The UC Riverside Library will once again host notable authors and scholars of speculative fiction with the 2026 Virtual Eaton Symposium on Jan. 8.

The daylong event will include speculative fiction writer Ken Liu as the keynote speaker.  Liu recently published the techno thriller “All That We See or Seem” and is a winner of the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy awards.

The Eaton Collection of Science Fiction and Fantasy held its first Eaton Symposium last year, reviving an annual tradition when authors and scholars convened at UCR for the annual Eaton Conference on Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature from 1979 to 2013.

Phoenix Alexander, the Jay Kay Klein Librarian for Science Fiction and Fantasy, said the symposium was brought back to continue growing the passionate community around the Eaton Collection’s legacy.

Last year’s event included a series of panels featuring authors, editors, researchers, and librarians. Last year’s panels were streamed live and then posted on YouTube. Alexander said viewers have expressed excitement at the continuation of the symposium on social media.

The upcoming event includes researchers from UCR, Harvard University, and Goldsmiths, University of London as well as a panel of local curators from the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art, Huntington Library, and Cal State Fullerton discussing their collections. 

Other panelists include Sheree Renée Thomas, editor of the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, John Joseph Adams, editor of Lightspeed magazine, and David Agranoff, author and reviewer at Amazing Stories.

“I wanted to focus more on the scholarship side of things for the 2026 symposium, while still bringing in amazing names from the science fiction and fantasy publishing world,” Alexander said.

The Eaton Collection will also be featured in an upcoming episode of the Emmy-winning PBS SoCal documentary series Lost LA.  Host Nathan Masters interviewed Alexander and visited UCR for a look at the vast collection in the episode titled “Sci-Fi Origins” that will air locally and on YouTube on Jan. 13.

Find out more about the symposium schedule and registration here.

Learn more about Lost LA streaming and air dates here and watch on YouTube here on Jan. 13.