Category: Book Events

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of attending the annual YA Lit Conference at Anderson’s Bookshop with my mom. We look forward to this event every year! It’s technically geared toward teachers and librarians but book enthusiasts are welcome as well.  🙂 I thought I’d give you a little rundown of the featured speakers. Enjoy! Mark Oshiro He gave his speech in numbers: At 8, he read IT by Stephen King(!!) and fell in love with stories. At 13, he saw himself in the character of Rickie in My So Called Life—a gay brown boy, which he’s never seen outside of himself. At 14, he was touched by The House on Mango Street In 2017, only 7% of children’s books were written by Black, Latinx, and Native authors combined 43 – The number of times his first manuscript (not Anger is a Gift) was turned down. Many agents told him it… Read more »

This past Sunday, my mom and I got to attend the Children’s Literature Breakfast hosted by Anderson’s Bookshop. This is the first time I’ve gone to this event, and I was excited to see what it was all about! KEYNOTES: Peter H. Reynolds – Peter introduced us to his newest children’s book The Word Collector, which is all sorts of adorable and inspired by the fact that he’s been keeping lists of words that he loves in journals for many years. Lena Roy & Charlotte Jones Voiklas – These two shared excerpts from their biography of their grandmother, Madeleine L’Engle (Becoming Madeleine) and also shared some sweet stories of growing up with her. One thing that was interesting to hear was how L’Engle’s voice in her childhood journals matched with the woman they knew (much later in life, obviously). L’Engle had a strong personality and a dream for her writing… Read more »

I had a chance to go to an author event at Anderson’s Bookshop last night with my mom (in celebration of her birthday), so I thought I’d share a quick recap. I’m doing it in bullet-point format to make it easier! Adam Silvera just plain makes me happy. I don’t think I’ve ever gone to an event that featured him and not fallen a little more in love with the guy. You know, in an authorly sense—not weird, I promise. Adam Silvera + Lauren Oliver is even better! These two are both just incredibly fun and interesting and listening to them chat together is like listening in on two old friends who you just know adore each other. They both talked about the struggles of writing and how often the last thing they want to do each day is sit down to write their current book. Not because they don’t love writing, but because it’s hard…. Read more »

Last weekend was ALA Annual, and what a whirlwind it was! This was my first experience with ALA, so I had no idea what to expect. My blogger friends who have been to BEA, ALA Midwinter and ALA Annual told me that ALA Annual is somewhere in between the other two: unlike Midwinter, there are lots of author signings, which makes for lines and a bit of craziness—but it’s still not nearly as hectic or crowded as BEA. I found myself feeling relatively laid-back about the conference because there were only a handful of books that I felt like I absolutely had to have (and I got them). My mom was with me too (as she always is at pretty much every book event I go to), which meant that I could occasionally be in two places at once. (Thanks, Mom—you’re the best!) I still wasn’t good about going to the panels and such… Read more »