Miscellaneous

Book Expo America 2010 Or: How We Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Hundreds of Pounds of Books – Day 2

This is our report for Day 2 of Book Expo America 2010, go HERE for Days 0/1

DAY TWO: The Lack of Will Power, Alchoholic Pasta, Geeking Out and a Smugglerific Party

Thea and Ana getting ready to rock

Ana: Armed with the strong resolve of not getting as many books as the day before, on Thursday morning we decided to arrive at the Javits earlier in order to be prepared for the Block of Doom – Part 2 (between 9am and 11am) and so that we could check some of the publishers we hadn’t seen the day before (like Disney Hyperion and Flux). We met up with Kenda to share a taxi at around 8am but our plan was twarped by the evil BEA organisers who decided not to open the hall before 9am. I immediately started whining at how “We could have slept another hour!” and then we sat down to wait. As members of the press (yeah, bloggers can get their BEA passes as members of the press – for FREE) we were allowed to enter the Press Room just before 9am and I attempted to drink their godawful coffee but couldn’t drink more than a couple of sips. We met Janice at the room and I took a picture of the group being all press-y:

From L to R: Kenda, Janice & Thea

At 9, the rush began and people were running (myself included – any attempts of playing cool and just strolling away were crushed by my own cursed competitiveness) to the Simon & Schuster booth in order to get an ARC of Cassandra Clare’s Clockwork Angel. I am pleased to report we all got copies. We then ran to see Deanna Raybourn who was signing The Dead Travels Fast. We had a pretty cool moment here when she recognised our blog’s name and told Thea how much she loved her extremely well-written review of Silent in the Grave. Thea was delighted and I was mucho proud.

Carrying on with the Block of Doom – Part 2, we got in line to signed copies Adam Rex’s Fat Vampire, Larry Doyle’s Go, Mutants!, Gena Showalter’s Unraveled, Eric Luper’s Seth Baumgartners Love Manifesto and since most of these lines were short, we ended up getting into other lines and as you can see we completely failed to keep our resolve – we ended up collecting 30 books each, especially after doing impromptu visits to the Harper Collins’, Penguin’s and Flux’s booth (where I basically begged the nice lady for a copy of A Blue So Dark by Holly Schindler and since I do begging so well, she actually gave me one of the display copies) which means that by 11am, we were already carrying way too much weight and dead tired on our feet.

That was when we collapsed (I had a horrible headache at this point) and decided to take a REAL break. We went back to the hotel to drop the bags off (making resolve number 2 of NOT GETTING MORE BOOKS but guess what, we didn’t keep it) and then have our first real meal since Monday night. We went to an Italian restaurant close to the hotel and had the most …. interesting pasta ever. It was supposed to be a regular tomato pasta but we are 100% convinced that someone must have dropped a bottle of pure, undiluted alchohol in it. It had the weirdest alcoholic taste but we were so hungry that we just ate the whole thing anyway.

Making our way back to the Javits (this time braving the subway system) , we made it back just in time to see the YA Authors of YA Editor’s Buzz panel with Ally Condie (MATCHED); Rebecca Maizel (INFINITE DAYS); Kody Keplinger (THE DUFF); Sophie Jordan (FIRELIGHT); Erin Bow (PLAIN KATE). The authors talked about their upcoming novels, about writing them and then read excerpts from the novels. This was actually a surprising panel because the two books we most wanted to read before we attented it (FIRELIGHT AND INFINITE DAYS) seemed to be the least interesting and we came out really interested in MATCHED and THE DUFF and positively salivating over PLAIN KATE. They didn’t have any copies to giveaway there but I ended up getting a copy of FIRELIGHT (see? no will power).

We then went back to get a copy of more signed books – Thea really wanted Pariah by Bob Fingerman and wouldn’t you know, Erin Bow was signing Plain Kate just there so we whooped and squeed and got ourselves copies.

