Mostly pictures from yesterday in this entry – busy, busy morning!!!!
Skinless
Yesterday was a very, very intense day. Wonderful, every single minute of it, but wicked intense. I feel like an apple that was peeled with a dull knife and left on the counter overnight.
It’s weird because I used to be a profoundly shy person, and then I learned how to be brave and extroverted, and now I actually love hanging out at conferences and meeting hundreds of people, but then I have moments like this when I feel shy again. Balance, I guess, is the key.
The highlight of yesterday was booksignings, an hour at Anderson’s Bookstores booth, and then an hour at the PermaBound booth, where the line stretched forfreakingever.
I was thrilled when Ms. J. from Hawaii showed up! I met her on my MySpace page when she wrote asking some questions her students had about the symbolism in SPEAK. Her MySpace photo has her sticking her tongue out, so it seemed appropriate.
TWISTED reviews from real live readers (as opposed to the dead, stuffed kind)
The Galley Group (a teen book club in Allegan, Michigan) read TWISTED and wrote reviews that I would like to paper the entire inside of my house with. You might enjoy reading them, too.
You can also see the real, live author interviewed about the book. (Be patient. The clip might take a minute to load.)
I am writing. The Creature With Fangs is guarding me.
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
My adventure
Yep. BH and I spent a long weekend at the 2007 World Fantasy Convention in Saratoga Springs, NY.
“But Laurie,” you say. “You don’t write fantasy. You don’t write science fiction. You write contemporary YA and dabble in historical fiction. What on earth were you doing there?”
For years, whenever teen audiences would ask what I read when I was in high school, I’d blush and confess that I wouldn’t touch realistic stories back then with a ten-foot pole. I would only read sci-fi and fantasy. I don’t know that I will ever write in those genres, but I love them, and I adore many of the practitioners of the art. So I decided to treat myself and attend a conference as a fan instead of a speaker, to sit in the audience, to be nameless and faceless and perfectly content.
It was a blast. We saw Sharyn November (
Plus I got to fangrrl over a few heroes, like Tamora Pierce (who gave a wonderful reading)
and Garth Nix.
We loved the city of Saratoga Springs. We ate (and drank) a lot at Saratoga Coffee Traders, chatted up Dale the Cheese/Meat Guy at Putnam Market, and barely escaped spending every last dime on yarn at Saratoga Needle Arts.
We stayed at a terrific B&B, The Mansion, outside of town.
They serve a killer breakfast there.
This lady stared at us while we slept. That was a little creepy, I admit.
We also took several trips out to the Saratoga National Battlefield. On Saturday we snuck in a run through a good portion of it. This is the view looking southeast from Bemis Heights. Definitely need to go back.
Before heading home, we wandered north into the Adirondacks to visit the graves of my grandparents and this, their last home. Shed some good tears, held them in my heart, and was very, very filled with happy memories.
Then I introduced my husband to Oscar’s Smokehouse, close to Grandpa’s. We stocked up on nitrate-laden fatty animal products and headed home.
For those who have heard one of my recent speeches, this was a weekend of well-filling. Will anything I saw or experienced turn up in a story? I dunno. That wasn’t the point. The point was to stretch myself, to do something new, to laugh and eat and have fun.
Mission accomplished. My muse is fat and happy and the well is filled to the brim.
Thanks, Parkrose and friends!
Now that was fun!
I am officially on a hiatus from school visits so I can write all these books that are crowding my brain. This hiatus officially went into effect this autumn, and will very likely extend to the 2010-2011 school year. This is a Good Thing. I need more quiet time at home, I want to write more than I speak.
But I miss seeing kids.
That’s why this morning was so much fun. The Multnomah County Library system always sends its visiting author to Parkrose High School to speak to an audience assembled of students from ten different area schools. So even though I am still officially on hiatus, I got to go to school today.
It was a big crowd.
A very big crowd, filled with great kids who had read my books and showed me all kinds of respect and friendship. Thank you, everyone!
This is a leftover picture from last night when I met Linda Schlechter. She is a community member who found out that there were kids at Parkrose who didn’t have the resources to go to the prom. Instead of shaking her head or muttering, she did something useful. Linda started The Gateway Prom Project to raise money for the kids who couldn’t afford their one special night. Last year, her organization sent 21 kids to the prom. We are holding a frame that is filled with pictures of the beautiful men and women at prom.
We saw this on the way back to my hotel; a church with the word “Fever” spraypainted up near the roofline. How would you caption this?
I’m going to sleep early and am going to wake up earlier in an effort to shift back to east coast time. Tomorrow is another airport/airplane day, but it will end in my favorite place in the world: at home.