Justine Larbalestier, Charles Brown & me
Charles Brown was the guy who taught me a simple, yet important truth: the way to avoid white wine hangovers is to drink equal amounts of water to wine. Many glasses were raised at the parties we threw for him on his visits through Sydney. Last time he was here, he took me to lunch down on Sydney harbour and then we went wine shopping. The snooty salesman was utterly freaked at the sight of Charles’s thonged feet and silver tonenail polish. He was even more freaked when Charles proceeded to order thousands of dollars worth of Aussie wine & arrange to have it shipped back to the States.
This photo was taken in 2005 following Writers of the Future in Seattle. I stayed behind an extra day so I could go out to dinner with Charles and some other fabulous people. Every time I saw Charles at WOTF that week, he’d grab me by the arm and try to drag me off to a bar somewhere. The awards ceremony itself was a dry affair. He kept looking at his watch and growling ‘Carn, let’s get out of here and get a drink!‘ I’m told he usually packed a hip flask. It was a long evening so I’m guessing he’d run out of supplies early.
Charles and
Bye bye Charles. I’ll miss you.
4 Comments
A dry awards ceremony? That’s horribly barbaric.
it truly was!!!
Last year at Wotf (IotF for me) Charles hosted a party in his suite (convention style) during the week — I think the night before the ceremonies. When I walked in I saw a bottle of Oban. There was probably beer and wine as well, but…
The next day Leslie (my SO) and I were out by the pool (this was Southern California, after all). Charles came out for a swim. I got up to help him get his scooter through the gate. Of course he flirted shamelessly with Leslie, who banters well in those situations, so also of course Charles fell in love with her and I gained a little more prestiege in his opinion (funny how that works, but hey, such is life with a beautiful woman). After his swim we sat and talked awhile (mostly about his opinions about the contest, etc., which are not secret but don’t need to be recorded here). At one point his party came up (I probably thanked him for holding it). He smiled and said, “Well, once those illustrators showed up my bottle of Oban disappeared.) He had that twinkle in his eyes that stared off to distant stars and other dimensions. The man never missed anything. I’m glad I got to know him and bit better last summer (in Seattle the judges and luminaries were in another hotel, and when he was at our hotel he was in the bar with you — heh — at least I got to buy him a scotch then). Yes, he was one of a kind and will be missed.
I’m so glad you ended up with a couple of Charles stories of your own. Sounds like the Californian IOTF was a bit less stuffy than the Seattle one. I’m not a big fan of segregating anyone, let alone sci fi people.