Minicon 45

Minicon is a local (ie, Minneapolis/St. Paul local) science fiction convention that I've been attending for about 16 years with Gail (Disorganized As Usual). It's changed a lot in that time frame. The first 5 years it was this HUGE 3,000 person party with a masquerade (a costume contest), people dressing up, parties, panels, and much weirdness. Then The Big Change occurred, the location changed and the focus returned to writing and books. The last 5 years it's been back in Bloomington, with about 400 attendees talking science, fantasy and fiction.

This was a pretty good year. The GoH was Brandon Sanderson, who will be finishing Robert Jordans Wheel of Time series. I stopped reading this series at about book five as there was no end in sight. I think book twelve is where things come to a close. The artist GoH was Don Dos Santos. Absolutely fascinating speaker and artist. He still works in oil paints and has not gone completely over to all computerized work. I spent my time bouncing between panels with these two on them as they were very engaging speakers.

The panels I attended were:
Dos Santos Slide Show - Artist GoH presented a history of his art and life.

Solar Eclipse in China 2009 - Full eclipse lasting 6 minutes as seen only from China. They event was rained out and the speaker didn't have much to say.

Brandon Sanderson talks about Writing - decent.

New Images of Fantasy - Dos Santos gave a slide show of up and coming fantasy artists. Pretty cool looking at lots of pretty pictures.

GoH Interview - Funny. Engaging. Interesting.

Artist GoH Interview - Intimate. Engaging. Interesting. Sunday morning panels are usually pretty small so we all sat in a circle.


Not much else to add, other than I picked up four used Joe Haldeman books for $6.00. Way cool.

Next year's GoH will be Charles Stross. He's a fairly engaging speaker too - I've sat in on panels he's been on at a couple Worldcons. Dates for Minicon 46 are April 22-23. Register now to get the earlybird price!