At 4pm, we made our way to The Book Bloggler Convention Reception and that was another surprise. Extremely well organised, with food and drinks, the room was absolutely packed not only with bloggers but also industry professionals from major publishing houses and imprints such as Tor, Little,Brown, Harper Collins and Big Honcho Media. The best part of it though was meeting two authors we are friendly with: historical fiction writer Susan Holloway Scott and YA writer Diana Peterfreund whom we spent a good hour chatting to and geeking over Halloween, books and blogging.

Top: Susan Holloway Scott and us; Bottom: Diana Peterfreund and us (and I don’t know why we all look like the leaning tower of Pisa

You can’t see in the picture but I am wearing the BEST T-SHIRT EVER CREATED which Angie (thank you Angie!) presented me with and it reads:

What Would Eugenides Do. (if you don’t know who Eugenides is and why would anyone be interested in knowing what he would do, go here.)

We were one of the last ones at the reception and we had to madly dash back because we were throwing our own BEA party: A Smugglerific Party at a bar called the Volstead. Unfortunately, NY conspired against us and it was raining buckets when we left the hotel and we were finally able to observe and experience the phenomenon of NOT BEING ABLE TO GET A TAXI. Up until that point we thought all the TV Shows and Movies lied to us because we had no problems getting taxis till then.

Our Reserved Table

We were the last ones to arrive at the party (bad, bad hostesses) but once we settled down, it was an absolute blast. On top of some of the bloggers we had already met like Angie, Kenda (with her husband in tow), Kristen, Janice and Heather, we finally got to meet two of our favorite bloggers in the world. The wonderful Christine of The Happily Ever After, someone we had been exchaging emails with since the start of our book smuggling careers and the lovely LR of Lusty Reader.

The Smugglerific Party’s attendees

The bar was a little bit too loud and we did have to shout our conversations a little bit but the food was delicious (thanks Heather, for letting me share the most awesome steak sub) and very affordable (key word here, people). The party ended at around half past ten and we made our wobbly way back to the hotel, where we once more collapsed in exhaustion.

Thus, Day 2 endeth. Report of The Book Blogger Convention and the conclusion of our NY adventure including “The Strand – An Exposee” will be up on Wednesday! We promise.

23 Comments

  • Erika (Jawas Read, Too)
    May 31, 2010 at 2:51 pm

    Day two sounds, if possible, even better than day one. 🙂 I hope one of your next BEA posts reveals how you both managed to get all of those books home!

  • katiebabs
    May 31, 2010 at 3:10 pm

    What a lovely group of ladies!

  • danielle
    May 31, 2010 at 3:21 pm

    i.am.so.jealous.

    great haul, ladies. clockwork angels looks…wonderful.

  • Susan Holloway Scott
    May 31, 2010 at 4:03 pm

    Awwww…. finally seeing you guys was one of my highest of high points, too! Though I’m not quite sure why, in that picture, we’re all doing that weird-tippy-thing with our heads. Must have been the rarified air of so many excellent bloggers in one place. 🙂

  • Howard Sherman
    May 31, 2010 at 4:10 pm

    Meeting y’all at the BBC reception was not only fun – it was educational. Thanks for all the time you spared me! 🙂

  • Kristen
    May 31, 2010 at 4:58 pm

    It was so wonderful to meet you both! What a fantastic week!

  • Chachic
    May 31, 2010 at 5:17 pm

    I want a What Would Eugenides Do shirt too! 🙂 BEA sounds amazing. I can just imagine how wonderful it is to to meet authors and fellow book bloggers in an event like that. Your Smugglerific Party looks really fun.

  • Karen Mahoney
    June 1, 2010 at 1:50 am

    So. Awesome. 🙂

    Oh, I can’t wait to see you this weekend!!

    Kaz
    <3

    p.s. Ana, you like you're not wearing shoes in that last photo of you (party group). Confirm or deny? *ninja*

  • Estara
    June 1, 2010 at 5:40 am

    Both your BEA syndicated entries where just above janicu’s on my Flist at LiveJournal so now I feel as if I was part of the BEA/BBC experience ^^. So many tasty boooooooooks! And Beth Bernobich is not just an author but a great webcoder, she renovated Sherwood Smith’s website.

