< Back Compton Crook Selections The 2025 Compton Crook Award winner will be announced in the weeks leading up to Balticon 59. The Compton Crook Award is presented to the best of each year's English language first novel by an author in the field of science fiction, fantasy, or horror by the members of the Baltimore Science Fiction Society at our annual science fiction convention, Balticon, the Maryland Regional Science Fiction Convention. Awards have been presented since 1983. The award is also known as the Compton Crook/Stephen Tall Award. Visit the Compton Crook page on the BSFS website for more information.

< Back To Be Announced 2025 Compton Crook Winner The 2025 Compton Crook Award Finalists The Book of Love by Kelly Link Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell The Stars Too Fondly by Emily Hamilton Sun of Blood and Ruin by Mariely Lares The Wings Upon Her Back by Samantha Mills The 2025 Compton Crook Award winner will be announced in the weeks leading up to Balticon 59. The Compton Crook Award is presented to the best of each year's English language first novel by an author in the field of science fiction, fantasy, or horror by the members of the Baltimore Science Fiction Society at our annual science fiction convention, Balticon, the Maryland Regional Science Fiction Convention. Awards have been presented since 1983. The award is also known as the Compton Crook/Stephen Tall Award. More Information about the Crompton Crook Award can be found on the BSFS's website... 2025 Book Selection

Fan Tables & Parties Fan Tables Fan Tables are available to fan groups, clubs, and organizations within the local community to showcase their group or event during the convention. Fan Tables are a great opportunity to promote, recruit new members, raise awareness, and do community outreach. We are now accepting applications for fan tables. Please fill out our form. If you have any questions about Fan Tables, please contact fantables@balticon.org . Fan Table Request Open Room Parties Promote Your Fan Group or Event Balticon has a long history of open-room parties for event promotion and socialization! We group all Room Parties on the same floor to minimize disturbing other attendees and hotel guests. If you're planning a party, whether open or not, let us know and we'll make sure you're on the Party floor. Open Room Parties may only be hosted by someone with a paid Balticon badge. Party Rooms are assigned for the entirety of the event on a first come, first served basis. There are a limited number of adjoining rooms in the Party Block. To request a Party Room, first make a hotel reservation for the room, and then fill out the Party Request form. You will need your hotel reservation number(s) to reserve a space in the Party Block. Our Party Coordinator and Hotel Liaison will reply with a confirmation that you are in the Party Block and, if requested, you will also be informed if an adjoining room is possible. We recommend that you make your reservation as early as possible as sometimes the hotel sells out, and no rooms are reserved from the convention block for parties. Parties may be asked to lower the volume if other hotel guests are disturbed outside of the Party Room block. Balticon does pay the cleaning fee for the first ten (10) rooms, one per party, but if more Party Rooms are requested, the registrant would be responsible for the cleaning fee. The Balticon Hotel Liaison and/or Party Coordinator do a tour of the Party Rooms prior to the convention and catalog any damage(s) they find. Any damage caused by the party to the room outside of what the hotel considers standard wear and tear is the financial responsibility of the party host. Due to Baltimore corkage laws, no alcohol is permitted to be distributed in Open Party Rooms. Parties may not charge an admission fee. Food and non-alcoholic drink may be served. Parties caught breaking these rules may be shut down or banned from future party assignments. Balticon also has limited rental space for larger events like book launch parties, etc. Please contact the Hotel Liaison for more information. Party requests should be made as early as possible and before May 1st of the convention year. If you would like to hold a party in your room, please fill out this form. (To be linked soon.)

Convention Information Balticon will once again be at the Renaissance Baltimore Harborplace Hotel , inside the Baltimore Inner Harbor Entertainment District. We are close to multiple shops, restaurants, and entertainment venues, and accessible by public transit or by car. To find any information that you need, select any links below. Online Registration In-person and virtual options Hotel Booking Need a place to stay? Parking & Directions How to get here Just the FAQs Frequently Asked Questions Email balticoninfo@balticon.org Call 410-JOE-BSFS (410-563-2737) Please note: this line is not usually answered live! Leave a message and we'll get back to you. Follow

