Catherynne M. Valente

Denizen of the Month: The Tiniest Martian’s First Real Convention

Added 2025-04-27 21:40:10 +0000 UTC

Now, Bastian has been to many conventions before. Somewhere near 20, I think. But they were a baby, or at Worldcon and thus in the childcare suite, so they never could really participate or comprehend what exactly was going on.

NO LONGER.

What you see in the first pic is my kitten signing their first autograph--as someone asked them to sign their book as well as me. Just before this? BASTIAN WAS HANDSELLING BOOKS LIKE A PRO. I had no idea they had it in them. They just jumped up and started telling people they needed this book or that one (many versions of "what's it about?" "I don't know, I just think you'd like it!" ensued), making change, restocking inventory, AGGRESSIVELY insisting that these books NEEDED to go home with people, all in a signing room that was PURE BEDLAM. This kid was CLOSING DEALS. My jaw was on the floor. One of the other guests of honor owned a bookstore and even she did a double take at the SOUL OF A SALESMAN that suddenly possessed this child's body.

Honestly, they were very good, and adored the convention, especially all the costumes, whose quality level they could not comprehend given Mum's propensity for making things out of duct tape and happy thoughts. (We did make a War of the Worlds costume for them, hilariously, many, many older folk stopped us to compliment the costume and then could not quite place what it was because, you know, normal people