National Book Festival

Welcome to DC! Home of the Library of Congress's National Book Festival!

I had some issues getting out of bed, so Dan tried to drive me into town, but a lot of it was shut down. So, he dropped me off and I trotted off, catching some of the sights along the way.

Finally! The Festival!

With the Capital!

Mrs. Frizzle was there, along with her Magic School Bus.

I wanted to go inside, but the line was looooooooooooooong.

Arthur was there, along with The Berenstain Bears and other PBS characters.

And of course, I got to hang out with the fantastic Sara Lewis Holmes, author of Letters from Rapunzel

Gail Carson Levine read from her new book Fairy Haven and the Quest for the Wand. It's obvious she's used to talking to school groups and it was crowded event.

Then I ran over to see Nancy Pearl.


Funny lady!

Holly Black gave a fascinating talk about urban fantasy and urban legends and folklore. Even though she read from Ironside: A Modern Faery's Tale (sequel to Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale) most of the questions were about The Spiderwick Chronicles.

Gene Yuen Lang (of the most awesome American Born Chinese gave a great talk about comics and why you shouldn't get into them. (He had 3 reasons why, but I can only remember 2-- you'll slowly starve to death and it's not sexy. I think the third was the fact they take forever to draw and write.) His kids are super-cute and his talk was great.

Patricia McCormick talked about her research for and the writing process involved in her book Sold which I haven't read yet, but now I absolutely must.

Then, to wrap of the day, M. T. Andersen gave a great talk about the American Revolution, inspiration (including some great stories about what his experiences working at McDonalds that went into Burger Wuss), and getting into the eighteenth century voice. (Oh, and because I was wondering, I asked, and the next Octavian Nothing comes out NEXT fall.

All in all a great day! Also, if you've made it this far with me, Cybils nominations are open, so get over there already! And the song of the day is Polaris and Waiting For October...