AWP LA 2016 Recap: alien flowers, writers, and speculative women

AWP 2016 Recap:

Back from LA and AWP 2016 (I got in at 4 AM yesterday, and I’m still a bit zombie-esque) so I can finally recap it for you!

Had a wonderful time doing the panel on “Women in Spec” with Lesley Wheeler, Nancy Hightower, Sally Rosen Kindred, and Margaret Rhee. The room was packed (and about 112 degrees) and the audience response afterwards was really positive. I really enjoyed hearing the panelists talk about their inspirations, their publishing experiences, the way they found community in the speculative writing world. It made me feel more optimistic! We made an audio recording which I might be able to upload from my phone. I loved talking to people after the panel, too. It made me feel so hopeful for the future of women’s writing in this genre!

Thanks to everyone who worked hard to make this AWP happen! The bookfair was large but not as crowded as Seattle’s AWP. I sold some books at my signing and was happy to see lots of old friends (although never as many as you want to see, isn’t that always the way?) I got to see most of my publishers (Steel Toe Books, Moon City Press, Two Sylvias Press) except Judith from Mayapple Press and of course James from New Binary in Ireland, and talk to a few magazines I’d recently had acceptances from, which was fun. I picked up some contributor copies, swag, and a couple of new books from friends. (See the Rumpus mug and Moon City Press t-shirt? Cool, right?)

AWP Swag and Books

I was navigating all of AWP in a wheelchair and with a cane, and that made the whole experience a little more difficult (although at Seattle’s AWP I had a broken elbow and was recovering from pneumonia, so…) It also meant I couldn’t run up and hug friends from across the room, and fewer people made eye contact with me (what is it about wheelchairs that does that? Wheelchairs aren’t contagious, people!) I heard several publishers say their sales weren’t as good as at AWP’s past (LA isn’t really a book town like Seattle or Minneapolis – when I lived in SoCal, it was hard to find books at the actual library) and there was a decision not to make the bookfair open and free to the public on Saturday which may have had a negative impact that way. It’s always nice to just to be around other writers talking about writing, though!

Here are some pics from parties and bookfair!

I wish I’d been walking w/o my cane or wheelchair – I’d been doing really well until an injury right before the conference – and that our travel plans (cough, Virgin lost my wheelchair for an hour and the rental car didn’t have a car available big enough to put a wheelchair in, cough) hadn’t messed up my plans on Thursday to register and get to at least one evening keynote or reading – but these frustrations were reminders that traveling with any kind of disability is tough. I hadn’t flown for six years – and I remember why now! A bad immune system and any kind of mobility problem – from an inability to walk large distances to carrying a suitcase – make travel extra difficult.

I stayed a bit away from the conference in Hermosa Beach which meant navigating LA traffic – never a pleasure. But I got to make up every morning and look at the blue Pacific ocean (our ocean in WA is always gray and uninviting, even in good weather) and watch the sunset in the evening. My flights to and from both had problems, especially the incoming flight from Virgin (we actually had to change tickets home on the fly because Virgin screwed up our tickets home so much) and I think LAX is the worst airport I’ve been in since LaGuardia. I probably won’t fly again for a while, which means my next AWP will probably be Portland’s in 2019.

I was obsessed with the fascinating alien flowers blooming in strip mall parking lots, by the side of the highway, in office parks. Something about the California landscapes always makes me feel like an alien, a mutant hybrid, which is actually pretty inspiring.

Just for fun, here’s a link to a poem I wrote about California that was published in LA Weekly that sums up the frustrations and beauties of LA:

Introduction to a California Poetics