Book Expo of America

My top 10 BEA moments

(which really aren’t in top 10 order, because how could I possibly choose?)

10) Twitter people! It was great to put faces with the image-avatars that Alea & Amy use, great to see Gail, Steph, Laura, Stacy and Mitali IRL. As we stood in Javits’ lobby and said goodbye, it felt like the end of summer camp. Except, instead of sincerely-meant but soon abandoned promises to write & stay in touch, I could tweet at them as soon as I got on the BEA shuttle bus. I love technology!

9) Meeting people in lines. I have no actual patience and a do a very poor job of pretending to be patient, but I enjoyed waiting in autograph lines. Why? Because I met the most wonderful people. At different points during the day, I was lucky enough to wait with Cinda Williams Chima and Bettina Restrepo. I loved hearing their publication stories and welcomed their advice as I battle the query-waters. Bettina’s inscription in her book, MOOSE AND MAGPIE, might end up framed: “To the great debut author I knew before it happened.” Some people are made of sunshine and positivity – she is one of those people & I can’t wait to read her YA book ILLEGAL, when it comes out in Winter, 2012.

8) Being referred to as “The Tiffany’s.” Lisa McMann coined this at her signing in March. At BEA, Barry Lyga and Justine Larbalestier also called T.O.T. and I “The Tiffanys.” Clearly, The Other Tiffany and I cannot go to signings separately. Agreed, T.O.T.? :)

7) Uber-helpful publishing people. I especially have to thank Greg Ferguson at Egmont and Karen Walsh at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. They were incredibly helpful. I can’t wait to pass along the books they suggested to my kiddos and add the titles to my recommended reading lists.

6) Showing Maureen Johnson the photo of the kiddos’ ABBA masks. Maureen is one tough cookie to battle the Leakyflu to come to her signing and I couldn’t resist spreading a little ABBA love to make her smile.

5)) The BEATweetUp. It was loud, packed, and so great to meet the people I communicate with in 140-character bursts. Conversations without character limits, @-signs, abbreviations and emoticons were even more fun. Although, I did not see very many other people in the super-cool TweetUp badges. (Was wearing them un-cool? Like how you never wear a band’s t-shirt to their concert? If so, I did NOT get the memo… and I still want to see the bar-code thing on the back in action)

4) The post-Tweetup hilarity that was had by the dilly-o’s of #CasualPickle. Allegra, Indiepub medal-wearing Jen Fosberry, & T.O.T., you will never convince me that there is a such thing as too many pickles and my dress was most certainly BLACK.

3) Unloading my suitcase of books when I got home. Each time I pulled out a book, I told St. Matt why I was excited to read it and about the author. His eyes got larger and larger and his mouth hung open. Finally he managed to croak: “Am I even going I even going to see you for the next month?” He doesn’t look too convinced by my promise that once I finished CATCHING FIRE, I’d put the rest to the side until summer.

2) Suzanne Collin’s CATCHING FIRE. It was my must-get ARC and despite my many, many moments spent worrying, I did get a copy, read it, and LOVED it. Now, when will book three be done? Who can I Book Bully into finishing it NOW so I can discuss? And do I really need to keep my promise to St. Matt and not read the rest until summer?

1) Knowing there’s another BEA next year…