For 1st Friday in April, we had Tom Doyle, winner of the 2008 WSFA Small Press Award, read his short story, “Consensus Building”. The story was originally published in Futurismic in 2005. The reading took place after the business meeting and many of the members stayed for the reading. Tom is a great reader and read with intonation and a strong sense of timing and the dramatic. He even heightened the tension of waiting to find out what happens next by pausing at each section break to sip water with great deliberation.

We hung on every word. The story was set in the near future dealing with implanted chips that could allow people to interface with each other, sharpen memory/recall, and act as a personal PDA. However, things could, of course, go wrong. What happens, and how, made for a very chilling story that really stays with you.

Tom graciously answered questions after and participated in a general discussion among members about technology and society and related issue.

This is WSFA’s second guest event with a reading — for this past Friday — Thanks, Tom, for a great evening.