1 The Ramada Jarvis (aka the Ramada Plaza) sits next to the historic St Mary Redcliffe Church, and is a ten minute walk from Temple Meads Station in one direction, and Bristol town centre in the other. The Number 76 bus runs from the centre right past the hotel. PARKING:There is a pay and display car park for 170 cars opposite St Mary Redcliffe, just across the road from the hotel. Further afield, parking can be found at Lower Guinea Street near the Ostrich Inn (five minutes walk), and on-street in the area around Queen Square, though this can be busy. EATING:Opposite the hotel, the Portwall Tavern (the tiny blue pub) does a small range of pub grub, pizzas etc. Two doors down is Byzantium, a large and highly recommended Mediterra- nean restaurant. Follow Redcliffe Way past St Mary Redcliffe and over the bridge (5 minutes walk) and you come to the Grove, home of the upmarket Severn Shed and River Station restaurants, and the more homely (but often crowded) Hole in the Wall tavern. But for real bargain dining the Bristolcon Committee highly recommend the all-day breakfasts served at the Colosseum, next to the Mer- cure Hotel on Redcliffe Hill. It won’t win any glamour prizes, but it’s cheap and very cheerful. CASHPOINTS:Nearby cashpoints are situated behind the hotel, on the corner of Redcliffe Mead Lane and Somerset Street (RBS), and a little further along Somerset St (Lloyds). 2 Last year’s event was such a resounding success that we thought we’d do it all again for 2010, only bigger, better, and a few hundred meters closer to the station. And here we are! In your hands, juggled awkwardly between a pint of cider and a goodie bag, is your guide to all the delights Bristolcon ’10 has to offer. Let your mind boggle as science fiction authors speculate on the future, and quite possibly recreate the Battle of Thermopylae as they tell you how to write a kick-ass fight scene, before the Filk tunes of Talis Kimberley lull your ears into a false sense of security. And then the Pub Quiz taxes your brain to infinity, and possibly a little bit beyond. All this, of course, wouldn’t be possible without our fabulous guests, volunteers, and organising committee. If I mention them all by name here this guide would be as thick as the Yellow Pages, and you don’t want to be lugging that around. And of course, it wouldn’t be possible without you. So thanks for coming, and enjoy what I’m sure will be a fantastic day! Best Wishes, Jo Hall (BristolCon Chair) PAUL CORNELL is a writer of SF and fantasy prose, comics and television scripts, the only person to be Hugo nominated for all three media. He wrote three episodes of the new Doctor Who, Captain Britain and MI-13 for Marvel Comics, and is now the regular writer on Action Comics for DC. His novels are Something More and British Summertime, and he has another coming out from Tor next year. He lives in Oxfordshire with his wife, Caroline. JOE ABERCROMBIE is the author of several critically acclaimed fantasy novels. He first became famous for The First Law trilogy, comprising The Blade Itself, Before They are Hanged and Last Argument of Kings. He also produced a standalone novel set in the same world: Best Served Cold. Another standalone book, The Heroes, is due in 2011. In 2008 Joe was a finalist for the prestigious John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. He is published by Gollancz in the UK, and by Pyr in the USA. He lives in Bath with his wife, Lou, and his daughters Grace and Eve. 3 10:00 PUBLISHING PANEL Andy Bigwood, Insights into and experiences of the tricky business of getting Colin Harvey, published. Dave Bradley, Juliet McKenna (Chair), Mike Shevdon 10:50 READING Juliet McKenna Juliet McKenna 11:00 Guest of Honour–JOEABERCROMBIE Joe Abercrombie, A Questions and Answers session with Cheryl Morgan Cheryl Morgan 11:50 FILM Lewis Bear A short stop-motion animation "Wizards of Speed and Time" by Mike Jittlov. Made in1979, Mike created all of the special effects himself, includingthe stop-motion animation. 12:00 SPECIAL EFFECTS– Alex Keller, FROM HARRYHAUSEN TO AVATAR. Mike Tucker, As little as five years ago, Empire Magazine predicted that John Meaney, James Cameron’s Avatar, then trapped in development hell, Terry Cooper, would never be realised because the technologyto make it Gareth L Powell (Chair), simply didn’t exist. Dave Golder This year SFX guru Ray Harryhausen celebrated his 90th birthday and, in honour of these two events, Bristolcon is devoting a panel to the history of special effects in movies and TV, looking at how far they’ve come from the days of stop motion, wondering if more is actually better, and speculating on how far the art can be pushed in the future. 