The Many Autographed Books
The Many Autographed Books
Science fiction is the jazz of prose.
Ian is most famous as a singer/songwriter and musician, but she is also a science fiction writer. In 2003, Ian teamed up with five-time Hugo Award-winning author Mike Resnick to publish an anthology of stories based on her music.
The Janis Ian Archives contains many autographed books by famous authors who are personal friends of hers, including an inscription from George R.R. Martin in his 1979 novellette, “Sandkings.”
Ian connected to Martin through pure chance. It was the day after she’d performed a three-encore set at the Philadelphia Folk Festival in 2001. At the urging of author Anne McCaffrey, she’d decided to attend her first World Science Fiction Convention (“Worldcon”) right after the festival, with a couple of days off in between the two. Sitting in a booth at the hotel’s restaurant, she overheard a couple of festival attendees talking about Worldcon. Having only been to conventions when she was singing at them, Ian was pretty nervous about attending as a spectator. So, she popped her head over the booth to inquire.
“You’re Janis Ian,” one of them said. “Great show last night. Why don’t you join us?”
She did and asked whether they knew any authors and if they were nice. The people in the booth promised to help her meet some of the writers and get her books signed. As it turned out, the people in the booth were Parris McBride, Martin’s longtime partner and fiancé, and her close friend Dave Axler, who’d been working with the folk festival for many years.
Two years later, Martin and Resnick were “best men” at Ian’s wedding to Patricia Snyder in Toronto.
The Inside Story
I’d brought, literally, two large boxes of books with me, hoping to get them signed. I had them all in my hotel room, laid out in order of the author appearances. So, when a couple of uber-fans accused me of just being there for publicity and not being a real fan, I brought them up to my room and settled the issue.
