HELICON 2 EASTERCON SF CONVENTION. HOTEL DE FRANCE , JERSEY MARCH 29th TO APRIL 1st 2002

This version of the Con Report deals exclusively with the Con. A more detailed report extended to cover the entire period of my Channel Isles Holiday, including all this Con data is online at eastercon.2002-science.fiction.convention.htm

FRIDAY 29th MARCH - (THE CONVENTION BEGINS)

The Terribly Splendid And Worthwhile Opening Ceremony was our first glimpse of the Con's special guests, Peter Weston, Harry Turtledove and Brian Stableford who made pleasant cheery and informal introductions was I have to confess guiltily, the only one of the many programme events I attended on the Friday. I was keen to see the dealer room and art room displays, which were both excellent. It was immediately apparent that I would spend a fortune herein books and weird memorabilia. I also signed up now or over the days to come for various future cons and magazine subscriptions, especially Eastercon 2003 and 2004 (Hinkley and Blackpool respectively).

After much loitering and lovely chatter in the Windsor Bar that would see more of me than my own Hotel bed would, I went with some friends for a Tandoori meal at the Shahi Indian restaurant. It was now proving a difficult thing to find a bad eatery on the Island. Even the Con daily newspaper, Helicodex would eventually give up reporting enthusiastic recommendations with a suggestion to just look any up in the phone book.

SATURDAY 30th MARCH

No touring today, but straight to the De France and the first programme event of the day, "Points Of Departure: The Reformation -" an excellent panel talk on alternative history speculating what might have happened had Luther's Reformation never taken place. The indication was that it would have happened later had it not happened then, as there were several unrelated outbreaks of rebellion to the Catholic dominance at the time. The Catholics, already bearing down heavily through the Inquisitions would have had to become extremely totalitarian to survive and suppress every such schism. There was then also the question of what would happen to science if Catholicism had held sway, considering the recantation made by Galileo under pressure from the Papacy. It was pointed out that the Jesuits were much more inclined than may have been believed to be scientific in their approach to life. (we were reminded at this point that the De France itself was formerly a Jesuit College). It struck me however as unlikely that Darwinism could have survived a totally Catholic dominated world view.

There was a very good heated often angry panel lead discussion then on Sex In SF, which was not surprisingly very well attended, and really ought to have been on the main Lido Stage rather than in a quieter seminar room. The discussion focussed on Slash Fiction, written predominantly by Media-SF fans to allow them to fantasise about what it would be like if the characters in well known (or even obscure) SF shows were to move from platonic to sexual relationships, i.e., if Kirk was to Seduce Nurse Chappell.

One panellist argued against the tide by suggesting that the use of sex in SF meant the author was not telling the story any more but playing out a non-SF sexual interlude in the sex scene. Others argued that this was not the case. I suggested that a sex scene can carry an SF story forward, as with Barbarella where her sexual naivety is highly important to the albeit flimsy story line. Also, a sex scene in SF may explore SF as a fetish background, involving sex in zero gravity, with drug inducements, figures with multiple sexual organs, bizarre encounter suits, unusual forms of contraception, etc. There was also the question raised of Gay-Slash fiction. There was no doubt that most Slash, straight or Gay is badly written pseudo-porn (often without the pseudo) in which just about anyone can get sex with anyone. A Fun and thoughtful panel item.

The next Talk I attended was Harry Turtledove's own Guest Of Honour piece on his work, and he proved to be an exceptional speaker (sadly I never saw the other GoH's main addresses). Harry spoke of projects old and new, of the work of fellow Alternative History Writers, (i.e., Robert Harris, Kim Stanley Robinson), how he sees Alternative History as a branch of SF rather than an independent genre to it, etc.... all with good humour and a very clear voice.

