Book Expo America - Day Three - Post 3.3

With books in hand, I headed back to the show floor. I had an agenda. My first stop was to HarperCollins for the galley drop of Burning Skies by Sherry Thomas. Also at 11am, I had a lecture scheduled which I skipped and four other signings. But first, I wanted to grab a ticket for Diana Gabaldon who was signing at 11:30. I headed over to Random House, found her line, asked if there were more tickets and was told to go back to the end of the line to see. I got there and asked just as two other women arrived, but they only had one ticket left. The other two women took pity on me and allowed me to have the last ticket, but they were advised there may be extra books available, so they stayed in line. I wanted to go to the Romance Writer’s booth for a signing of The Reckoning by Alma Katsu, but I felt guilty about taking the last ticket and so didn’t ask if they’d hold my spot. More people lined up behind us on the off chance there might be extra books. Diana was signing copies of Outlander in trade. At one point, someone came over and asked where the end of the line was. The bother was making very sure that anyone who had tickets got in front of the people without tickets, but this person wanted to turn in her ticket, so one of the ladies behind me took it. Luckily, it happened again and both women had tickets. I was relieved and asked them at that time if they would watch my spot. However, by the time I got to the Romance Writer’s booth, the signing was over. I think they ran out of books. Although disappointed, I had to keep my eye on the prize and that was a book signed by Diana Gabaldon.

Jim Gaffigan was on stage at noon right by where I was standing and after that, he was going to be signing books. I got to hear him a little, but the line moved up and out of earshot. There was another Jennifer L. Armentrout writing as J. Lynn book pre-signed being given away at 11:30, but I’d want to meet her. I had two other signings at noon, one of which I made. That one turned into a line signing. I wanted to pick up The Secret of Ella and Micha by Jessica Sorenson, but there were two other adult romance writers signing as well. So, I got hers personalized and the other two just signed.

From there, I wanted to pick up a book called Mermaid in Chelsea Creek by Michelle Tea. Unfortunately, this was a signing you had to buy the book for. The book was $20.00. Not that I am against that, but I knew nothing about the book or the author other than there was a mermaid in a creek, I didn’t feel compelled to pick the book up. I did put it on my Amazon wish list, though.

With that being a bust, my next stop wasn’t until 1pm. Ellen Datlow was signing another collection at the Horror Writer’s booth, so I made my way over there, but got there way early, so I sat in line. We got moved around a bit as we kept blocking other booths, but finally, Ellen started signing the books. Of course she didn’t remember me from the day before, how could she seeing so many hundreds of people daily, but she seems really nice and I enjoyed getting the opportunity to meet her.

From there, I had a signing at Sourcebooks at 1:30, so I made my way over and just happened to walk through Penguin booth just in case anything was going on. What I didn’t expect was a mob scene!!! Okay, it wasn’t a mob scene as much as it was a very well-formed line, but the line was so long I’m sure it went into Canada or at least out of the building. Okay. It was neither, but it was really long. I think I’ll just buy the book. At that point, I probably wouldn’t have gotten one anyway and she had just started signing. I went and got my book signed at Sourcebooks, My Life Until Now by Jessica Verdi, and headed back to the Horror Writer’s booth for a signing of Twice Shy by Patrick Freivald. 

At this point, I had almost an hour to wait. I was first in line which was a first for me. Of course, I completely spaced Star Wars Reads Day Celebration happening from 1pm – 2:30. I could have totally made most of it. I saw some Star Wars characters in Shakespearean garb walk by later which is what reminded me of it. My last even of the day was a signing by Chuck Wendig, Gods and Monsters. I had a while to wait, but it ended up being fortuitous as Quirk books was close by and they were giving away ARCs of William Shakespeare’s Star Wars. I was talking to the girl in front of me. Her name was Molly from insertgeekhere.com. She had mentioned she had been to the Star Wars Day Reads Celebration and I asked her about it. She said they had lots of activities and were giving away some Star Wars books. I’m sorry I missed it. I told her the one book I had tried to get was Star Wars Jedi Academy from Scholastic. I had a little friend named Tara who is 8 and she is a huge Star Wars fan. Molly told me she got two copies and she gave me one. So thank you Molly! You have made one little girl very, very happy!

So, I got my book signed and I was done. This signing was at 3pm, but while I was on line, it sounded like a lot of booths were already taking stuff down. At one point I looked down the aisle and I saw that all the shelves were empty. After four days of carrying a ton of books, I was just too tired to care anymore. A lot of the display copies of books were gone, picked over by the carrion eaters, I mean attendees, but I was just too tired to care. I took a quick walk by all the big publisher booths and headed down comic row. Dark Horse was having an author signing for the new Star Wars comic, so I got one of them signed for Tara and one for me. And then it was time to leave.