Okay, so I’ve been a little bit remiss in posting recently. I could come up with a lot of excuses including but not limited to two solid weeks on the road, balky Internet connections and the most wicked case of bronchitis ever, but what would be the point? Blogging is as blogging does. If you can’t do the blog, don’t do the….blog. Or whatever.
Anyhoo, I thought I’d fill you in on just a few random things I did and saw in the last couple of weeks, before I take off tomorrow to attend the International Reading Association Convention in Atlanta. Incidentally if you are attending the IRA convention (and no IRA does not stand for Irish Republican Army) I’ll be doing a bunch of appearances there to sign books so see the end of this post for the details (but don’t skip over to the end, read the middle part first!).
So first I went to Texas. It was the first time I’d ever been to the Texas Library Association convention. Them Texas Librarians! Are they ever friendly and do they ever love their Texas books! My signing of TEXAS RANGERS: LEGENDARY LAWMEN was spectacular and I thought it was a great show all the way around. I’ll definitely be going back.
From Texas I went to New York City for New York Comic Con. Wow. Where to even begin? This is my second time at NYCC and it was another great weekend getting in touch with my inner nerd. I saw so many cool things and si
gned a lot of books. The coolest thing though was the Penguin Young Readers Group banner at their booth that had the cover artwork for THE YOUNGEST TEMPLAR: Keeper of the Grail right there in the middle. (By the way, the book is now available for pre-order on Amazon.com. I’m just sayin’!) All I can say is that Penguin Young Readers Group rocks! I had a great time hanging out in the booth and signing Advanced Readers Editions of the novel.
The thing I love about Comic Con is that you see things there you won’t ever see anywhere else. Some highlights:
1) The ‘light saber’ competition at the rear of the convention center with real judges like in a martial arts competition. I half expected to see Daniel LaRussa and Johnny and the rest of his Cobra Kai minions square off. You almost couldn’t tear yourself away from it.
2) I saw seven women dressed as Princess Leia from Star Wars: Return of the Jedi.
3) Almost every booth has a ‘booth babe’ an exceedingly beautiful woman whose sole purpose is to engage geeks in conversation and get them to buy stuff. What was funny this time is I saw a guy dressed in a Wolverine costume trying every move he knew (which apparently was about three moves, tops) to pick up a booth babe. Buddy, here’s a hint: YOU’RE DRESSED AS WOLVERINE! UNLESS YOU ALSO HAPPEN TO BE HUGH JACKMAN YOU HAVE NO SHOT!
4) A super cool Green Arrow statue. In the words of Napoleon Dynamite “I want that!”
It was almost too much fun and I’ve heard that San Diego Comic Con is even bigger and geekier so I can’t wait for that one come July.
From New York, a three day side trip to Orlando for other business, and then I was in Los Angeles for the LA Time Festival of Books. This is one of my most favorite events of the year. Held on the beautiful UCLA Campus it’s a gorgeous celebration of books and book lovers. Despite heat in triple digits it was a fun day and I can’t wait to go back again next year.
Then I came home and after two weeks in hotels and on airplanes breathing germy air, I got sick. So that’s my excuse for not posting for the last couple of weeks. Not to mention that in between all of that I had to get some writing done.
So that’s it. Off to IRA. If you’re attending I’ll be signing at the Walker Booth on Monday May 5th from 4-4:30pm. And on Wednesday I’ll be signing at Anderson Bookshops from 10-11am, HarperCollins from 12-12:30 pm and Penguin Young Readers Group from 1:30-2pm. So if you’re attending the show during one of these times, please stop by and say hello!
Hope to see you there!
