Recap of lunch with Charlaine Harris

My birthday was last week, and my BFF took me to lunch with Charlaine Harris to celebrate! Just the three of us....and about 200 other people, lol :) Murder by the Book in Houston puts on a great event - the lunch was at the Briar Club and it was wonderful.

She did a Q&A session before she signed books. Yes, I'm a nerd and took notes, right there at the table. She was very funny and self-deprecating. She laughed a lot and took compliments from the audience very graciously.

• The original title for Dead Until Dark was Southern Fried Vampires but her publisher didn't like it. She says it took her two years to sell it - the only other UF at that time was Laurell K Hamilton, and publishers didn't know where to put these kinds of books. She'd been writing her mysteries (Lily Bard, I think she said) and said she decided to write a new series: She'd take her 10 Lily Bard readers with her, throw in some mystery to grab that audience, throw in some blood/gore to grab that audience, and throw in some sex to grab the rest!She's surprised that people are so wrapped up in Sookie's love life, she says the romance is not the main theme for her.

• After Dead Reckoning there are only two more books left. She's had the key scene in the last book written for 10 years.

• Sometimes real people do inspire her characters.

• Her favorite Sookie book to write? All Together Dead - She loved writing about the trip and the hotel.

• Her favorite (any) book to write? Ice Cold Grave from her Harper Connelly Series; she says she's done with this series. She doesn't believe in extending a series beyond where it should go.

• I asked (okay, I made my BFF ask) if there were any characters she regretted killing off - she said Claudine. She was in a "clear the decks" mood and killed off a lot of characters in that book - she still feels bad she killed off two pregnant women in one book. States the murders seemed like a good idea at the time :)

• Someone asked who Niall was talking about when he said "he's a good man" - Ms. Harris states she won't tell us (probably not, anyway), she likes to make her readers do some of the work.

• She loves her covers - states "It's not a chick in black leather with a gun or knife" Lisa Desimini is the artist.

• Where did she get the name Sookie? She says it's an old Southern name - her grandmother's best friend was named Sookie. (So is my cat, lol)

• Was she invited to Stephen Moyer and Anna Paquin's wedding? No (she playfully acted indignant)

• She loves writing Pam - she's fun and sarcastic. States Kristen Bauer does a great job even if she does get the accent wrong - she's supposed to have a British accent, not a Southern accent. She says the actress looks like Pam and the character and writing are consistent.

What's coming up next? She's got an anthology coming out in August: Home Improvement, Undead Edition, with Patricia Briggs, James Grady, Heather Graham, Melissa Marr, and others:

She's also got The Sookie Stackhouse Companion coming out August 30. There's an original novella, interviews with Ms. Harris, Alan Ball, character interviews, a timeline, recipes, and a secret Eric/Bill conversation (<--I'm guessing that has a lot of hissing and "Sookeh is mine" in it, lol).



All in all it was a fabulous lunch - our table mates were super nice and I met another blogger who will be in NOLA for the ALA conference in August. We also sat next to the cutest couple - both in their 70s, I would guess, who were absolutely adorable. They didn't stay for the book signing, they just wanted to see Ms. Harris and hear her speak. BFF and I both said later we hoped our marriages would be like that when we were their age (awwww!!!).

Thank you BFF Hannah for the tickets and going with me; Thank you Hubs (for sending me off for a fun birthday weekend and bankrolling the crazy), and Thank you to my son and mother who watched my two Littlest Book Addicts so that I could go to Houston and have a wonderful grown-up (relatively speaking) weekend!

Family Funnies...

I don't usually do personal family-type posts here, but I posted this on my "family blog" and since I've got a few book-related things here I thought I'd share the whole kaboodle:


My 4-year-old grabbed my hand the other night and says, "Mommy, come see, come see!!" and shows me this:

Me: Oh how cute! It's a king cake!!
Molly: *looks at me like she's saddened by my lack of intelligence and blows out a sigh*
No, Mommy. It's a paper plate, and we cut it out and put paint and glitter and glued a crown on it.