The book auction followed, and I found the number of bargains I had secured doubling by the minute. The presentation of this was hugely entertaining, even to anyone not actually buying anything. It was stand up comedy at its best. One book almost sold by the page. At one point, one of the auctioneer's assistants begged to buy a book back, realising it was one he wanted to ad to his own collection, and there's the fate of J. Hunter Holly's dire little classic, The Mind Traders, 1967. Failing to sell for even a penny, it was cast into the audience as a freebie, and then rethrown and passed around the room until I finally decided something that doomed needed rescuing, so I have it here before me.

The next big event was The Banquet, a major and expensive but cheap at twice the price, meal with tickets available only on a limited first come first served basis. One criticism raised was that this left no alternative events for the whole Saturday night for anyone not wishing to attend, which was perhaps rather naughty on the part of the organisers.

I went, and it proved one of the finest meals I have ever been to. As the compere observed before hand "You're mouth will love you forever for this." It was after the meal that the World outside reached in at us with the announcement of the Queen Mother's death, and an invitation to gibe a toast in tribute to her. Some seemed happy to, while non-royalists, to whom this was merely a death of a celebrity, and hardly surprising at such an age, seemed less certain how to respond.

An after dinner speech followed from Ian Watson, a patchy but mostly amusing story of his own efforts to create an alternate history of how the Germans might have captured Britain, i.e., with warships so vast they could bridge the Channel with them and drive across. The speech didn't really end. Ian just stopped when he thought he had talked long enough, making the piece seem a little inconclusive.

The fun wasn't over yet, though it was already late enough. SMS, Eira and Cal had been searching all day for members of the Beyond Cyberdrome Sprokkette Binary Cheerleader team. This legendary division has cheered the demise of robots in Cyberdrome conflicts for several cons now, but the distance and cost of a Con in the Channel Isles had meant a low turn out from the full usual Binary Cheerleader team. Cal, as their main choreographer, was prepared to help SMS and Eira audition a new team for this Con. I myself had been approached, but was unable to attend as the audition clashed with the banquet, and I was deeply depressed throughout the banquet naturally for having missed my chance in a lifetime.

However, joy of Joys, the initial attempt to secure auditioning Sprokketes had failed so a second recruitment drive, now much more successful, gave me another chance, along with many others, male, female and ursine alike. So far, Sprokkette Cheerleading had been for women only. Half the Con audience seemed to turn up to watch history in the making as Beyond Cyberdrome became an Equal Opportunities Employer.

If you've ever seen the Kids From Fame this was more like the Kids from Shame. Several ladies, some barely dressed, took their goes. Then it was the turn of Beeblebear, a two headed bear with an obvious Hitchhikers' Guide To The Galaxy moniker, and a stylish punk bin-liner look for half his Siamese girth. Another performer, in heavy armour and carrying a large projectile weapon, from which he took his label, Big Gun, also did well. I realised I didn't have a prayer.

However I didn't run away, I took up the fierce challenging questions from the judging panel. SMS, Eira, and Sprok-Senior, or Sprokess-Superior, Cal, as to my credentials and experience. I quickly pointed out that I had formerly been a Robot in the Beyond Cyberdrome conflicts (true, I had presented myself in the arena suitably attired at the 2-Kon year as R U R D-NUFF, a cardboard Glaswegian bottle-battle droid (he carried a broken bottle in his armoury) droid.

This clearly impressed the judging panel, who allowed me to show my performance in Binary dance, (inspired by seeing someone do the YMCA dance at a disco). It was my radical move from zero zero one one zero zero one one one type sounds to introducing 'two' that almost lost me the day. I was however given a chance to go again, dumping two for the traditional ones and zeroes. I also bared my midriff to add some sex appeal to my science lesson) A few competitors, heartened by my dismal efforts took to the floor to do their own bit.. and then the audience judged us. The girls did extremely well... the bear also did extremely well, possibly aided by my subliminal advertising campaign on his behalf, holding up a bit of paper with the vote for bear on them... I got a decent but unsuccessful vote... it was however Big Gun who won the day, by holding the audience and judges and competitors hostage at gun point and securing twice as many votes as there were potential voters. I, realising I had failed in my life's ambition, tried to use his gun to end my misery but experienced Samaritans in the audience assured me it wasn't worth it and then we were all invited to be Sprokettes anyway for doing so well.

