Blog
When readers left off with my August 24th Bookreporter.com newsletter I was all over my plan to have four suitcases for this trip. 1. Clothes 2. Books. 3. Knitting 4. Overnight bag for the hotel. I figured this system would compartmentalize my interests and assure me that I never would be asked again to have my "big suitcase" ready first. Well, I did pack the four bags and felt like Audrey Hepburn albeit in turquoise not black as I stood outside the car poised with my bags.
This week I feel like I have a third son whose name is Harry Potter. Around our house, around the office and well, just about everywhere you look, it's all about Harry. While the news was this week was all about leaks and early shipments, I wish the focus was where it should be --- on the fact that millions of people will be spending this weekend doing what my husband has titled, "Harrybernating," reading Harry Potter.
On thelast weekend of my vacation I read Jodi Picoult's book, NINETEEN MINUTES. I always like Jodi's writing and thus I was looking forward to seeing how she handled her subject matter about a shooting at a fictitious high school in New Hampshire.
I never seem to get fully away on vacations. Instead I usually just move work locations and reply to email a lot more slowly while getting more reading/knitting/relaxing in than usual. It's why I love going down to the Outer Banks. The beach is a short bike ride away, the deck is steps from the door and I can work for a couple of hours a day in a more relaxing setting. I love my work and thus really never feel a need to totally disconnect from it though pulling back is just heavenly. And having time to read without interruption is a total pleasure.
The Virginia Festival of the Book gets better and better every year. I just love it. This was my sixth year of attending this event and each time my trip gets longer and longer as I want to spend more time there. This year I arrived on Thursday in time to have dinner with some friends at one of the terrific restaurants on the Downtown Mall. Cuisine is an art form in Charlottesville, which always surprises me for some reason. There's great food at amazingly affordable prices at least by New York standards.
One of the nice things about attending book festivals is that I get to see parts of the country that I might otherwise not venture to. My trip two weeks ago to Columbia, South Carolina for the South Carolina Book Festival was an illustration of that. The event was held downtown at the convention center just a few blocks from the state capitol, the building that you may remember got a ton of press in recent years as it still flies the Confederate flag though these days it's positioned in front instead of atop the dome.
On Monday, Martin Luther King Day, I logged onto Google and saw an illustration on their home page that had five children playing jump rope. Looking closely at the drawing I saw that they obviously were from different races and the spirit was one of comraderie. I smiled seeing this drawing as I have found it to be matching what I have been seeing evolve in this country --- children do not see race the way previous generations do.
I have friends who cannot believe my idea of a really fun weekend is to attend a book fair. A few weeks ago I was getting my hair cut and I mentioned that I was headed to Miami. Folks gathered round telling me about their favorite places in South Beach, the hottest restaurants and the best nightclubs. I told them I was not doing any of that. I was attending the Miami Book Fair. They looked at me like I was daft. I went back to going over the author lineup and planning my weekend.
It's Election Day. I am excited. This means that we can go back to inane commercials for products things instead of inane commercials and on-air screaming from candidates. I think going forward candidates should only be able to talk about what THEY are going to do, not what the other person has, or has not, done. It would save a lot of time and a lot of money.
I headed for Madison, Wisconsin for Bouchercon on Friday of last week with two hours of sleep behind me. I was up late packing, and then I had to be up at 4:30 to go to the airport. The hours in between I more napped than slept, thus I crashed most of the flight to Cleveland where I was changing planes. I have never been to Cleveland so here is my report from the airport. There is a Starbucks. There is a bagel place that does not have great bagels.
