Imagine, if you will ...
... ten (actually eleven) world famous authors cramped in the living room area of Dan the Man's apartment ... and you can begin to see how special TTP was on May 1. :-)
It took me just a wee bit longer than I wanted to get out of
Danville --- it was closer to 9 than it was 8:30 --- but I made
pretty good time down to Boonsboro. I didn't get lost at all! That is
always way cool!
When I stepped through the doors of TTP, recognition swept over
the faces of Dan & Ruth. They were standing @ the counter talking
with two other BB/Ns that I recognized from pictures --- Edith &
Arlene! TOO COOL! My first hug of the day came from Edith!
Within minutes, I also had the pleasure of meeting Debbie ... no
wall flower was she this time!
When I heard that TTP would be having 10 authors at this signing, I thought, Where the hell they gonna put them all! LOL! At TTP I last year, only 6 authors were signing, and it was pretty cramped then!
Like everyone else who came through the doors, I veered to the
right after receiving all of the wonderfully friendly greetings ... I
expected to see Nora & Co. there ... but all I saw were two
really cute tables & chairs! ====:-O Since no one else was there,
we immediately claimed the spaces for ourselves!
The authors were in Dan the Man's living room! They had set up two
long tables (or maybe it was 3!) so that they formed a V ... Nora was
at the left end of one of the V's ... she immediately recognized me
But there was no MK ... I didn't fret too much ... I figured that she was late. But when I went back in later on and asked Gaff about her, I found out the only bad news/downer of the day. :-( MK's sister was involved in a car accident on Wednesday night --- only thing that Gaff & Nora knew was that she possibly had a broken leg --- since MK's sister lives in CA, MK immediately flew out to be with her. I sure hope everything's okay.
<sigh>
The lengths that MK will go through to avoid being hugged by her new best friend & moi.
I kept going in & out of the signing room to gawk at all of the thousands of Nora books in TTP's collection (btw, for those of you in need of the MacKades for your collection, TTP has all but Shane's story IN STOCK! :-) ... chatting with Ruth, Dan, Edith, Arlene, & Debbie ...
I immediately whined at BW for NOT having door prizes! Hmpf! My
pouting worked! :-) He gave me this really, really cute pen that
says, "Nora loves her Australian fans" ... the end has a Roo on it!
Ruth had her wedding pictures to show us --- so we sat down to
look through them. While looking at the pictures, I heard my named
mentioned by Ruth ... she was recruiting a new BB/N at the counter!
As we neared the end, I heard a very familiar, very friendly voice! TRACEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CAROLYN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I snuck up behind Trace & captured her in a head-lock (hey! we broads need to be imaginative in our greetings! ;-) ...
Carolyn had this really cool t-shirt on about chocolate &
wanting it NOW! I think that all BB/Ns should have a shirt like that!
As I mentioned, I needed to conduct some business, so I made one of my many trips back to the "author room" to chat with the authors, give them TBID's business cards, talk about their websites, our websites, & doing signings.
Oh! And I went back time & time again to get pictures! Lots
& lots of pictures!
Because I wanted to be able to expand my reading experience (see, Wym, you've taught me well! :-) ... I knew that I'd be leaving TTP with at least one book from every author. My first stop was Nora/J.D. Robb ... hmm --- I wonder what book I bought from her!
Sitting to Nora's immediate left was Ellen Rawlings (she's a mystery writer). Since I did not know most of these authors (hey, we all gotta meet @ that first time!), I told her---as I told the others---I can only get one book ... which would you recommend ... I picked up Ellen's Deadly Harvest.
To Ellen's left was a very petite, very pretty (grrrrrrrrr)
romance writer, Robyn Amos. I knew a little bit about Robyn because I
went to her really cool website when I was researching the authors
attending TTP ... I picked up Robyn's Private Lies. This will
be my first Arabesque romance to read; I can't wait!
To Robyn's left was another very petite, very pretty (grrrrrrrrrrr
grrrrrrrrrrrr) romance writer, Ruth Langan. Ruth is one of Nora's
bestest pals --- I could tell this right away --- when I asked Ruth
to recommend one of her many titles in front of her, she exclaimed,
"You want me to choose from my one of my children?!" (or something
like that! Tracey?!) Since I have her anthology
Next up is my favorite Slut, Gaff!
Sitting to Gaff's left was everyone's favorite vampire writer,
Linda Lael Miller! I told her that the BB/Ns told me that I had to
read one of her vampire stories ... because she hemmed & hawed a
little bit, Donna Kauffman helped her out ... she picked out For
All Eternity for me.
Donna was next up. Because I've had several conversations with her
@ MK's board, I ordered her two most recent books through TBID
(before I knew I'd be attending TTP's signing). And then one of my
bestest pals, Wym (aka Nina4Books) provided me with the rest of her
backlist. So I did not have any books to purchase from Donna. But I
have a whole bunch to read.