Lots more beer followed to celebrate till we realised that the clocks had changed and we had lost a vital hour of sleep and went off to our Hotels at about 4,30 am (clock change allowed for).

SUNDAY 31st MARCH

This was a busy day, Binary sprokking and Masquerading in the same day.

Chaos costuming where many masqueraders make and/or refine their costumes kindly allowed me to hang J. Alfred Cthulhu's gear up in their room, along with his bouquet of flowers, which was going to save me a lot of moving about between the two hotels.

Cyberdrome went incredibly well. The sprokks turned up in force, except for Blue Fairy Sprokk, who by way of apology for being in another event, sent us all Blue Fairy Cakes to keep us going.

The robots were less and smaller in variety than usual due doubtlessly to the cost of travel and the difficulties of getting wire-and electrical equipment looking not unlike a small bomb on board aircraft. Rumours abounded of robots quarantined by customs (see Helicodex reports) but those who made it were pretty impressive, a giant alligator droid that moved like lightning, to the so small many didn't believe it was real Murphy's law Nanobot...... The compere's SMS and Eira, were assisted unusually by Mark and M@ despite the fact that neither Mark or M@ had made the con. Claims that they had been replaced by puppets must be dismissed as evil rumour-mongering by the terminally jealous.

When the robots started hitting one another the Binary Cheerleaders, known as The Sprokettes, of which I am proud to be one, launched into binary, followed by ad lib shouts of "Carnage Carnage Carnage..." and the football chant "You're not fighting any more.... You're not fighting any more."

Droids destroyed, Blue Fairy Cakes consumed in triumph, it was time now to prepare for worst to come.

There was a calm before the storm, in Tony Keen's very well presented talk on references made to Classical history from Greece and Rome in shows like Dr. Who and Star Trek, showing some terrific knowledge on Tony's part of the historic subject matter, with a generous supply of clips from the shows to highlight his point, and other points at which he declined to show a clip or two simply for being 'rubbish' even when we wanted to see them anyway. Tony was very keen to finish in time for Brian Stapleton's talk that was to start soon after, regrettably while I had a date with destiny at the Masquerade.

It was now common knowledge to everyone that the masquerade involved two competitors in Cthulhu related costumes, (the other one being James Steel who would be accompanied by Cal and Marcus Streets who looked very fetching in a bearded lady sort of way in his lovely dress to play Cthulhu Pus's Emily.

It was just before the rehearsal that i discovered for sure I was being invited to play a second part in the masquerade too.

We did various walk ons, and sound checks, and we got sneak previews of the costumes to come. The Cybob piece was a great feat of achievement, a cyberman who would break down only to be repaired by a galactic Bob The Builder, (as presented by Sabine and Karen Furlong), Heather Petty's Fantasy Airlines costume, Jane Weddell's delightful and scary Chaos Fairy.... and many more, but for a time it was looking like helicon had turned into Cthulhucon.

The show started in earnest soon after the judges had admired our workmanship. I had to put J. Alfred's outfit on for that, then lose him to do my other piece before putting him back on in the nick of time for his show.

After two children had done their bits, it was time for SMS, Eira and myself to sneak on as a children's entry, The Bell Children, singing, as in Bagpuss mice fashion, we will fix it, we will win it....Our costumes were merely blankets thrown over our heads so we looked like really rubbish ghosts. We chirped like deranged ovaltinies about our wish to get lots of Chocolate as a prize, but Sue Mason, compering told us to get lost and we cried our way off to much audience sympathy......

Quickly changed, with my latex mask and glove, clutching my flowers, it was J. Alfred Cthulhu's chance to find romance... as he danced off to the sound of Madness' One Step Beyond. The text of J. Alfred's story is online at www.arthurchappell.clara.net/cthulhustory.htm and in print in Ride The Night Mare Arrival Press 2001.

