Hertz: Let’s Get Ready for Some Auction

By John Hertz: The Fan Funds Auction at this year’s Worldcon, LoneStarCon 3 (28 Aug – 1 Sep, San Antonio, Texas), has been scheduled for Saturday afternoon 31 Aug. Have you anything you’d care to contribute?

If you’re attending, bring it. If you aren’t, consider sending it. A friend might bring it for you. At least one item, planned last year but only just ready, is being mailed to me so I can bring it. I’ve learned how things can be shipped to the con; call me (213) 384-6622 (land line, Pacific Daylight Time) and ask.

This traditional auction benefits our traveling-fan funds, which are maintained by various donations.

The senior fund is TAFF (Trans-Atlantic Fan Fund), sending fans in alternate directions each year between North America and the United Kingdom – Republic of Ireland – Europe since 1953. DUFF (Down Under Fan Fund) for North America – Australia & New Zealand, founded 1972, is the second side of a triangle. Third side is GUFF (between U.K. – Eire – Europe and ANZ; Going Under, or Get Up-and-over, Fan Fund, depending on the direction), founded 1978. There are sister funds, e.g. CUFF (Canadian Unity Fan Fund), FFANZ (Fan Fund of Australia & New Zealand).

The two trans-ocean funds touching the continent of LoneStarCon 3 are TAFF and DUFF. TAFF’s current NA Administrator is Jacq Monahan, visiting delegate Jim Mowatt; I’m the DUFF NA Adm’r, delegate Bill Wright. We’ll all be at the Auction. So will John Purcell who runs the Worldcon Fanzine Lounge this year. Other funds may be represented.

If your donation is labeled saying where proceeds go, they will; otherwise we’ll share them out. Consider also noting what makes your item of interest, what value it may have; we’re more diverse these days and people may not know. In the 2009 Worldcon Art Show, Jon Singer exhibited pots he’d made of clay from Neil Gaiman’s yard; everybody knows Jon Singer, but –

We’ll have to decide on the spot what order to auction things in and even whether to auction particular things at all. If your item’s not auctioned, we’ll dispose of it in our discretion unless you say otherwise (e.g. last year a rare copy of a Sam Moskowitz book didn’t arrive in time but raised money through a private donor’s putting it in a public-access university collection).

Oh, and you might want to buy things.

Hertz on WOOF: Purcell Says I May Tell

By John Hertz: John Purcell, host of the Fanzine Lounge at the 2013 Worldcon, has confirmed he will also serve this year as Official Editor of WOOF.

WOOF, the World Organization of Faneditors, is an amateur publishing association whose contributions are collected, and whose distributions are issued, at and from (but not by or for) the World Science Fiction Convention.

An apa is an assemblage of fanzines. Most apas are quarterly or monthly. WOOF is yearly, and in fact I’m in one that’s weekly, both very much the produce of Bruce Pelz, who as Suford Lewis said had a fruitful imagination.

This year’s Worldcon will be LoneStarCon III (or 3 if you were writing this note), 29 Aug – 2 Sep, San Antonio. Did you attend LoneStarCon II? I did, and I remember the Alamo. What was LoneStarCon I, you ask? As Rudyard Kipling said, that’s another story.

This year’s WOOF will (I think) be No. 38. In honor of the 71st Worldcon, submit 71 copies of your contribution. We want plenty to hand round. Must you bring, or send via an agent, physical copies? That helps. Printing on-site can be a logjam. How many pages?  Be reasonable — no, we’re fans.

The English musician’s name, as Gerard Manley Hopkins said, rhymes with “reversal”. Our OE is from an Irish branch that rhymes its last name just like ringing a bell. He’ll be good. Write to him at <[email protected]>, or get his real-mail address by phoning me at (213)384-6622 (that’s Pacific Time). I hope we’ll have no occasion to call “John 54, where are you?” Maybe I don’t hope it.

New Grandchild

It was just in the last issue of his fanzine Askance that John Purcell wrote, “Personally, I’m in no hurry to become a grandfather, but I know it will happen someday.”

Well, today was that day!

John and Valerie Purcell’s daughter Josie gave birth to Brian Charles James Blevins at 5:21 p.m. on May 26, making them grandparents for the first time. Congratulations.