12:50 READING Gareth L Powell Gareth L Powell 13:00 SIGNINGS Guests Time for you to meet the authors and get books signed. Books will be on sale in the dealer's room for those who haven't brought their own! 13:50 READING John Meaney John Meaney 14:00 BRISTOL-FANTASTICAL CITYSCAPE Eugene Byrne A virtual tour of strange and mythic Bristol in search of inspiration for writers, and would-be writers. Bristol has a couple of would-be portals to other worlds, no end of urban legends (historic and present day), two separate founding myths, at least two walking statues, and a street which is marked on maps, but which doesn't really exist at all 14:50 READING Mike Shevdon Mike Shevdon 4 15:00 VISUALISING FABULOUS WORLDS Joe Abercrombie, How do fantasy writers create a world where the sea is Stephanie Burgis, exactly the right shade of pink? One of the key hooks of Kim Lakin-Smith (Chair), fantasy is the visualisation of the fantastic, but how does that Mike Tucker, change when interpreted into a different medium? Andy Bigwood, Roz Clarke 15:50 READING Stephanie Burgis Stephanie Burgis 16:00 FUTURE SCIENCE Alastair Reynolds, Writers talk about the science they want to see in the coming Gareth L Powell, decades. Whendoes Science Fiction become Science Paul Cornell, Fact? Where are we all going to end up? And when do we Nick Walters, finally get the jetpacks and flying cars we were promised Dean Burnett about50years ago? 16:50 READING Sarah Singleton Sarah Singleton 17:00 Guest of Honour-PAUL CORNELL Paul Cornell Paul Cornell talks about his life and work 17:50 READING Paul Cornell Paul Cornell 18:00 WRITING FIGHT SCENES John Meaney, We’ve all got drunk. But very few of us havebeen involved Juliet McKenna, in a tavern brawl, fought hand to hand combat, faced down a Joe Abercrombie, barrage of ray guns or led a cavalry charge. Maybe as a Colin Harvey (Chair) result of this, writers frequently cite fight scenes as one of Cheryl Morgan the hardest things to write. So we have martial artists/authors John Meaney and Juliet McKenna on hand to guide you through the mechanics of writing fight scenes, and maybe, if you’re lucky, demonstrate some moves on our other unsuspecting panellists... 18:50 READING Colin Harvey Colin Harvey 19:00 TALIS KIMBERLEY ENTERTAINS Talis Kimberley Whether inspired by literature, real life or the world of myth, Talis' work always takes a quirky, sideways view of the world. 20:00 PUBQUIZ Nick Walters Don your thinking caps-Nick Walters challenges the best SF minds in Bristol. 22:00 PROGRAMME ENDS ...but the bar will stay open! In addition our guests will be available to sign books, chat and the like at various times during the afternoon. All panelists appear subject to work commitments and not getting killed practicing for the fight scenes panel. 5 Alastair Reynolds is one of Britain’s best-selling science fiction writers. Currently signed to a million-pound contract by Gollancz, he thrills readers with his complex tales of the far future. Reynolds’ Chasm City won the British Science Fiction Association Award for Best Novel in 2001. He has also won a Seiun Award in Japan, and been three times nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award. His latest novel is Terminal World. He lives in South Wales, and was a Guest of Honour at the first ever BristolCon in 2009. Colin Harvey lives in Keynsham, and is a writer, reviewer and blogger. He is the editor of Future Bristol, published in 2009, and of Killers, which was short-listed for the Black Quill Award. His novel, Winter Song, published by Angry Robot Books, was launched at BristolCon ‘09, and his new novel Damage Time, was published in October 2010, also by Angry Robot. Next up is Dark Spires, an anthology of west-country based SF, fantasy and horror from Wizard’s Tower Press. Juliet E McKenna has always been fascinated by myth and history, other worlds and other peoples. She studied Greek and Roman history and literature at St Hilda’s College, Oxford, and has a lifelong love of SF and fantasy fiction. She is the author of the acclaimed Tales of Einarinn series, and the highly praised Aldabreshin Compass sequence. Her current project, The Chronicles of the Lescari Revolution, is a trilogy exploring divided states, personal conflict and the rights and responsibilities of power. She is one of the leading lights of The Write Fantastic, a UK authors’ initiative promoting the breadth and depth of current fantasy fiction, and reviews online and for Interzone and Albedo One.