As performance art it was clearly well received, if dark in presentation and mood. James's Cthulhu Pus was shamelessly hysterical, and fun, and with accompaniment by two such lovely ladies, he could not fail. J. Alfred was rather unsporting about this, commenting to James Steel that he was an impostor, and that the only 'galaxy' he had ever devoured was made by Cadbury's, which seems rather ungentlemanly to my mind. After the BSFA and Fhlosk Awards and a supurb on the spot off the cuff discourse by Compere Sue Mason, our results were forthcoming

I did win a prize for best Novice (though in fact I have masqueraded before) (not referring to The Bell Children piece of course) while best in show (which makes it seem disturbingly like Crufts) award went deservedly to James, Cal and Marcus.

The audience showed considerable appreciation to us all, and took many photographs. It's a shame the two Cthulhus never met together on stage somehow but one can't have everything. The flowers were dedicated to Sue Mason for her excellent work in presenting the event, and then given to various ladies in the Masquerade including the delectable bearded one who served the false Old God.

As things had gone on so long from one event to the other that I was half starved, and saved only by the kindness of Eira in presenting me with an apple and a sandwich I got from the bar.

MONDAY 1st April 02

Still hungry from the previous night I savaged the breakfast buffet most severely. Then it was back to the con, to which I was kindly offered a lift by an attendee who had brought his car along on the ferry.

The first Item was an important discussion by the 2003 Eastercon committee on just what we want Next Year,. Options included an improvement in the Voodoo Board communication channel, and better events for children to attend, (though it has to be said that the children and toddlers at this con were exceptionally well behaved and clearly seemed to enjoy the whole weekend). The Con Committee have a very interactive website set up at.......to further this discussion.

An event I missed (among many I missed in fact) was the theological debate on just who it is that does or should rule our Universe, which concluded that we are created and destroyed by none other than Small Clanger. This raises some serious ecclesiastical issues for me. I have in my possession a whistling model of said Small Clanger and I need to know if this is an Icon or an idol.

J. Alfred Cthulhu, still licking his wounds at being deprived of his grand prize in the masquerade, has however asked me to forward his desire to declare ware on The Clanger homeworld if the little upstart isn't kneeling before him sometime in the next 8,000 years.

The last event I went to was a discussion forum for local groups, attended by members of SF fans from all over the UK, and some from abroad (Encouragingly, this was a very Internationally attended Eastercon). It also attracted one genuinely local chap, who comes from Jersey itself.

Groups here lamented the frustration of much often expensively produced publicity material falling on deaf ears, the fine balances between media-fandom and general SF fan based groups, the hiring of rooms, the use of pubs... fans who feel that they are trying to join what is too much of an elite, where fans seem to know each other well already and pay insufficient interest to the questions and needs of the newcomers...... One man who has been to Manchester FONT meetings (Web page  FONT - MANCHESTER SCIENCE FICTION GROUP ) observed that while we are very nice people (as we are) he felt we were just not what he wants in a group, which is sadly fair comment, and it will be impossible for any group to please all comers.

That said, a group should be economically run, meet somewhere not to expensive, be sure of what SF expectations its members and would-be members want, and be in regular communication with other groups. The internet should be exploited where possible, along with local SF shops, i.e., Forbidden Planet branches, and libraries. There should be leaflets and fliers and some source of information that tells people roughly what to expect.

This event went on so long for no one having need of the room after us that we completely missed the closing ceremony of the con itself and carried on chatting and gaining vital insights into how one another's groups run. Then it was feeding time again, so we set off to the Chinese restaurant, Ming's Dynasty. Could it be the Cthulhu influences from the previous day that lead so many there to pick squid from the menu?

We returned for the Dead Dog Party, an event held annually for those con attendees who don't fly off home right after the closing ceremony, which as the Con was so far from home was better attended than usual. It was also the latest night out of all for many of us, and a thoroughly enjoyable end to a fantastic, extremely well organised Eastercon. I left for the Norfolk Lodge in the sorrowful knowledge that many of my friends would be going home before I had a chance to see them again.

Details and official websites of the next two UK Eastercons -