Sitting next to Donna was probably the quietest author of the
bunch, Candice Poarch. OH MY! I just read the back blurb of Candice's
book that she picked out for me
Next up was Rebecca York, who I mistakenly thought did Nora's webpage! Oops! She writes @ 43 Light St. And since Nora's website URL is http://www.lightst.com/nora/, I thought that Rebecca had her hand in website construction! LOL --- well, it was a great segue for talking about ADWOFF! Rebecca recommended for me her Father and Child story. (it promises to be great romance/suspense)
Then it was my pleasure to meet Eileen Charbonneau & her
daughter (I didn't get her name :-( --- but not only does she do a
webpage for Eileen
Last, but not least, was ... ====:-O I left her book @ the store!!!!!!!! Oops. I mean, TBID's --- not TTP's! And my brain is too fried to remember her name w/out a prop in front of me. <sigh> BUT, I can tell you that her story had a cat on the cover --- and the cat had a crown on its head! I mistakenly thought that it was a children's book ... but she told me that it was an adult fantasy book that involved a cat! I immediately thought of Wym! (<blushing> ... BTW, the name of the author I couldn't remember is Anne Knoll. Her book is called The Secret Life of Thomas Bradford. <blushing>)
I left this book @ the store for Jaci to read because she told me
that if we liked her story, she'd be more than happy to come up to
TBID for a signing!
And thus, the all-star author line-up at TTP in little Boonsboro, Maryland. (BTW, never reread Divine Evil BEFORE you drive into Maryland! ===:-O ... )
Before I go any further (of course there is MORE! LOL), I must say kudos to BW, Ruth, Dan, & Nora! They pulled off an absolutely FABulous signing w/out any hitches. Well, any hitches that I could see! :-) And as always, they were so gracious & generous & patient with us --- especially me, this ultra-hyper BB/N around so many wonderful, talented authors.
Before I would let the authors escape, I demanded
(please, please, please allow these pictures to turn out!)
After Gaff FINALLY got out behind the table, I was able to give
her a hug. Before Nora left for a weekend of fun, fun, fun w/all of
her pals, she gave us all hugs, too.
Tracey then arranged for BW to take a group shot of the BB/Ns who attended ... It was TTP I all over again ... we ALL gave BW our cameras! LOL ...
Then, after ALL of that, we had to refuel (for me, fuel for the
first time!) ... we stole Ruth away for a half hour
Of course, I learned interesting tidbits about these broads ...
like Edith doesn't like --- oops, can't say!
Debbie left first :-( ... she wanted to beat the traffic back (can't blame her) ... before we allowed Ruth to go back to work, she showed us her apartment ... immaculate, I have you know! LOL ... The one thing that I did learn was that Bob (Ruth's new dh) IS NOT what he appears to be! In the wedding pictures that I had seen of him, he looked like this clean-cut, conservative guy. ROTF ... nooooooooooooooooooooo! His long hair was captured back in a French braid for his wedding ... we saw lots & lots of pictures with Bob w/his hair down!
Then ... the time that I hate most ... time for good-byes. Well,
Wym actually has this really cool quote about good-byes (I can't dig
it up right now) ... so it's not really good-byes. Besides, we got
more HUGS!
I had a three hour drive back to Danville. It was really pretty, so that helped. There were a couple stupid drivers, but I got over them!
Like Edith & Arlene & Trace & Carolyn, what bad-luck I
had occurred AFTER I got back to Danville. My truck acted up again
when I drove home from the store (Jaci graciously allowed me to
driver her car down to TTP). I thought I'd have to walk home.
And then, despite being ultra-tired, I wanted to get online &
let you all know about my day at TTP. AOL decided differently. I
tried for OVER two hours to sign on. I have no clue what was going on
... only that I was not a happy camper. To pass the time, I
alternately cat-napped & read from this really, really, really
COOL NEW book I picked up at TTP ... um ... Holiday in Death
Once again, I had an absolutely FABulous time @ TTP. Credit has to go to Nora, her writing pals, the wonderful TTP crew, and the truly MAGnificent BB/Ns that I never grow tired of meeting ... time & time again.
Are you still with me? Wow! Those are as many of the details as I
can remember (for now). Oh, except for this one really, really cool
thing---that I can't talk about---yet---because it's part of a
surprise for Wym.
(I can now share those details w/you since I have finally [!] sent Wym her b-day present [only a month & a half LATE! ====:-O] ... One of the books that I saw at TTP was the British version of Born in Ice ... only instead of Nora's name on the cover, it had her British pseudonym for the series, Sarah Hardesty. I immediately thought that this would be a really cool book for Wym's collection, so I asked Nora to personalize it to her. Nora started to sign it, and then she paused and said, "I don't know how I should sign this! I've never signed a Sarah Hardesty book." After we [everyone in the room] mentioned that she signs the DEATH books as J.D. Robb, she decided to sign this BORN IN book as Sarah Hardesty. So Sarah, I mean, Nora <g> started to sign the book and then paused again. She laughed and said, "How do you spell 'Hardesty'?"
So, Wym, not only did you get the British version of Born in Ice, but you also have the very first personalized edition w/the Sarah Hardesty personalization! :-)
Sue + CBDRJ
ADWOFF > NEWSLETTERS > PHOTO ALBUMS > TTP SPRING RETREAT > 1998 > Sue