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Last night we went out to dinner, and on the way home, my 10-year-old was telling us about a vampire book she's reading. Somehow the conversation got side-tracked, because the next thing I know, she's asking, "Vampires can't be gay, can they?" To which hubs answers, "Of course they can, read one of your mother's books. Oh wait, don't."

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This is why I love springtime:

I took this picture standing in my back doorway. By the end of this week that bush will be a huge pink puff of color. Love it!!! (Yes, we have a "cajun chandelier" hanging at the top of that picture - we are high-klass. Hubs and the girls made azalea necklaces this morning.

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I'm thinking about taking the kids to Houston my birthday weekend so I can go see Charlaine Harris. I went out there over Mardi Gras to see Patricia Briggs/Kim Harrison and had a great time with my brother and his wife (my BFF). I'd make it a 3 or 4 day weekend I think (surprise brother and BFF, lol), since we're not doing a "real" vacation this year. Of course, I still want to visit for our traditional 4th of July weekend visit too ;)

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I'm super-excited about the "super moon" tonight. I love all things celestial and I've already been outside twice to look :)

Hope you're having a great weekend!

Meeting Sherrilyn Kenyon (ummm, actually twice!)

So, Friday my parents took my two youngest chidren with them to Houston for a 4-day weekend and left hubs and I with only the teenager to deal with. First on my list of kid-free things to do this weekend: Attend the Sherrilyn Kenyon book signing at the Barnes and Noble across town! As depicted by Ms. Kenyon in the picture below, the event had highs and lows (don't worry, it was mostly highs!):

The signing started at 6pm, and I got there right at 6, so all the chairs (they had maybe 40 or so chairs?) were taken. The set up was in a side "wing" of the store, but it was very cramped and anyone not in a chair had to line up between the rows of bookshelves. Of course, once she started talking, I said "screw it" and got out of line so I could see/hear her. She's a great storyteller (I guess that's a given since she's a writer, LOL) but I couldn't hear much due to the SexAndTheCity wannabees next to me who would not Shut The F Up. Problem was, it was so cramped there was really no where else I could move.

Ms. Kenyon actively encouraged questions, and there were a lot of questions about future HEAs for various characters but I couldn't really hear the answers. I did ask why she chose New Orleans as the setting for her Dark Hunter books. Her answer: It's just such a great city - full of life and mystery and that certain "feel" you don't get anywhere else. She said she loves this city. (Did I mention I (heart) her?)

She also said as far as YA content, Nick's series would age as Nick ages and eventually lead up to and intersect with the Dark Hunter books. Again, she said some other stuff about this series as well as her other series but I couldn't hear her answers.

She brought along one of her writing partners, Diana Love. This lady was a bundle of energy - she was energetic and very supportive of Sherrilyn. It was very obvious they have a lot of fun together. She spent the whole time cracking jokes and throwing T-shirts. I've never seen so many t-shirts at an author event, and she was funny and got everyone involved, which made the time pass quickly (I didn't get out of there until 9pm). See the t-shirt Sherrilyn is wearing below? Yup, I won one! Ms. Love was super nice about making sure the winners got shirts that fit, which was pretty awesome.

So, here's what happened: I finally got through the line - it would've been fine if not for the incredibly annoying (and rude) ladies in front of me in line (yes, the SexAndTheCity wannabees). OMG - I thought about giving myself death by papercut but was afraid Ms. Kenyon wouldn't sign a bloody book. (Really, ladies, no one gives a shit how many pages a day you can read. It's not a contest.) Anyway, by the time I got up to Ms. Kenyon, I was so nervous. She was very sweet and signed my books and we chatted a minute but damned if I remember any of it. I got to my car and realized I had been holding a book and forgot to get it signed, AND I forgot to get a picture! So, I went back in and got back in line (there were only about 15 people left) and saw her again. She was so sweet and gave each person her full attention and got up for pictures and hugged everyone; very down-to-earth.

