I decided–perhaps foolishly–to join in Maureen Johnson's Blog Every Day in April*. Ye olde Shaken & Stirred has been a bit cobweb-encrusted lately, and I've managed to slay the major cluster of attacking deadlines, so it seemed like a good time to be wooed away from the tiny noncommittal updates of twitter and back here a bit more often. I actually intend to do more Real Posts this month, as opposed to link round-ups.
That said, we've had a willy nilly kind of weekend and I can't think of a good topic I could manage to be enlightening–over even cogent–on. (I suppose if there is something you'd like me to post about or a question you have, you could leave it in the comments or send it via e-mail and I'll give it a shot sometime this month.) SO I'll just natter about the weekend, thus meeting the commitment but with minimal thinking required. Everyone wins.
Friday evening we drove up to Cincinnati, because the outrageously fabulous Cassie Clare was coming through on her City of Glass reading and signing tour (with Lisa McMann) and we don't get to see her that often. After her throngs of fans (see phone-grabbed photo below that does not begin to capture how many teens were in attendance) cleared out, we got to grab some Chinese food and have some quality time.
Highlights of the evening included: random very nice fan who asked if I was Holly Black (ha!); buying books (including Rita Williams-Garcia's Jumped, which I am so very excited about after hearing her read excerpts from it during my grad school residencies, and Shaun Tan's Tales from Outer Suburbia, which is GORGEOUS); explaining why there was such a crowd to the asocial freak at the bar (not really a highlight); and cheering the world domination of the Mortal Instruments series. But mostly it was just really nice to see Cassie.
Saturday we drove out to the farmlands and today we gamed and now big bad thunderstorms are swinging through. Busy busy, as I said, but not in a bad way. Oh, and I finished rereading Graceling. Such a great book. Happy sigh.
*Apparently those days at the beginning I didn't manage it don't count, because I hadn't signed up yet. I love an event with amnesty.
Drat, I just finished my own “Blog Every Day in March.” Not because I am a famous author with adoring fans who want to read my blog, but just to see if I could. And it seemed like a great, excessive way to celebrate Reading Month. Unfortunately, I ended two posts short. It’s a great exercise, though, and I wish you luck.
You might be interested in one post that contained a list called “Books teenagers should read instead of Twilight.”
Go to: http://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/books and scroll down to March 31.