Can't Make It to Baltimore? Enjoy Balticon Anywhere From your hotel room or your living room We understand all the challenges of going to a con. That’s why we’re dedicated to bringing a great con experience to you, wherever you are. Virtual members have access to live broadcast streams and virtual panels. This includes replays of all recorded panels on our YouTube channel. All memberships include access to Balticon Anywhere, even our in-person attendees! Streaming and Virtual With more than 120 hours of streamed content, there’s something for everyone. Enjoy Opening Ceremonies, Guest of Honor events, and our amazing Masquerade from Main Tent . Whether you love hard science, want to learn about building your fantasy village, or are interested in post-apocalyptic fiction, we’ve got you covered with four program rooms, streamed live and recorded to watch later. Our virtual panels open the door to authors, creators, and scientists all over the world who can’t make the trip to Baltimore. We have three virtual rooms : two dedicated to exclusive virtual-only panels and workshops, and a third as our Virtual Consuite where you will find author readings, discussions, and filkers. Balticon Anywhere uses multiple platforms to make the magic happen. All platforms are free to use and most can be used in a web browser. Some platforms require you to create a free account or download an app. (See below for more information on each platform we use. Click the arrows to expand!) Balticon Anywhere Hub All Virtual Programming is accessed through the Balticon Anywhere Hub. You will be emailed a unique password-free login link to the email address you provided at Registration. Zoom Streamed program items are broadcast via Zoom from meeting rooms in the hotel. Whenever possible, we will have someone in the room to relay questions and comments from remote viewers. There is no physical location for our virtual programming! Our participants join from their own locations, and the program is hosted either through a Zoom webinar or meeting. Each event is its own session, with 2 or 3 simultaneous events scheduled during most of the weekend. Attendees will be able to watch and listen to program participants and ask questions via Zoom’s built-in Q&A feature. Zoom is free to use. It is accessed in a web browser or through the free app. A Zoom account is not required to be able to view a session in Zoom. Most Zoom events will have automatic closed-captioning. To enable, click the Closed Captioning button in the meeting controls toolbar. See Zoom help. Zoom links are at the bottom of the program description within the Balticon Anywhere Hub after you’ve logged in. Discord Join us on our Discord server, ‘BSFS & Balticon’, to interact via text chat and voice chat. Discord is the place to go to talk with Dealers and Fan Tables, after panel discussions, technical help, and general socializing. Each Programming room, both virtual and in-person, has an associated channel with the same name that can be used for continued discussions after the panel. Video watch parties, scavenger hunt, and similar events may also be organized over Discord channels. Discord is a free voice, video, and text chat app that’s used by tens of millions of people aged 13+ to talk and hang out with their communities and friends. Apps are available on Google Play and the Apple Store. If you prefer to use a computer, there is a desktop app, or you can use it from a web browser. Use our invite link to go to our server https://discord.gg/5U3s2YzPzQ and create an account. You can also choose to use the web browser or download the app, if desired. This is a good beginner’s guide for using Discord. YouTube Replays of panels and presentations will be available on YouTube through the Balticon Anywhere Hub within two weeks after the con has ended (or sooner, if volunteer time allows!) Sign up for our email newsletter and we’ll let you know as soon as they’re up! YouTube can be used in a web browser with or without logging in, or you can download the YouTube app for your device. Get your Balticon 59 Membership Does it sound like somewhere you want to be? We're so excited to have you join us! Take My Money!

< Back Stephanie Law Artist Guest of Honor Stephanie Law’s images trace the boundary between dream and reality. She delves into the pictorial language of allegory, explores mythology in new contexts, chases tiny worlds of wonder from an insect’s viewpoint, and highlights the beauty of growth and decay found in nature. She interweaves texture, watercolor, gold and silver leaf, ink, and creates intricate layered pieces with resin and custom designed frames. In a meld of organic patterns and familiar archetypes, her paintings pose a question on the nature of perception and beauty, and it is against this backdrop that the ephemeral guides and strange creatures dance and beckon the viewer to follow through her various series. Archetypes, the basis for the universal appeal of mythological concepts, are one of the defining inspirations for her imagery. This is mingled with the movement of dance. Stephanie has been a dancer for almost two decades, and she uses that experience of how the human body moves and emotes to create a bridge into her artwork so that not only do the humans dance across the page, but the branches of her trees move with a sinuous grace, and the arrangement of inanimate elements has a choreographed rhythm and flow. Growing up in California, Stephanie has been surrounded by the wealth of natural inspiration all around her. The twisting boughs of live oaks from the hills near her home insinuate themselves into her paintings. The chaos of Nature’s wild growth, and conversely the beauty of decay, echo in the textures and fractal patterns of her work. She has worked for gaming companies to create art for rpgs and ccgs, including Magic the Gathering, Forgotten Realms, Blue Rose, Warhammer, Legend of Five Rings, and also designs art for magazine illustrations, book interior and cover illustrations. She is the author and illustrator of the Dreamscapes watercolor tutorial series of books, and The Shadowscapes Tarot, and the artist for The Treekeepers Oracle. She’s currently working on a new deck, the Verdance Tarot, as well as regularly showing her new work at Modern Eden Gallery (San Francisco, CA) and Haven Gallery (Northport, NY). For more information about Ms. Law's artwork, please visit her website .

< Back Marc Abrahams Science Guest of Honor Marc Abrahams writes about things that are surprising—so surprising that they make people LAUGH, then THINK. IG NOBEL PRIZES : Marc founded the Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony in 1991, and serves as master of ceremonies. The prizes — for achievements that make people LAUGH, then THINK — are handed out by genuine, bemused Nobel laureates in a gala event held every year at Harvard University, and broadcast on the web and on public radio. (The 1995 ceremony was one of the very first events ever webcast.) In 2022 the Ig Nobel Prize was itself given a prize: the Heinz Oberhummer award , for “outstanding science communication”. WRITING and EDITING : Marc co-founded and edits the magazine Annals of Improbable Research (AIR), and wrote This is Improbable, The Ig Nobel Prizes, and other books. He edits and writes much of the web site and blog www.improbable.com and the monthly newsletter mini – AIR . He also writes t he weekly “Feedback” column in New Scientist magazine. Marc is co-author, with entomologist Jiri Hulcr, of the fairly new book The Surprising Lives of Bark Beetles: Mighty Foresters of the Insect World . For thirteen years, he also wrote a mostly-weekly column (called “Improbable Research”) for The Guardian . He created and hosts the Improbable Research podcast. Earlier, Marc was editor of the magazine Journal of Irreproducible Results . You can follow Marc on mastodon at MarcAbrahams@mstdn.science