opposed to reprints. Although I love what the Van Der Meers did for the genre in their anthology simply titled,  Steampunk,  I wish there had been more from new writers. Although, on the other hand, someone did need to set the historical precedents all in one place and they were the perfect pair to perform such a feat.

I met Nick at The South Carolina Literary Conference and discovered he was a great guy as well as a steampunk author of note.  His book, Thomas Riley, is a rollicking steampunk ride - inventive, quirky, full of  technological marvels, alchemy, airships and action!  It's available both in print and on kindle at Amazon and you can get a signed copy at a variety of Cons. He travels all the time and I'm looking forward to his panel at Dragon Con in Atlanta. I don't know if I mentioned this before. but I'm even more pleased because a few weeks ago Nick notified me that I'd won a pair of goggles from him in a Twitter contest.
And as a fan of steampunk, who is currently writing steampunk short stories and novels, including: Foxglove Broadsides, The Orchid Collector and Marquete de Fleur, and also building a character or characters (steam printer, botanist obsessed with poisonous plants and hot air balloonist) I was in dire need of goggles, not knowing how to make them and not having procured them yet.  I focused a bit too much on the "pretties" of the genre and neglected the necessities, as I am wont to do often, I'm afraid.

Coming Back after the Crash

After being a month or more without my main computer, after it's crash, I'm getting back on track.  I lost the entire issue of the Steampunk Fissure issue due to be released later this year as well as all of my new writing on Shaman in Exile (I think I have most of it in hard copy, so will have to retype it.)  But so far I think that's all.  I may have lost some later bits of Foxglove Broadsides. 
So this week I plan to get back into digging around in those folders and finish Shaman in Exile so I can get into editing the second in the Shaman series.
I'm gaining more and more hours at work so that's taking up a lot of time.  There's a good bit of work I do at home even.  Setting up a new art program for a head injury and spinal cord center is a lot more work than I imagined, but it's fun and valuable and I have the bulk of the planning stages and supply gathering finished so now it's down to implementation.  So far everyone seems to be enjoying it and I go home feeling very satisfied at the end of the day knowing that amazing things can happen in the alembic of a group art studio.
I'm also taking some personal time to work on my own art journals again, as well as make some for the steampunk world.  Those are a ton of fun.  And thanks to Nick Valentino, author of Thomas Riley, for awarding me a set of goggles in his twitter contest!  Wow!  That's so incredible, especially with the timing, since I don't own a pair and was going to scout out a mechanic at the Upstate Steampunk Meetup and commission a pair.  I'm already honored to wear the crew credentials and flight patch (now on my poison bag) of the airship, Blood Countess.