GCLS in Washington DC

Counting the days…has it really been almost a year since last year’s GCLS Conference in New Orleans?

GCLS 2015 – Author signing

I feel the time is passing quickly and July 6 will be upon us very shortly. Especially now that I’ve checked the schedules and discovered that I’m on the very first Author Spotlight session on the Wednesday afternoon. So after you’ve registered, caught up with friends and met new ones, you’ll be able to listen to me and three other authors reading from our books. I’m thrilled to be in the same session with Jane DiLucchio, MB Panichi, and Chris Parsons. I think it’s quite an eclectic mix of writing styles. And Catherine Maiorisi has the moderator’s job of keeping us in line.

On the Saturday morning, I’m taking part in The Politics of Poetry panel. When my friend and moderator for this panel, E M Hodge, asked if I would be willing to participate, I was rather hesitant. I’m not a poet and I there’s not anything I know about politics that I would like to share in a public forum. But now the full line up has been revealed, I can relax. Jewelle Gomez is on this panel. Jewelle Gomez! I think the rest of us should just sit back and let her do the talking. Who wants to hear what I might have to say about the politics of poetry when you can listen to Jewelle Gomez?

I thought nothing could top last year’s GCLS with the abundance of lesbian icons in attendance…Dorothy Allison, Lee Lynch, Rita Mae Brown, J M Redmann. But the GCLS conference organisers have done it again. If anyone’s not sure about the value of attending a GCLS conference, just take a look at the line up. As well as the aforementioned Jewelle, there are authors I’ve admired from afar for many years…Katherine V Forrest, Karin Kallmaker, Lee Lynch, Radclyffe, Georgia Beers, Fay Jacobs…to name a few.

Annette Mori, Jen Silver and Ali Spooner with C.d. Cain – who we had obviously coerced into buying our books, but she’s still smiling!

In the not-so-famous corner, Ali Spooner, Annette Mori, Renee MacKenzie, and myself are representing Affinity eBooks at the conference this year. Please come along and talk to us at the Affinity book table. We will have some super swag to give away…plus an awesome range of books for you to buy. (Apologies – no photo of Renee here – she was probably wrestling with an alligator somewhere.)