Goal for the morning: Make one, single conversation absolutely sing.
Status: Goal achieved. *
* At least I think so, and right now I’m the one who matters, eh?
So here’s my second pass at something I would put on a page that pointed my brilliant readership to other, probably far more interesting people than myself (if I had such a page, anyway). This time, it’s Aussie writer Lezli Robyn.
She’s interesting to me for several reasons, not the least of which is that she spells her name with a “z” and a “y” and that the legend goes that she wrangled her way into the field without really even wanting to do such wrangling, by critiquing a couple of Mike Resnick’s stories.
Pretty cheeky, right?
I had already read bits of her work before meeting her while in San Antonio, and I admit I enjoyed her open and gregarious nature in the few brief conversations we had early in the convention. But she won me over fully at the somewhat ill-fated launch of her collection (titled Bittersuite, and which will be out in the next few days or weeks?), when she faced the daunting process of conducting a reading and a panel interview after having lost her voice.
She conscripted Jay Lake (another most interesting person, himself) to read, and then managed to hold court and whisper her answers to questions from the audience. The story was a small slice of pristine, and Lezli was remarkably composed. Definitely interesting.
Lezli has recently moved to the States, and I would guess that if you pay attention to the world of SF, you’re going to see a ton more of her stuff start sprouting up everywhere.