Dear Author: Romance Book Reviews, Author Interviews, and Commentary

Sarah from SB, Kassia K from Booksquare, Marcella White Campbell, aspiring romance author, and I were interviewed by The Today Show. The show will air on Friday 8:00 EST. Also interviewed were Nora Roberts and Beverly Jenkins.

That’s all my fingers can type right now.

Got up early this am for real work stuff and then left to have some breakfast. Saw early birds Alyssa Day and Caridad Ferret who graciously invited me to joins them. We had buffet if you wanted to know. I had fruit and three pieces of bacon. I figure it all balances out.

Day and I exchanged some lawyer war stories and Ferrer suffered our chatter.

I’m now standing in line for Registration which has an inordinately long line for the H-Mcs. Should have chosen a different last name.

The bathrooms at the DFW are disgusting. I felt like needed to shower after exiting.

And of course my flight is delayed for no apparent reason other than the mechanic ran off with the log book. So I am running an hour late. At least. I wouldn’t really mind but that I am rooming with some people who were kind enough to take me in tonight because the hotel had no room and I don’t want them to be kept up all hours waiting for me. That and I have a telephone hearing I have to take at 6:30 in the morning and would like some sleep.

Oh the front door is closed. We may be leaving.

We finally did leave. I watched three episodes of Dexter. Holy creepy batman. Definitely not a show to watch during meals.

I read half of the Jaz Parks book too. It is interesting but kind of confusing. There are scenes which contain several people but for much ofthe passage it is like they aren’t even there and then toward the end, they talk or take action which has me paging backwards wondering what I missed.

Am on the Bart now.

…

Read 1 chapter of Bitten to Death. Am slightly confused but am enjoying Jaz’s bloodthirsty behavior (not literally since she is not the vamp). But then felt queasy and decided to watch the season premiere of Dexter. Watched half. Still feeling queasy. Tried yo eat somr trail mix and drink half my $1.99 pint of water. Dammit. Why didn’t I bring dramamine. Must stop for drugs at connecting flight.

Touched down. Smooth flight. Only 10 min delayed. Missed connecting flight information. Have 3g capability for the iPhone. Holy crap that is so much faster than Edge (not that most of you care).

I took a nap on the flight after trying to read and watch a shoe and feel quite good right now. Do I stop for
Dramamine or not? Can’t decide.

My in flight reading material.

1 quart bag of toiletries per traveler? Just 1. Gah. How supremely frustrating. I’m determined to carry on and not check. I hate airline travel. Why ate we the only industrialized nation without high speed rail?

Bloggers aren’t the only ones recounting their adventures in San Francisco. Authors do it (and have done it before bloggers even began attending). Jude keeps track of everyone at Blogging Nationals where you can find the most up to date information about RWA San Francisco such as Louisa Edwards pre-conference horror story of the hotel running out of power. Bring a flashlight, kids, and possibly an extra battery for the laptop.

Kristen Painter and others are keeping track of what the YA authors are doing. Fictionistas will be doing a series of interviews with the YA Rita finalists (both the Young Adult category and the YA books in the Best First Book category) during the week of Nationals.

Come check out what Melissa Marr, Maureen Johnson, Simone Elkeles, Kelly Parra, and Rosemary Clement-Moore have to say. And as an added bonus, if you post a comment during that week, you’ll be entered to win a totebag full of YA books from the conference! It’s that simple. The more times you post, the more times you’re entered to win, so check out each day’s interview.

Interviews will be posted from July 28-Aug 2 at www.fictionistas.blogspot.com.

And …

another test - pay not attention.

Last year I kind of did a live blog from RWA using Twitter. This inserted hundreds of 2 sentence blog entries onto DA. It annoyed some people. So in preparation for this year, I’d like to hear what readers would want in terms of liveblogging the event.

I didn’t go to many seminars last year, instead I went to signings. I am thinking of foregoing the signings this year to attend some seminars. If I did attend seminars, what ones are you interested in hearing about?

I heard some people were irritated by the name dropping, i.e., I’m standing next to Judith McNaught or stuff like that. Is that beyond boring?

So, please let me know what you would like to see in terms of content and accessibility of the liveblogging of the 2008 RWA Event. Thanks guys. Don’t be afraid to be critical!

The Board approved the following 2008 Award Recipients:

RWA Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award – Vicki Lewis Thompson (this used to be the Lifetime Achievement Award but was renamed to the Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award)

RWA Emma Merritt Service Award – Linda Winstead Jones

RWA Service Award – Jill Limber, Nicole Burnham

RWA Vivian Stephens Industry Award – Sue Grimshaw, Romance Buyer, Borders Group Inc.

RWA Steffie Walker Bookseller of the Year Award – Dianne Defonce, Borders, Fairfield, Connecticut

RWA Librarian of the Year – Susan Gibberman, Schaumburg Township District Library, Schaumburg, IL

RWA Veritas Award — no nominations submitted.

The RWA Grant recipient for 2008-2009 is Sarah S. G. Frantz, Assistant Professor of Literature, Fayetteville State University (Woot! Dr. Sarah. We can’t wait to read your papers that come out of this grant).