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Today's guest blogger is Mary Jane Beaufrand --- author of the YA historical fiction novel PRIMAVERA, and the newly released mystery THE RIVER, which is out in stores today. Below, she recalls a literary event made memorable for all the wrong reasons, and demonstrates how and why children's authors are often the life of a party.


My seventeen-year-old niece, Silvie, doesn’t want to go with me to the writer’s party. She’d rather stay and hang out with her friends. “You should come,” I say. “It’s a good opportunity. Sherman Alexie might be there.”

“It’s Friday night, Aunt Mare, there’s a football game. “

It is October and I’m in town for a literary conference. Town is Portland, Oregon. Or in this case, Boring, Oregon, where my sister Claudia lives with her family.

Boring. I’m serious about the name. The last literary party, for the Society for Children’s Book Writers, was the best time I’d had in years. Even the biggest literary muck-a-mucks, plied with enough Pinot Grigio, were happy to talk about this and that.

And that was what I thought Silvie and I would be in for tonight.

So I coax my niece into a sweater and skirt, the one she normally only pulls out once a year for school pictures. Silvie is a runner like the rest of the family, so she prefers to hang out in sweats, or jeans with T-shirts that say things like “In my dreams I am Kenyan.”

The party is in a funky old building in the Pearl District of Northwest Portland. The deck off the third floor, where the party is, wraps all the way around the building and has views encompassing a lot of territory. And it’s a great evening --- clear with a balmy breeze blowing. I get a Pinot Grigio for me and a sparkling water for Silvie, and we go outside to let the good times roll, baby.

But here’s the thing: they don’t.

Nobody seems interested in mixing it up with anyone else. Everyone seems reluctant to go up to strangers. More than half are so smug they’re waiting to approached. They wouldn’t stoop to talk to other writers or, God forbid, non-writers. Sherman Alexie is nowhere in sight.

Instead of offering my niece the opportunity of a lifetime, all I can do is lean against the deck railing and give her pointers about who looks like dating material and who doesn’t. “See that guy with the sunglasses hanging in the neck of his shirt? Anyone who accessorizes like that is vain. And see that guy in the pith helmet? You don’t need to date him either.”

We leave the party early and go around the corner to Powell’s Books, where I have to fork over for a pretty big stack of reading material in hopes she’ll forgive me for inflicting that smugfest on her. It’ll take more than that for me to forgive myself. What happened? How could this be?

A month later I’m invited to another literary conference, this time in Seattle. I’m a little nervous so I leave my relatives at home. Maybe that very first fun literary conference was an aberration? Maybe these things are all smugfests? And indeed, at first glance that seems to be the way this is going to go. I check in at the first stage and there are people in Birkenstocks discoursing on this or that. One woman is shaking her head, saying “You’re not listening to me,” looking as though she can’t believe she’s forced to talk to such idiots. In the next stage, a middle-aged man is speaking on a platform and he’s wearing a bomber jacket.

And then I turn the corner to the Secret Garden Children’s Stage.

There is music coming from within and people are dancing. A woman is coming out.
I walk into the room. “Oh, hey, MJ. We’re about to make a Kettle Corn run. Want anything? Water? Junior Mints?” says the woman manning the cash register. Christie, I think her name is. I’m not sure if it’s her openness, or the Junior Mints, but within five minutes, I’m at ease. I tell Christie about the smugfest I’d been through in Portland, and she rolls her eyes. “Were any of them children’s writers?” I think back and tell her no, I don’t think so. “That was your problem. Next time find the children’s writers. I’ve never met one who was too smug.”

So let’s pretend for a moment you’re my nieces and nephews. I’m not saying stay away from grown-up writers. Some of them are perfectly charming. In the meantime if I show up at your school, local library, or bookstore, I’ll try to bring chocolate. I’ll choose my accessories with care.

And I promise to leave the pith helmet at home.

-- Mary Jane Beaufrand