On Tuesday, September 17th, I learned the very sad news that Nelson DeMille passed away. He had been fighting esophageal cancer for about nine months. When I saw a note in my inbox last Tuesday night from his children, Lauren and Alex, I literally yelled “No!’ so loudly that my husband came in from the other room to see what had happened.

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For years, I have heard about Lisa Scottoline and Francesca Serritella’s Big Book Club Party and had wanted to experience it to share more about it with our readers. Last weekend, they hosted their 13th annual event. On Saturday, my son Greg and I were invited to Lisa’s 44-acre farm in Pennsylvania to attend the first day of what is a two-day celebration of book groups. One hundred groups attended each day on Saturday and Sunday, bringing somewhere between 500 and 600 people each day to Willow Farm, which is the name of Lisa’s farm.

It was everything I hoped it would be --- and more.

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Last Saturday I spent a lovely evening at the East Hampton Authors Night event at Gardiner Farm. I had been to this event last year and thoroughly enjoyed it, so I was looking forward to seeing author friends and watching readers buying books and conversing with authors.

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A dozen great books were part of my vacation reading --- what a way to spend time away! Ah the places books can take you when you float in the pool. 

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Kathy Jund, one of our readers in Southern California met up with Carol Fitzgerald at the Romance Writers of America Literacy signing at the Anaheim Convention Center last Wednesday. Here is her report on that event, as well as her commentary on some of the other romance-themed events she attended surrounding the conference.

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One of the highlights of the Romance Writers of America “RWA” conference for me is the "Readers for Life" Literacy Autographing where last night more than 400 authors signed books, the proceeds of which will fund literacy charities. The authors sit at cloth-covered tables theatre style with copies of their books that have been donated by their publishers with pens poised, ready to sign --- and often with goodies like bookmarks, upcoming chapters, pens and candy to share. Readers make their way from aisle to aisle to meet favorite authors and explore new ones; all proceeds of the evening this year will be donated to ProLiteracy Worldwide, Read Orange County, and Literacy Volunteers—Huntington Valley. Since 1990, RWA has raised $716,000 to fight illiteracy.  

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The weather got gloriously better towards the end of our trip and thus my reading moved from the couch to lounge chairs on the patio and even poolside!

I have been looking forward to HEADING OUT TO WONDERFUL by Robert Goolrick (June 12th) for months now. As many of you recall I was just crazy about A RELIABLE WIFE, which was a Bookreporter.com Bets On selection. There are many parallels between the two books including the lonely characters who have lots churning inside.

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Spring Break for me is about reading. It’s a chance to do some catching up and some reading ahead. And I did a little of each this trip while also realizing there are some classics that I clearly missed that I need to explore.

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