Last year I spent several days at BEA but this year I was only able to go down for the day. A day which started with my 8yo home from school. And if you know anything about me–that makes me crazy. Maybe I do have a little bit of a control freak streak that comes out from time to time. But my sitter (practically a big sister to my boys) was already lined up to hang with the 12 you for the day (he graduated to middle school the day before) so I decided to put on my fancy shoes and go anyway.
I’m so glad I wore those comfy puppies on my feet and stashed my fancy shoes and top in my bag for the Simon & Schuster Pulse/Aladdin happy hour. Because the first thing I had to do when I hit NYC was wait in about a 20 person taxi line in the sweltering heat. OMG! Liked the Wicked Witch of the West–I was melting!
This was when I only had 3 or 4 people in front of me and I was getting excited. LOL!
A sweaty but very happy me in the cab with air conditioning until….
My driver stopped at a red light, pulled out a book and started reading. It was pointed out to me how cool it was that I was going to Book Expo America and my cab driver was reading. NO! Sorry, not cool. Even with air conditioning–not cool! Unless a new Harry Potter book comes out–then I’ll totally let you do it. But that’s it.
Made it to BEA alive and who was waiting for me? Lisa Lueddecke from The Young Adult Connection. <3 We were roomies for BEA last year and this was our 1 year Friendaversary. It was so awesome to see her, but I’m going to straight up say that between her evil, painful shoes, my lunch with my agent and the poor cell phone service, I didn’t see her nearly as much as I wanted to. Such a tease. We are totally going to have to Skype or something. Soon. If I could figure out how to Skype. I seriously have SDD Skype Deficit Disorder. *le sigh*
But just like old times, Lisa and I went ARC hunting and we found OMG!!!! LAUREN MYRACLE!!!!!!! AND I HUGGED HER!!!!!! AND SHE IS MORE AWESOME IN REAL LIFE THAN ALL CAPS CAN REALLY EXPLAIN.
And of course I had lunch and hung out with the agent of awesome…MICHELLE WOLFSON!!!! One of my favorite things in the whole world. <3 I also got to finally meet my Wolf Pack Sistah, Jennifer Iacopelli, debut author of GAME. SET. MATCH. Which I started reading on the train ride home and LOVE!!!!! And I also ran into my local book buddy and friend Emily.
There was more, a hazy hot blur of more. I actually ran into a lot more friends and met a bunch of amazing new people between BEA and the Pulse/Aladdin Happy Hour, but my phone battery!!!! The Javits Center eats battery bars for snacks, but on the bright side I met old and new friends while hanging at the charging station. LOL!
So, what have I decided about BEA? I need less than three and a half days and just a little bit more than one. And on the bucket list…I plan on signing there at some point. And on that note–it’s back to work.
PS I’d just like to add that I REALLY REALLY WANTED an ARC of FANGIRL by Rainbow Rowell. And I may have threatened to mug a young book blogger at the charging station, when she whipped out her copy. But I didn’t. So–there was that. What book from BEA would you have almost mugged a book blogger for?
Tags: BEA, Book Expo America, Fangirl, Game. Set. Match., Jennifer Iacopelli, Kim Sabatini, Kimberly Sabatini, Lauren Myracle, Lisa Lueddecke, Michelle Wolfson, NYC, Rainbow Rowell, Taxi
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My recap of BEA 2012 in pictures!!!!
Yeah…off to a pretty good start. *grin*
My awesome roommate, book blogger at THE YA CONNECTION and aspiring author…Lisa Lueddecke. Ummm so we just happened to go right by the Hershey’s store. And they had free samples.
The Class of 2k12 Books at the Bank Street Bookstore where we talked about breaking into the business of children’s and young adult fiction.
We got our swag on!
Bank Street Bookstore provided yummy snacks and beverages.
The whole gang from L-R
Kimberly Sabatini (Touching the Surface available October 30th), Sarvenaz Tash (The Mapmaker and the Ghost), A.C. Gaughen (Scarlet), Sarah Tregay (Love & Leftovers) and Lynda Mullaly Hunt (One for the Murphys)
Someone asked me why I had such a little book…of course my answer was that I write for little people LOL!
We had so much fun with this bunch!!!
Of course a little ice cream from the “Seinfeld Dinner” never is a bad ending to a great day. Lisa and Kim.
Look what was waiting in our room from the W Hotel!!! I felt so special…((((hugs)))) to A.C. Gaughen.
Tuesday morning…the view from our room.
Lisa needs an official Times Square picture!!!!
Meeting Suzanne Lazear (Innocent Darkness) for a quick breakfast.
The registration area of BEA.
The Editors for the YA Editors Buzz Panel. Everything sounded fantastic. You can read all about it at Publisher’s Weekly-BEA 2012: Diversity Rules at YA Editor’s Buzz Panel. But I want to give a special shout out to my fellow Apocalypsies: Gennifer Albin, author of Crewel and Kat Zhang, author of What’s Left of Me!!!!
I got to spend the WHOLE day with one of my favorite people EVAH!!!! My fantabulous agent Michelle Wolfson. *Heart Squish* And a shout out to Jennifer Laughran for taking a kick-ass picture of us. *grin*
Can you spot all the fabulous Sourcebook authors I found? SEND by Patty Blout, My YAOTL buddy Geoff Herback with STUPID FAST and NOTHING SPECIAL, and some of the Apocalypsies like…Miranda Kenneally with CATCHING JORDAN and STEALING PARKER, Zoraida Cordova with THE VICIOUS DEEP and Leanna Renee Hieber with DARKER STILL and THE TWISTED TRAGEDY OF MISS NATALIE STEWART. Plus a ton of other great reads!!!
