The time it was all bookish mail -- 2

Book mail is the best mail and this post is all about signed things I've recently received!

When the Breathless Reads tour was announced, I knew I would be ordering books for the authors who were on the east coast.  I had been talking with Fiona Paul and Elizabeth Richards a lot on Twitter and those conversations led to what could be the greatest inscriptions I've ever gotten.

With Fiona, we talked about our mutual love of The Crow.  We may or may not have quoted lines to each other a few times.  When it came to my order of Venom, she told me that if her signing line was slow, she would fill her time with writing quotes from The Crow all over my book.  I said I was expecting it. 

With Elizabeth, I had just finished Phoenix and in my flails, I may have begged asked for Ash. Fiona jumped into the conversation by saying that we had to share him, and I could only have him a few days a week.

And when I opened my books, I almost died...

 

At the same signing, I was able to get Shades of Earth by Beth Revis. I met Beth last year on the Breathless Reads tour and while I'm bummed I didn't get to see her, I'm happy to complete the signed series. And I can't wait to see how this trilogy ends!!

Kimbery Derting and Lisa Schroeder did a signing at Powell's in Oregon and thankfully, Jennifer was willing to get some things signed for me. I am super excited to see what happens in The Essence and I'm thrilled to have another author to cross off the list of the Dear Bully contributors. 

  

When the Dark Days tour was broken into two different legs, Jennifer and I split them up so we could have signed copies from all of the authors.

Jennifer got me things from Lauren Oliver, Dan Wells and Claudia Grey...

  

And then at another event, Jennifer also got me a copy of Scarlet by Marissa Meyer.

Who's a spoiled brat? Oh yah.  It's me!

The time I had so many books

Veronica Roth was announced as part of the Pitch Dark Days tour and I knew that wherever she was going to end up, I was going to get there. When the tour stop was announced at the BN in Huntington, it was a done deal.

I got up to the store around 4:15. I proceeded to wander around, looking for a hardcover copy of Divergent for Michelle. The event already looked like it was going to be huge. People were walking around, carrying copies of the books and there were little clusters of people sitting on the floor. By 4:45, the event area was being set up and everyone who was sitting had been lined up. Ava and Kim got there shortly after I got in line and we were able to get 4th row seats.

The chairs quickly filled up and there was an additional line of people along the banister. 6pm brought the employees going through the chairs of people, writing post-its for inscriptions. And the line got even longer. 

And then this happened....

The authors got there right at 7. There was a brief introduction from each author with a synopsis of their books and then it went right into Q&A. Aprilynne said that they'd only have about 30 minutes due to there being so many people. There were some good questions and some of the standard advice sort of questions. 

But let's get down to business, because we allll know that I didn't take any sort of notes so I could properly recap.

They started the signing going row by row with a line behind every author.  Originally [because I had 13 books with me to get signed], I was going to wait until the very end.  With the crowd control, it was much easier to get everything done...

SJ Kincaid was the first author I went to.  She is adorable.  I gave her my book and congratulated her on her book release day.  And then she put me on the spot by asking what my favorite book was.  Confused, I asked her if she meant for all time.  She said, "Favorite book that think of first." My answer was [of course] Pride and Prejudice.  She countered with, "Favorite movie Mr. Darcy?"

Pfft.  Like there's any real answer other than Colin Firth. 

We chatted about how lovely Colin is in that role and how someone [SJ's cousin? Friend? I don't remember] thinks Colin does the creepy stare.  SJ and I agreed that the creepy stare is the best part of Colin's Mr. Darcy. I will be keeping tabs on SJ for this alone.  *nods*

Aprilynne was next.  I had books for Jennifer to have signed, plus my copy of Dear Bully.  Aprilynne asked which book was for me and I explained how I had books for several people.  She also asked about Dear Bully and if I had been getting other authors.  I told her I was working on getting everyone to sign it and she said she's seen a lot of people doing that.

I quickly slid over to Dan Wells.  I did meet him when he toured with Lauren Oliver and Claudia Grey and he is a lot of fun.  Excellent sarcastic answers, plus he loves Hermoine.

I had gotten a copy of I Am Not A Serial Killer at ALA, so I had that signed. He also asked which book was for me since I had something for Jennifer.  Dan had pins on the table and I asked if I could take one.  He said yes, but for $10.  So, I took 2 and said that I would run and get him some money.  Dan said he would accept pretend money.

Now.

For Veronica, there were a shiton of people there.  One of the B&N events people [who's name I don't know...] said there was 350 people there and every single one of them had books for Veronica.

I had 8.  Plus my Nook.

When I got up to her, I started to apologize for the stack.  Veronica went to grab the first book off the top and somehow managed to knock over her Starbucks.  Thankfully, it missed all of Dan's swag and didn't hit any books or people. 