Amazing’s 50 Shades of Blog

Amazing Stories relaunch continues January 2 when over 50 bloggers will begin contributing to its Social Magazine Platform.

Publisher Steve Davidson has lined up personalities from all over the field to stoke discussion of an enormous array of subjects of interest to genre fans.

We’ve got authors and agents, bloggers and editors, podcasters and broadcasters; we’ve got gamers and game designers; artists and art collectors; pulpsters and indie authors; we’ve got Hugo winners, John W. Campbell Memorial Award winners, John W. Campbell Best New Writer winners, Nebula and Hugo Award winners and nominees and winners and nominees of many other awards; people who review films, people who make films; we’ve got fanboys and fangirls; we’ve got former editors of Amazing Stories, writers who’ve become synonymous with the field and writers who are just getting started; comic artists, book reviewers; traditionally published authors, self-pubbed authors and authors who’ve done it all. The response to my request for participation was phenomenal.

They’ll cover 14 principal topics: Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror, (lit), Film, Television, Gaming, Comics and Graphic Works, the Visual Arts, the Pulps, Audio Works, Anime, the Business of Publishing, Science and Fandom.

Here’s the starting lineup:

Cenobyte – http://www.cenobyte.ca
Mike Brotherton – http://www.mikebrotherton.com
Ricky L Brown – http://doctorfantastiques.com/author/rickbrown
Michael A Burstein – http://www.mabfan.com , http://www.bursteinbooks.com
Cait Coker – http://www.aggiescifi.wordpress.com
Johne Cook – https://twitter.com/theskypirate
Paul Cook – http://www.paulcook-sci-fi.com
Gary Dalkin – http://www.tothelastword.com
Jane Frank – http://www.wow-art.com
Jim Freund – http://www.hourwolf.com
Adam Gaffen – http://www.thekildaran.blogspot.com
Chris Garcia – http://efanzines.com/DrinkTank
Chris Gerwel – http://elflands2ndcousin.com
Tommy Hancock – http://www.allpulp.blogspot.com , http://www.prosepulp.com
Liz Henderson – http://www.true-blood.net , http://www.onceuponafansite.com , http://www.nicegirlstv.com
Samantha Henry – http://www.scifidramaqueen.com
M. D. Jackson – http://www.michaeldeanjackson.blogspot.com
Monique Jacob – http://www.moniquejacob.com
Geoffrey James – http://www.geoffreyjames.com , http://www.sorcerer.net
J. Jay Jones
Peggy Kolm – http://blog.sciencefictionbiology.com
Justin Landon – http://www.staffersbookreview.com
Andrew Liptak – http://www.andrewliptak.wordpress.com
Meilissa Lowery http://www.true-blood.net , http://www.sidcity.net , http://www.chucktv.net
Barry Malzberg
C. E. Martin – http://www.troglodad.blogspot.com , http://www.mythicaltheseries.blogspot.com
Farrell J. McGovern – http://www.can-con.org
Steve Miller – http://stevemillerreviews.blogspot.com , http://nuelow.blogspot.com/
Matt Mitrovich – http://alternatehistoryweeklyupdate.blogspot.com
Aidan Moher – http://aidanmoher.com/blog
Kevin Murray – www.kevinmurray.ca , http://www.falloutfiles.com
Ken Neth – http://nethspace.blogspot.com
Astrid Nielsch – http://webdesign.asni.net/ , http://www.asni.net , http://www.asni.net/newsletter.php , http://music.asni.net/ , http://conceptart.asni.net/
D. Nicklin-Dunbar –http://mouldysquid.wordpress.com/book-reviews
John Purcell – http://efanzines.com/Prior/index.htm
James Rogers – http://scienceismagic.com/
Diane Severson – www.divadianes.blogspot.com , http://www.starshipsofa.com/category/podcast/fact-articles/poetry-planet/ , http://www.sfpoetry.com
Doug Smith – http://www.smithwriter.com
Lesley Smith
Bill Spangler
Duane Spurlock – http://pulprack.blogspot.com , http://spurandlock.blogspot.com , http://duanespurlock.blogspot.com
Michael J. Sullivan – http://www.riyria.com
G. W. Thomas – http://www.gwthomas.org
Erin Underwood – http://www.underwords.com
Stephan Van Velzen – http://www.rantingdragon.com
Cynthia Ward – http://www.cynthiaward.com , http://www.writingtheother.com
Michael Webb – http://www.martianexpatriate.com/
Keith West – http://www.adventuresfantastic.blogspot.com , http://futurespastandpresent.blogspot.com
John M Whalen – http://johnmwhalen.wordpress.com
Ann Wilkes – http://sciencefictionmusings.blogspot.com
Karlo Yeager
Leah Zeldes – http://www.zeldes.com , http://www.thewaythefutureblogs.com , http://www.diningchicago.com/blog

