Lately, I've been thinking about all of the authors I've been lucky enough to meet and what makes some of them truly shine out in my mind. As bloggers, we spend a lot of time getting to know our favorite authors online and I think that our interactions with them truly do impact book sells. Authors like Lisa Derochers, Ann Redisch Stampler and Jodi Meadows who are always active on Twitter absolutely remind me of their presence daily and make me recommend their books more.
However, I can follow an author's blog and all their tweets and it still doesn't compare to meeting them in person. I have picked up books I never thought I'd read because I've met the author and they were just so sweet that I HAD to support them. So I've been thinking about some of my most memorable experiences meeting authors and I wanted to share them with you.
1) Kimberly Derting (Second meeting)-I'd had the pleasure of meeting Kimberly Derting in Miami once before and found her to be incredibly engaging, funny and very sweet. I was excited when I found out she was going to be at YALLfest. She remembered me from our last meeting and as we began talking, she started signing a few books for me. She signed most correctly but I had a paperback there for a friend and she accidently signed it for me. The line was huge but she someone remembered after she'd done it that I'd asked for that one to be signed to a different person. So she made me (literally made me) run and grab a new book for her to sign. Then she signed my last book "To Amber (who screwed up my book)" which amuses me endlessly. I was already a fan of Kimberly Derting's (my friend says I have a lady crush on her) but that made me like her even more.
2) Michelle Hodkins- Also appearing at YALLfest was one of my favorite authors of 2011. I fell in love with The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer and had been chatting back and forth with Ms. Hodkins on Twitter prior to the event. She wasn't signing but I did find her hanging around and went up to introduce myself. This really isn't like me since I'm usually pretty shy but I wanted to meet her. We started talking a little ibt about how she wished other people would introduce themselves with their online monikers too since she likes talking to people but obviously can't recognize us by face. I thought this was an interesting point. I mean, I knew that authors wouldn't be able to recognize us all the time from our blogs but I always wondered if it'd be weird to introduce myself as such. It put my mind at ease.
3) Libba Bray- I really enjoy meeting every author but I have to say, I think Libba Bray made the biggest impression on me. Besides the fact that she is my "gateway author" (her books brought me to YA), she was so funny. Everytime she spoke, she had something witty to say. She captivated the audience when the authors talked to the group but what I found was even more interesting was how long her line was to sign. Not because there were millions of people there for her (though there were a lot) but because she spent a couple minutes gettng to know EVERY reader that came by. She wanted to know about you, what you are reading, where you came from, whether you were a gnome or a beauty queen. For a few minutes, you had all her attention and she was just as engaging one on one as she was with the group.
Those are a few of my favorite author experiences. I think I've been thinking about that lately since I'll be going to meet Veronica Rossi, author of Under The Never Sky, and Tahereh Mafi, author of Shatter Me, in a couple of weeks.
So I want to know, what have been some of your most memorable experiences meeting authors--online or in real life?
Yeah, Libba Bray is HYSTERICAL! And I remember being shocked by how much she talked to people in her signing line. It was really sweet.
ReplyDeleteI think one of my favorites was Simone Elkeles. She cracked me up the entire time she was presenting/talking about her books, then when I got mine signed, we had a debate about who was better - Alex or Carlos. Although we disagreed, she was super fun. :)