I was watching her sign her name and noticed that she signs "Rth" and then adds the "o" afterwards.  When I commented on it, Veronica said that she changed it because when she signed it as one word, it looked like "V. Rats".

After the stack was completed, I asked if I could get a picture.  She told me it was no problem and to come around the table.  I went back to the front to thank her and again apologize for the stack.  Her answer was awesome, that she wasn't going to be mad that I had bought so many copies of her books.  And then told me that she once signed 20 copies for one person.

I was tempted to buy more, just to beat the record. 

As we left, we noticed that people were lined up everywhere.  There was one large line, running down the banister and then people were lined up between the bookshelves.  The B&N in Huntington Beach always does a fantastic job of crowd control and everything always seems to run so smoothly.

SJ, Veronica, Dan and Aprilynne were all so much fun to talk with and they definitely made it worthwhile. 

Update 7/12: As of today, I'm suspending the giveaway.  Somehow I lost the damn copy I was going to give out.  I'm hoping that after I clear up all of the shit that has piled up in my office for/from Comic-Con, I'll find it.  However, the ending date was sooner than CC was over. 

As soon as I find the book, I'll put it back up.  Sorry!! =]

The time I didn't read the books before the signing.

I had heard all sorts of good things about Vroman's bookstore in Pasadena. When I saw that Lauren Oliver was signing, I was all over it. Add Claudia Gray and I was set... I ordered the books through the website with a note that I would be picking the books on the day of the event.

When we got to Vroman's, I was instructed to go to the will call section upstairs. The woman who helped me, Mary, was extraordinarily nice. She even offered to hold my ginormous bag of books behind the counter so I could go to lunch without lugging it around.

We got back to the bookstore around 3, and of course Nicole was there. :D I spent the time facing my books, writing my post-it's and chatting up the other people for the signing. Vroman's has an area devoted to signings and it was already set up with seating and balloons.

The three authors came out just after 4.  A woman from Vroman's did a brief introduction and gave the background for each.  And then each author went further into their background, including their stories. 

Dan started his introduction by telling the audience "You're Welcome".  He then stated that during their flight from Atlanta, they had to make a stop in New Mexico because there was a very sick woman passenger who needed to be removed from the plane.  The 3 of them were certain she was Patient Zero and they were infected with the virus [that the audience was now going to contract] which was going to kill off the population.

All 3 authors are animated, funny and so so so charming.  They give fun answers to the questions given.  The Q&A lasted for about an hour.  They answered questions from "what's your favorite book" to "what are you working on now" to "how to do write a believable romance between two characters".  They even threatened the audience with singing if the questions stopped before they were ready.  Apparently, the 3 of them sang the theme to The Love Boat and The Time Warp at other events, but none of them could remember why.

Admittedly, I didn't read the books before the signing started.  I was planning on reading Delirium, but heard there was a horrible cliffhanger, so I decided to wait for Pandemonium.  Now I've learned that Lauren [as well as Claudia and Dan] loves writing cliffhangers, so I was advised by other people in attendance that I should wait for the final book.

I did read Evernight, by Claudia Gray, but not any of the others in the series.  I loved the character Balthazar, so I'm very eager to see where she takes him.

I found Dan from the Vroman's website.  After seeing that he was going to be there with Lauren and Claudia, I read the synopsis of his book and I was definitely interested.

When the Q&A was over, we lined up along the wall.  Nicole was in front of me, so I was the second person in line.  I had 7 books to get signed between the 3 of them, so while Nicole started with Dan, I went to Lauren.

Now.  I had heard from some girls on Twitter that Lauren is super nice and when I walked up to her, she absolutely was.  She was extremely engaging, commenting on my husband staying in his seat while the signing was going on and even saying that she saw him on his phone the entire time.  She also asked if I had a blog.  When I told her that I did a blog about book signings because something weird usually happens to me at every event, she asked what weird thing happened this time.  At the time, nothing weird had happened [and it didn't], so she asked for another example. 

As I was telling the story, this is how she signed by book....

Lauren went on to ask how long it took us to drive up from San Diego [at this point, Nicole and I were both passing our books to all 3 of the authors, but I remained standing in front of Lauren].  I told her that it was mainly dependent on who drove, that I drove faster.  And when I mentioned that I was one ticket away from losing my license, Lauren, Claudia and Dan all did the "Ooooooohhhhh".

Claudia was excited to see a hardcover copy of Evernight, I think she even rubbed the cover a little...

And Dan was just plain awesome...

After I had collected all of my books, I thanked all of them for taking the time and I'm pretty sure they answered "thanks for coming" at the same time. 

All in all, it was an excellent signing.  Lauren, Claudia and Dan are hilarious together and have excellent chemistry as a panel of authors traveling together.  Everyone at Vroman's was friendly and helpful and I definitely look forward to going to future signings.