I went to a busy birthday party last night and found myself surrounded by the book people. Or in other words friends I know from one or another book related events who sorta knew each other in passing. We gathered at a couple of tables, talked about our lives and then the conversation turned to authors and books we’re reading. Not every one present read the same genre but we all did share one thing: we love to read. Most of us mourned the lack of time we have to read because there is some much out there we feel we’re missing, but we all had something to contribute.
So what did we talk about? We talked about the upcoming FenCon next weekend. FenCon is a speculative fiction literary conference in Addison. They have guest authors, artists and musicians along with writing instructors, gather for a weekend of learning and fun. I go for the fun part, others go to hone their writing skills and others go for costuming or the musical performances. A group of us will get rooms in the hotel even though it’s local and spend a weekend of intensive fun — being away from our jobs and families and indulging in literary stuff and being with friends, new and old.
But not everyone was going or cared about FenCon so the conversation also covered what we’re reading now. And I’m so excited because my find of the summer, Zoë Archer‘s books are finally available for sale and others have read them so we can talk about WARRIOR, the first in the series. Unfortunately for me, the others just heard the buzz about the series but no one had finished the book. Sigh, Okay, so it just came out this week and apparently holidays can mean less reading because of family time but still, ya’d think they could have read something! Just saying! Then we talked about other rabid fan moments. Rosemary Clement-Moore [PROM DATES FROM HELL] talked about her fangrrl moment this summer when she was the table companion of Meg Cabot. It’s funny how we all have our moments with our personal celebrities and go all shy or outgoing when we met someone we’ve put high up on a pedestal. It can be embarrassing to remember how we forgot our name, shouted in the person’s face or come up with the terribly witty tidbits bits we could have used. Ah, well, it’s comforting to know most of us share the feeling.
And we even had the ubiquitous reader tech conversation. Sorry guys but since my reading for pleasure is usually in paper format, I get impatient with the e-reader tech wars, the gloating over which e-reader broke this week, the agonies of the software upgrade, the how do you use this function, the did you know you could…on another. See, I’m honest. I know I’ll have a personal e-reader because it is convenient to have works at my fingertips but to be serious, I still love my books. And I’m fortunate to have access to most of the latest gadgets so I can try if I want. But I still also have my collections of books that not only bring me hours of pleasure but also the memories that pop up when I see the book cover so I remember when and where I read it. I’m just not sure I’d get the same thing from a device. After all, I don’t get too many warm and fuzzies from seeing my laptop.
Anyway, it’s the weekend, and we’re having a BIG tea today — French no less — and I promised to bring some books so I’ve got to go see what I’m willing to part with for the book trade What are you doing this weekend?
Until next time…Get out there and READ a book…
Sara Reyes
DFW Tea Readers Group
Join us at Readers ‘n ‘ritas November 12-14, 2010! with Sherrilyn Kenyon and more guests
See you on the Twitter (@FreshFiction)
PS: Tell me what your worst or best fan moment was and what you’re up to this week and be entered to win this weekend’s Fresh Fiction contest. Everyone LOVES free books!
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