Get ready for Olympus 2012

Time is running out to get your membership for the annual SF Eastercon! [updated]

There are less than two weeks to go before Easter and that can mean only one thing - time to make your plans for attending Eastercon. According to the organisers, though, tickets are selling fast and there may not be any available on the door.

Eastercon is the informal name of the annual British National Science Fiction Convention . It's been held over the Easter weekend every year since 1955 - before that it was held over the Whitsun weekend. Taking place this year at the Radisson Edwardian Hotel, Heathrow, Olympus 2012 (the title of this year's event) promises guest talks, panels, a dealers' room, art show and more. You can read our interview with the committee chair Rita Medany here .

Various contributors to SFX can usually be found at Eastercon each year and in 2012 you'll probably run into Saxon Bullock, Sandy Auden, Nic Clarke and more. To find out more information about event memberships, visit the official Olympus 2012 site , where the programme is now available.

So the big questions remain: will you be there and if so, what are you looking forward to most? We'll wager that in addition to the customary booze and banter, it's meeting one of the guests of honour:

Cory Doctorow: Canadian born Doctorow is the author of best-selling novels Little Brother and For The Win . His latest short story collection is With A Little Help . He's the co-editor of the blog Boing Boing .
http://craphound.com

Tricia Sullivan: In 1999 Sullivan won the prestigious Arthur C Clarke Award for her novel Dreaming In Smoke . Her more recent novel Lightborn made Adam Roberts' list of 10 Best SF Novels of 2010 over at Locus. In SFX issue 212 Sullivan wrote a Book Club page for us .
http://triciasullivan.com/

George RR Martin: Heard of a little thing called Game Of Thrones ? Of course you have. Martin's A Song Of Ice And Fire series, on which the HBO series is based, is now world famous but he's also written other novels including Windhaven and Dying Of The Light , not to mention TV episodes for shows such as The Twilight Zone and Beauty And The Beast.
http://georgerrmartin.com/

Paul Cornell: Perhaps best known to SFX readers for his work on Doctor Who and Primeval , Cornell also has an established career as a comics writer including titles for Marvel and DC, and has penned several novels. His next book is due this year from Tor. Cornell (a previous SFX columnist and three-time supporter of the SFX Weekender) has also been approaching people on his own blog who are going to Eastercon for the first time to ask their thoughts – worth a read if this will be your first time there too!
http://www.paulcornell.com/

You can read a report from the 2010 Eastercon (at the same location as this year's) on our site courtesy of Tom Hunter . Look out for the 2012 schedule and further details at www.olympus2012.org .