    I’m definitely buying Power Play. Sherwood recommends it, too.

    Aside: You ladies look lovely.

  • Brooke
    June 1, 2010 at 8:16 am

    I am still so excited for Infinite Days. The reviews are comin up – sounds good. Plain Kate looks so good too. Did they give out ARCs of Infinite Days?

  • KMont
    June 1, 2010 at 10:46 am

    Ahahahaahaaaaa! I look so…not professional in that pic of us in the press area. 😀

    I had Plain Kate on my list to get and somehow totally missed it! Whaaa! I mean, totally missed it, not voluntarily like some books that were at the end of the day and no longer as important as my DYING feet. Yep, killed me own feet.

    Dammit but I wanted Plain Kate. Damn you, FEET!

  • Rowena
    June 1, 2010 at 12:21 pm

    Wow, looks like a good time was had by all. I’m super jealous! You guys look fabulous too!

  • adrienne
    June 1, 2010 at 12:23 pm

    Nice! I am really glad that the major publishing houses are taking your blog and everyone else out there very seriously…90% of the books I buy now are from your recommendation which is huge 😆

    P.S.-begging for books is never wrong!

  • Heather J.
    June 1, 2010 at 6:51 pm

    Thanks for letting me join your fabulous party on Thursday night! It was wonderful getting to know everyone – I’d never met ANY of you all before!

    And Ana, I’d share a steak sub with you anytime. 😉

  • vvb
    June 1, 2010 at 7:18 pm

    thanks for sharing your adventures at bea!

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  • Emily (Super Reader Girl)
    June 1, 2010 at 11:56 pm

    Oooh! You really are book smugglers! 🙂 Pretty books! Congratulations! I spy a lot of the ones I’m looking forward to! Glad you had fun!!

  • Howard Sherman
    June 2, 2010 at 3:10 am

    I almost felt as if I stepped inside that last BBC picture of you both with Diana; I was standing right in front of all three of you as y’all schooled me on the world of book blogging.

    Thanks for that – and for being so warm and wonderful!

    Howard

  • Christine
    June 2, 2010 at 10:25 am

    I am so thrilled to have finally met both of you in person. It was like we’ve done it a hundred times before, wasn’t it? xoxo

  • Emily
    June 3, 2010 at 9:29 am

    thanks for sharing your adventures at bea!

  • Michelle
    June 8, 2010 at 3:59 am

    You ladies have absolutely ZERO resolve! LOL

    That’s ok….neither do I. So I feel joy at being in good company.

    My big goal for next year (and no it’s not to have better book resolve because really, where is the fun in that) is to be able to have more social time. This year I was all work and no play and I missed out on so much of the experience.

    I’m glad y’all enjoyed the BBC reception, I was shocked to see the masses flowing in. It was quite gratifying. Knowing that everyone got something good out of it makes me a happy girl 🙂

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  • Rommey
    September 24, 2010 at 1:53 am

    I was at BEA also and heard Levine praise PLAIN KATE.

    Here’s what Publishers’ Weekly wrote:

    Arthur Levine of Scholastic set the bar fairly high when he began his remarks about Plain Kate by Erin Bow by saying that because he had a hand in bringing Brian Jacques, Philip Pullman and J.K. Rowling to U.S. audiences, “I’ve been sent a lot of fantasy, some of it quite good. But it’s very rare for a book to stand out for me the way Plain Kate did.”

    The story of a girl who loses her father and is imperiled by suspicions that she is a witch, Levine said Bow’s prose has the “lyrical strength and classic proportions” of master writers. “She is a truly original talent,” Levine said, evidenced by a “breathless e-mail” he got from an associate at the most recent London Book Fair who said Printz Award winner Meg Rosoff had read Plain Kate and couldn’t stop raving about it. Rosoff’s blurb – “anything but plain, full of poetry, magic, sorrow and joy” – will be on the cover.

    I couldn’t agree more. Perfect for readers middle school and up. My 67-year-old friend lingered over Plain Kate for a full day-reading a few minutes at a time because it was scary, beautiful and he didn’t want it to end.

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