Having done an online workshop for the UK Ghost Story Festival last weekend, I then had the idea to attend the in-person event this weekend.
Despite relatively late notice, I bought tickets to a couple of panels, and let the genre community at large know that I'd be on site, if only for a few hours. Having done the journey to Derby repeatedly for the likes of Edge-Lit, I had a pretty good idea where I was going. Note that the last time I'd been in Derby for such a convention, it was held at the Derby Quad - but it's since been held at the Museum Of Making. This was my first time heading to said Museum.
For the uninitiated, the UK Ghost Story Festival is a relatively recent thing, with the inaugural event taking place at the Derby Quad in November of 2019. I'd actually gone because I'd had a piece published - a ghost story called Curious, If Anything, in fact - in The Third Corona Book Of Horror Stories the month before, and I wanted to meet with the publishers in person. Three days of interviews, workshops, an array of books on sale where you may get them signed by the authors if they're on site. And let's not forget the networking element.
The main reason I went this year was to catch up with a number of people in person. One of which is Pete Indiana Allison - a journalist and podcaster, among other things. Always good to catch up with this man. Discussing everything from what we've been working on, to the highs and lows of the Alien franchise, along with the newest Marvel properties. Yes, I'm amped for Daredevil: Born Again. I also went looking to catch up with Tim Rideout, who I was put in touch with by Sam Howe, since I'm due at the Sci Fi Weekender at the end of next month. Sadly, I didn't get a chance to speak to him. I did, however, get a chance to catch up with a number of people, including Ally Wilkes, Charlotte Bond, Keith B Walters (at long last), Lauren McMenemy and Alex Davis.
It's here in particular that I need to give the nod to Alex. As someone who has regularly put in work hosting both the Edge-Lit convention that used to happen in the summer and the pre-Christmas (in November) variant known as Sledge-Lit, Alex has been instrumental in spearheading those events. Of course, it can't all be done alone, so there's a team on hand to support (also good to catch up with Pixie Peigh this convention weekend as well).
What I'd seen in particular during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown - and for a number of things were online/remote initiatives. It was also around that time I saw Alex do more of specifically online events/workshops; he'd first asked me if I was interested in doing one of these a year or so ago, in fact. With people social distancing and staying at home to maintain it, such events got good engagement. Little wonder that now, conventions such as the UK Ghost Story Festival are now hybrid events, where there's both online and in-person programming.
Probably the biggest indicator I had of how much this event had grown legs is when I'd posted it on social media and one of my non-author friends already knew about one of the guests expected to attend. Another one was that, having gratefully followed Lauren's lead to the Cosy Club (a bar/restaurant that's like a Tardis), I had to bail out early in order to get a train back into London.
In terms of general scheduling, I do need to weigh my convention attendances against what projects I'm working on, along with what I get of attending said convention in the first place. At this stage, I may have to up the attendance at the UK Ghost Story Festival to an overnight one.
We shall see.
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