BEA Fun

This won't be a book review, it will however be almost as good. I want to talk about the Blogger and Book Expo that I attended Monday and Tuesday respectively. First I have to admit here and now that I didn't even know until this year that there was such a thing as a Book Epxo. You can imagine my delight when I was told that there was indeed one and that it was being held at the Javits Center in downtown Manhattan this year. I was so excited at the thought that I might possibly get to go to this amazing thing that I immediately jumped on the computer to see when it was, and how I could get in. As soon as I opened the page for BEA 2012 I saw that Monday June 5th there was going to be a blogger expo where people in the industry would talk about what it means to be a blogger in today's world and what book bloggers could do to stay in the game. To top in all off one of my favorite authors was going to give the keynote speech, Jennifer Weiner, I actually cheered out loud...in my head anyway.

I called my dad right away and said to him "I want to go to this, how do I get in?" He came up with a brilliant idea, why don't we ask our friend that happens to be in the publishing world to get me a badge. AH HA! Only problem? It wouldn't get me access to the blogger expo on Monday. WAAAHH! "But dad I wanna gooo!" A second brilliant idea came to us, try hitting the register button on the sight and pay the $130 to get access to the whole thing. Oh duh! That is what I did and I was assured of my place. Meanwhile the badge that our publisher friend was getting me also came through, what to do? Well again a brilliant thought occurred to me, my fellow blogger, author and good friend Sydney McEntyre was dying to go to the expo and so we changed the badge to be in her name. Awesome!

I was so excited about the blogger expo! I couldn't wait to be around my fellow bloggers, talking to them about the blogging world and of course checking out the competition! With that excitement fueling me I got up bright and early Monday morning, even though I had worked the closing shift the night before, put on my tiny hat, grabbed my brand new business cards and headed out. I got there, signed in and got my badges and headed to the opening breakfast. I sat at a table not really sure how it all worked and waited to see what awaited me. I met some fellow book bloggers and we all handed out our cards and then the fun began. Each table was arranged so that through out the hour three or four authors would sit at the tables and talk to the bloggers seated there for 15 minute intervals. We got three authors that unfortunately I haven't read but I now have their names and the titles of their books and am planning on searching for them when I get back. It was fun though just to be near them and hear what they had to say about the writing process.

Then it was time for the keynote speech and I could hardly contain my excitement knowing that the incomparable Jennifer Weiner was actually in the room with me. Her speech was fantastic! She was funny and full of wit and intelligence. She made excellent points on blogging and writing and readers. Her thoughts on all topics social media were spot on and made me happy to know that she really does enjoy hearing from and talking to her fans. It warmed my heart a bit. Also good to know that she thinks that we, bloggers of all sorts, are really and truly a part of the whole book process now. I had no idea that the book blogging community was so big until I saw the room with a large number of them in it and I didn't know how important we were to authors and books until I heard Jennifer Weiner talking about it. It gave me a sense of purpose. I felt that I was actually doing something worthwhile and that if I can get my readership up I might even be able to have an influence on what books people become excited about. On top of her many words of wisdom she was also kind enough to sign a copy of her book "Then Came You" reviewed recently right here, http://girlinthetinyhat.blogspot.com/2012/05/then-came-you-jennifer-weiner.html. And because she is just all around awesome, she took a picture with me, even though she was beyond exhausted.

After Ms. Weiner finished it was time for a panel of bloggers and people in the book world to discuss what it means to be a blogger in the world today and how to become successful. They had a woman who worked at Harper Perennial, a man that had helped start goodreads.com, a woman who was a blogger turned author and a woman who was a freelance editor and blogger. I was only able to stay for part of their discussion because I had to be at work but what I heard was great. They talked about exactly how important bloggers are becoming. Because in today's world where reading is becoming less of a hobby for people and more of a chore what to read next has become all about word of mouth. The more hype around a book, the more people ending up wanting to buy it. Bloggers have become the door to door book sales-people of our time, in a time when people spend most of their time on the Internet bloggers are becoming the go-to people for what books to read. The most used example of this was the "Fifty Shades of Grey" trilogy by E.L. James, a few months ago no one had even heard of it and now? It's so popular every third woman that walks in the Barnes & Noble I work at is looking for that book and everyone is reading it. At the very least everyone has heard of it. This is all because one blogger picked it up and liked it, wrote about it and the rest is history.

The next big question was "is it possible for book bloggers to make a living doing what they do?" Another important question that I felt was answered well. The ultimate answer is yes they can. However it's more difficult then just can I make money or not. Ethically no publisher can take a book blogger, who does book reviews, and pay them. The blogger would then be bound to do nothing but good reviews on said publisher's authors. This of course would defeat the whole idea behind being a blogger, our freedom of speech is virtually unchallenged. However, as one of the panelists proved, bloggers can go on to become authors themselves and make their fortunes from doing what they love, writing. They could start making commissions through affiliate programs that they post links to on their sites. I don't know if there is yet a way for book bloggers to make enough money to live solely off their blogs but maybe it's a thing yet to be discovered.

After that I pretty much had to leave so I snuck out the back and headed to work. I worked from 1-8:30pm, and then headed home and went right to sleep. Tuesday morning I woke up real early like again and headed to the first official day of the book expo itself. I was so excited! My fellow blogger, author and good friend, Sydney McEntyre, came and met me and we began our day. We were in overload before we even began. It was so exciting to just be there that we were giddy. The very first thing we got was a bright orange bag from CSPAN 2, booktv, and then we headed in to get the good stuff. Free bookage! We started near the booths dedicated to YA and children's literature. And we just made our way up and down aisles until we hit the opposite wall. We were there for hours and after getting and filling four more bags each we became those people that you see sitting on the floor against a wall. We met an up and coming British author and got advanced reader (from here on out these shall be referred to ARs) copies of his book, which he signed. Happiness! We proceeded to get more and more books until both of us just couldn't take it anymore.

While we were getting all this swag I was able to hand out my card to quite a few publishers, including Scholastic and Simon & Schuster, so excited about all of the contacts I made! It was so worth the back ache of carrying all those ARs and being on my feet all day. I am excited to start reading what I got and reviewing them. All the publishers I met with were friendly and receptive and a couple even said that they would start sending me review copies of their books. YAY! More free books! So very excited about that. I can assure you that reviews are going to start coming out of my ears. I hope that everyone continues to read and share them with their friends.

It's hard to fully explain just how cool being at the book expo was for me. As well as just how cool it was being at the blogger expo. All of it was 100% worth the early mornings, being on my feet for 14 hours and carrying bags full of so many books that I could bench press them. Being in a room full of people that not only work in the industry and authors but also being squished in with all of these people that love to read almost as much as I do was kind of like a high. I was giddy most of the day! It was literally two of the funnest days I have spent in New York since moving. Well actually two of the funnest days I have had period. I feel as if this was a big turning point for me and I would like to thank everyone that supported me and helped me get there. I really couldn't have done it without any of you! And be prepared, there are lots more reviews coming your way, this I promise you.