(My camera was acting up so I'm trying to smile while simultaneously figure out whether or not a picture was actually being taken)

Keep your eyes open around here in the next week or two - my 1 year blogiversary is coming up and it's possible that I have a signed copy of Infinity to give away!

Meeting Maggie Stiefvater, Carrie Ryan, and Jackson Pearce

I was playing around on twitter a few weeks ago, and stumbled across a tweet that Maggie Stiefvater was coming to New Orleans. I was thrilled - I haven't read her books yet but Shiver is definitely on my TBR, so the chance to meet her had me all excited. Little did I know she was bringing some friends:

(left to right: Jackson Pearce, Maggie Stiefvater, and Carrie Ryan)

Excuse my bad camera skillz, they were so entertaining I kept forgetting to take pictures! They each told funny stories about being an author and answered some of the most common questions they get. I really enjoyed seeing them interact with each other - as I watched and listened, I thought to myself "This is a perfect example of how women should treat each other - they're incredibly supportive and genuinely like each other."

Maggie talked about how she used to hate the question, "what made you decide to write this book?", until she met an author she admired, Melina Marchetta, who wrote Saving Francesca. She was thrilled to be speaking with Ms. Marchetta, and asked, "What made you decide to write this book?" and had an "ah-ha" momet. (I had to chuckle, because as she was speaking, it popped into my head that I thought this was the book that Danielle at Alpha Reader had gushed about this book several months ago; then Maggie mentioned Melina was Australian, at which point I thought "Bingo!")

Carrie Ryan was sooo nice, she actually approached us while we were looking at the books for sale, trying to decide if The Dead Tossed Waves was a follow-up to The Forest of Hands and Teeth or a separate book. She told a very entertaining story about how she ended up writing about Zombies, and talked about her upcoming short story in Zombies vs.Unicorns, which looks like it's got some great authors on board! And she wrote a really nice dedication to my son (and his bum leg) when she signed his books for me.

Jackson Pearce is a new-to-me author, she wrote As You Wish, a book about genies. She also talked about working with editors and when asked what book she wished she'd written, her answer was "Harry Potter", of course everyone laughed!

Now, I haven't read Shiver yet, but apparently one of the characters writes notes to himself on his hand? Look closely at the picture below:


It was hard to get a good picture where you could see there was something there, but apparently that is a story idea that will (hopefully) be going into Forever, the third book in The Wolves of Mercy Falls series. The whole time she talked, she moved her hands around, behind her, one hand over the other, and I couldn't help wondering how many ideas she'd accidentally wiped off, until she mentioned it's on there in Sharpie ink.

AND, while I was there I got to meet one of my fellow New Orleans- area bloggers: Parajunkee!
I have to tell you, Rachel has some crazy good marketing skills - she had absolutely adorable bookmarks and business cards that she gave to the authors. Why didn't I think of that?!? She told me that this was her first signing; I've gone to a few so apparently I'm on the slow end of the learning curve. Rachel put up a few good pics and some more info in her post here.

(Me and Parajunkee with our loot!)

I really hope this is the start of more authors coming to New Orleans. The gathering for this group was intimate (read: small) but there really wasn't any promo - as I said at the beginning of the post I found out by accident!

Author Appearance

For anyone in the New Orleans area, Maggie Stiefvater will be at Octavia Books on Saturday, April 17!!! Info here.

Anyone thinking of going? My son is having knee surgery a few days before this but I think I'm going to try my hardest to go.

*does the happy dance* Yay!!!

It's going to be a Happy Halloween!

Charlaine Harris is coming to New Orleans for a book signing!!!! (She's also coming for the Tru Blood and Gold Ball the night before but I don't see myself going to that.) I was thinking about going to VooDoo with my husband but no, I'm going to see Charlaine! Yayyyyyyyy!!!!!

*Diligently working on lining up a babysitter........*