Time to meet more of the Apocalypsies!!!!! We had an amazing Meet & Greet. Everyone was given a dance card to get signed by all the Apocalypsie authors in attendance. Here’s what they looked like. Each card was numbered and prize packages of books, ARCs and swag were auctioned off through out the afternoon.
So excited–I got to meet Erica Haglund of The Book Cellar and Julie Cross’ Perfect Ten.
I also got a chance to meet Natalia from Dazzling Reads. Love her!
It’s a small world! Barbra Kane (High School Librarian and Media Specialist in Jamestown, NY) and I graduated from the same college. Go Geneseo!!!
And don’t forget my buddy Grace from Words Like Silver. We saw each other everywhere…she may be tired of me LOL!
And here all the Apocalypsies who participated!!!!
After a hanging out with all the wonderful folks at Simon Pulse, I headed over to the NYC Teen Author Carnival.where I found lots of Simon Pulse authors and Apocalypsies and sometimes they were both, like K.M Walton (CRACKED) and Corrine Jackson (IF I LIE.)
Hilary Graham (REUNITED)
Lucas Klauss (EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW TO SURVIVE THE APOCALYPSE)
Fiona Paul (VENOM) and Lauren Morrill (MEANT TO BE)
Rebecca Serle (WHEN YOU WERE MINE)
Gennifer Albin (REWEL), Tiffany Schmidt (SEND ME A SIGN) and Katie McGarry (PUSHING THE LIMITS) There was a ton of other great authors here but I have yet to learn how to clone myself…the dystopian writers are working on that for me though.
Of course we were REALLY hungry after all that book talk so K.M. Walton, Lynda Mullaly Hunt, Me and Corrine Jackson got some yummy stuff.
Are you getting tired yet? You should have seen me by the time I crawled into bed that night, but no rest for the weary because I was off on Wednesday morning to the YA Author’s Breakfast!!!!
Chris Colfer from Glee was the MC for the event. He was wonderfully funny and very touching as he talked about his own goal, from the age of 10 to have his book published.
In my opinion he seemed very genuine.
Chris Colfer, John Green (the Justin Bieber of the YA world *snort*), Lois Lowry and Kadir Nelson–Each one of these three legends was amazing. Lois Lowry received a standing ovation that was well deserved. You can watch the a live stream replay of the breakfast here…Live Stream Book Expo America
Yeah…I got this close. *sigh*
Back on the main floor I got Tom Angleberger’s autograph for my boys…they were thrilled!
Heading over to my favorite place…Simon & Schuster!!!!
And look who I found on the way…Tim Gunn. He is Fabulous!
Simon & Schuster was crazy busy!!!! I think I can see someone grabbing one of my bookmarks LOL!
I am an awesome mom! Was in line for almost 2 hours to get my oldest son a signed copy of INSURGENT by Veronica Roth! (Lisa, Kim and Jennifer)
And when you make friends on line…you might just get dubbed the Fabulous Five by the line monitors LOL! Don’t forget to check out Terri’s blog Read & Riot. And a Happy Birthday to Terri’s mom, Irene–she’ll be celebrating on Saturday with my brand new 7 year old. Cha, Cha, Cha Irene!!!
The front of the line for the DARK DAYS TOUR had been sitting w-a-y u-p t-h-e-r-e since 10 am so I won’t complain LOL!
Apocalypsie Elizabeth Norris signing UNRAVELING, Veronica Roth signing INSURGENT, Bethany Griffin signing MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH and Aprilynne Pike signing DESTINED.
Flew by Rachel Ray
And a very TALL Harlem Globetrotter LOL!
I also wanted to hit some of the Apocalypsies at their author signings. I missed a ton, but was luck to get a book from…
Sorry it’s blurry–Dan Krokos signing Lisa’s copy of FALSE MEMORY.
And TIME BETWEEN US author and sweetheart, Tamara Ireland Stone
My last Class of 2k12 event was Mix, Mingle and Win! So I mixed and mingled with two of my new favorite people Kim an Judy…making me the winner.
The Class of 2k12 Sarah Tregay, A.C. Gaughen, Megan Bostic, Lynda Mullaly Hunt, Sarvenaz Tash and me.
One of my favorite BEA pics! A.C. Gaughen and her new FIGHT LIKE A GIRL T-shirts for a GLOW fundraiser. Great cause–I am so getting one! If you’re interested in buying one and supporting GLOW–leave your contact info in the comments and I’ll make sure that A. C. gets it.
And what you’ve all been waiting for…the books!
Not including all the MG books I got for the boys…here was my amazing YA haul. Keep tabs on my blog because a lot of these will be up for grabs after I read them!!!! Contests galore, but I can assure you that you will not be getting my 11yo’s signed copy of INSURGENT or my signed ARC of Lois Lowry’s book SON. <3 But that means my question must be…which book would you be desperate for me to have as a prize in a contest???? *FYI DAYS OF BLOOD AND STARLIGHT is only a sample–not the full ARC, but it comes with the full paperback of DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE. Also–if you’ve blogged about your BEA experience–add your link so I can check it out. I had a fabulous time and I hope you did too. And if you couldn’t be there, I hope this helped you feel like you were. Thanks for stopping by.
Tags: Apocalypsies, Bank Street Book Store, BEA, Book Expo America, Dazzling Reads, GLOW, Javits Center, John Green, Kim Sabatini, Kimberly Sabatini, Lois Lowry, Michelle Wolfson, NYC, NYC Teen Author Carnival, Publisher's Weekly, Read & Riot, Simon & Schuster, Simon Pulse, The Book Cellar, The Class of 2k12, The W Times Square, Wolfson Literary, Words Like Silver
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