The full press release follows the jump.

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Flaming Youth

Chris Garcia set his beard on fire while cooking yesterday. Apparently he was uninjured apart from his beard needing to be trimmed and Chris has been mourning his blighted sartorial splendor on Facebook.

Chris has promised to tell the complete story in the next issue of John Purcell’s fanzine Askance.

My favorite among the blizzard of comments by Chris’s Facebook friends was Kate Kligman’s insightful question: “People like that your face caught on fire?”

2010 DUFF Voting Opens

Voting is now open for the 2010 Down Under Fan Fund. An extraordinarily large field of candidates — Jeffrey Boman, Terry Fong & Jannie Shea, John Hertz, Melanie Herz and John Purcell — are vying to become North America’s delegate to Aussiecon 4.

Jeffrey Boman is a Montreal fan whose fanzine The Original Universe won a 2009 Prix Aurora in the Fan Experience (Fanzine) category.  He’s been nominated by Australian fans Cath Ortlieb and LynC and North American fans Chris Garcia, Yvonne Penney and Cathy Palmer-Lister.

Terry Fong, another Montreal fan, is running in tandem with Oklahoma fan Jannie Shea. Both have tons of conrunning experience. Their nominators from Australasia are John Maizel and Shaun Tan; from North America, Ian Stockdale, Todd and Joni Dashoff and René Walling.

John Hertz of Los Angeles, publisher of Vanamonde and a regular contributor to File 770, has been nominated by Australasian fans Robin Johnson and Janice Gelb, as well as North Americans Peggy Rae Sapienza, Mike Glyer (naturally) and Randy Byers.

Melanie Herz of Palm Bay, Florida has devoted years to helping people run conventions, often as head of the Volunteers Department. Her Australasian nominators are Julian Warner and Alan Stewart. Her North American nominators are Elaine Brennan, Pat and Roger Sims and Jim Mann.

John Purcell of College Station, TX by way of Minneapolis in ’73, is a prolific fanzine publisher. He’s been placed in contention by Australasian fans Bruce Gillespie and Bill Wright, and North American fans Arnie and Joyce Katz, Guy H Lillian III and Lloyd Penney.

To vote on paper, download the PDF ballot and follow the directions to mail it either to Steve and Sue Francis, North American DUFF administrators or to Emma Hawkes, Australia/New Zealand administrator. Ballots must be accompanied by a minimum donation of $5USD, $6AUD or $7NZD.

To vote online and pay voting fees or make donations via Paypal, use Jean Weber’s site http://wrevenge.com/duff2010/ (which shortly will be updated for this purpose.)

The voting period ends 11:59:59 p.m. (EST) on Wednesday, March 31, 2010. Any ballots received after that time will not be counted.

Jerry Weist Medical Update

Author and collectibles dealer Jerry Weist is battling multiple myeloma, reports Andrew Porter. The cancer was caught early, with no complications in his vital organs or other parts of his body. He’s just started on chemotherapy, an experimental program in which stem cells are used to fight the disease, presently being used to treat 15 people in Israel and 35 in the USA.

Weist is the author of Bradbury: An Illustrated Life, The Comic Art Price Guide, and The Art of Frank R. Paul. From 1990 to 2001 he was a consultant at Sotheby’s specializing in popular culture, overseeing the auction of Sam Moskowitz’s collection.

A few years ago Weist acquired the Harry Warner collection and sold the fanzines to James Halperin of Dallas, co-owner of Heritage Rare Coin Galleries. Not long afterward Askance editor John Purcell interviewed Halperin and reported Weist wanted to write a book about fanzines.