I leave for Australia in a week, and WorldCon is two weeks away. You know what that means? SCHEDULE TIME! Here are my programmed events, allowing for easier stalking through the city of Melbourne. (I'm not worried about actual stalkers. By the time we reach the convention, I intend to have assembled my army of spiders.)

Thursday, September 2nd, 3:00 PM: Breaking the Fourth Wall: Supernatural and Its Audience. Given my thoughts on how things went down with Jo and Ellen, this should be a super-fun panel, in the "bring plastic sheeting and pray" sense.

Thursday, 5:00 PM: Kaffeeklatsche. For those of you who have never encountered this strange creature before, basically, I will sit in a room at five on Thursday, and talk to anyone who shows up. Also, there will be coffee. If no one shows up, I will do lots of lovely inking. It's a win-win scenario for me.

Friday, September 3rd, 4:00 PM: Seanan McGuire and Catherynne M Valente In Conversation. Who is driving? Bear is driving! HOW CAN THIS BE?! Cat and I will spend the better part of an hour talking writing, editing, and whatever else comes into our heads. It's the Snow White/Lily Fair Variety Show, and you should totally be there.

Saturday, September 4th, 11:00 AM: Capes and Skirts: The Plight of Female Superheroes. Lo, we are going to sit and talk about female superheroes, why they are awesome, and why they don't get as much love as their male counterparts. This is the best convention schedule ever.

Saturday, 1:00 PM: Fringe: Paranormal Investigations in SF Television. Man, we are gonna tear. This. Up. It's going to be a super-awesome panel full of super-awesomeness, and you should totally come, and I will do my best to avoid discussions of Peter Bishop's fabulous ass.

Saturday, 3:00 PM: What is Filk? This is a fairly standard panel, but a very good one to attend if you want to learn more about filk, what it is, and why we're doing it in your hotel lobby. Not that we do that anymore. Much.

Saturday, 4:00 PM: Signing. I will sign stuff. Super-exciting.

Sunday, September 5th, 3:00 PM: YA Urban Fantasy. Why YA urban fantasy? What's the attraction? What makes it awesome? Let's discuss.

Sunday, 5:00 PM: Post-Apocalyptic YA. Boom, baby. Boom.

Following this panel, I will be going insane for the rest of the night while I deal with getting ready for and attending the Hugos. Please do not blame me for anything I say during this time, although really, I'm expecting the majority of my dialog to consist of "The Turtle couldn't help us" and quotes from Penny Arcade.

Monday, September 6th, 2:00 PM: Reading. What will I be reading? Only the Great Pumpkin knows. I'll figure it out based on who shows up...and if no one shows up, again, inking. It's good to have a backup plan.

catvalente and I will be appearing "in conversation" at the upcoming WorldCon. While we have a few topics of our own to cover, we thought it might be nice to see what other people want us to talk about. We're going to try to get this videotaped, thus giving y'all a much greater stake in the discussion than you might otherwise have. So...

Have a topic you'd like to see discussed by me and Cat, probably while under the influence of a lot of sugar? Drop it here! We'll copy out our favorites and put them into a hat (or hat-shaped object), to be drawn during our conversation whenever we need a subject change.

It'll be fun!

We're only inches away from An Artificial Night, and how better to celebrate than with a mixed review roundup? First off, Amanda at Diary of a Book Addict has posted a review of A Local Habitation, and says, "Set up in a somewhat unexpected way, A Local Habitation continues Toby's adventures in an enthralling, amazing and character-driven story that is just as good as the first one. McGuire's writing skills glow and her world is vibrant and engaging. I couldn't put it down until the very end." Hooray!

Meanwhile, SFX in the UK is showing the Feed love. Their reviewer says, "Feed is a proper thriller with zombies. Grant doesn’t get carried away with describing her world or the virus. She’s clearly thought both out brilliantly, but she doesn’t let it get in the way of a taut, well-written story." Glee.

Today's Livejournal review comes from apocalypticbob, who decided she was going to tackle Feed. She says, "I was lucky enough to win a signed ARC of this book, and it was so incredible that I couldn't wrap my head around it well enough to review it. Seanan has the ability to build worlds that suck you in and characters you love even when you aren't sure if you like them." Awwww. I like that.

There's another Feed review up at A Book A Day 'Til I Can Stay, where the reviewer says, "Feed is passionate and incisive writing. Grant is clever and thought-provoking, piggybacking on horror fiction tropes to speak to the audience about how we may be manipulated by the ‘news’, how fear motivates our decisions and how democracy is reduced to a special interest land-grab. At its core though, Feed is a story about a brother and sister who love each other very much. I eagerly await Deadline." That works for me.

Finally for today, sarahtales (Sarah Rees Brennan) has posted her awesome Feed review, and says, "These are not the zombie boyfriends or girlfriends you're looking for. What this is, is the ideal zombie book for nerds." Seriously, just go read the review. It's MADE OF WIN.

...okay, so this was less "mixed" than "four Feed reviews with a Toby on top." Whatever. The ratios will be shifting soon, and I have a link file to clear out!

More to come.