World Horror Convention 2011 will be in Austin — and so will I

An urbane gathering at WHC 2002

I learned in the past couple of days that the 2011 World Horror Convention will be held in Austin, Texas.

This is wonderful news, since it pretty much guarantees that I’ll be able to attend — barring any unforeseen downward lurches in the economy or upsurges of political, social, and economic chaos, which isn’t at all out of the running.

I attended and spoke on panels at WHC 2001, 2002, and 2003, and they were some of the most rewarding experiences of my life, both personally and professionally. Publication of my Divinations of the Deep collection arose out of the fact that at the 2001 convention in Seattle, editor/anthologist John Pelan, who had already bought my story “Teeth” for The Children of Cthulhu, introduced me to Chris and Barbara Roden of Ash-Tree Press and put in a good word for me with them. (The collection was already set to be published by the ill-fated Imaginary Worlds, the failure of which ironically turned out to be a boon for me and my book.)

The same convention introduced me to Brian Keene, who, like me, was an Imaginary Worlds author with his first fiction collection still mewling and raw like a ruddy newborn. He later published two of my stories at Horrorfind and one in The Best of Horrorfind II.

And I met Mark McLaughlin, he of the quirky horror and gut-busting humor, with whom I soon wrote two collaborative stories, “A Cherished Place in the Center of His Plans” and “Nightmares, Imported and Domestic,” both of which landed handsomely in published homes, and the latter of which will appear later this year in my Dark Awakenings collection.

And I met Tim Lebbon, who later said such nice things about my work in a 2005 interview, and who proved to be a real kindred spirit (and a damned fine writer) with whom I could enjoy chatting at length.

I could go on about more valuable contacts and, more importantly, valuable friendships that I made at that and other WHCs — as in 2002, where I finally met Mark Samuels in person, and also Stu Young and a whole host of additional Brits who felt immediately like family. But the point is probably made.

It’s especially interesting to look back and note that we all met when our writing careers were at the budding stage, and that over the past eight years everybody I just named has achieved not only a modicum of literary and publishing success but a heaping helping of it. There was some very interesting Cthulhuvian dream-beaming going on in our respective and collective unconscious minds in order to bring us all together at such a stage in our individual careers, I’m telling you.

(Of course, it wasn’t all darkness and mystery, as evidenced by the accompanying photo above, which captures a scene at a publisher party at WHC 2002. That’s me in the upper right-hand corner, wearing the dung-eating grin and looking out from between the heads of Brian Keene and Mark Samuels. The photo is courtesy of Feo Amante and his page about WHC 2002.)

So anyway, barring the effective end of the world, I’ll be heading to Austin in late April 2011 in eager hopes of renewing friendships and making up for lost time. Maybe in the meantime, Cthulhu will once again be telepathically weaving a synchronicitous web of creative connections.

~ by Matt Cardin on June 19, 2009.