The weekend before the end of Spring Break, my friend Frankie and I went to the Christian Book Expo 2009 at the Dallas Convention Center in Downtown Dallas.
It was a special trip to celebrate Frankie's 16th birthday, which we had been planning since October. Both of us are avid Christian fiction readers, and we were SOOO excited to get a chance to meet some of our favorite authors!!
The first day of the Expo, which was a Friday, we did not attend because we figured that we would have plenty of time to see everything on Saturday and Sunday. On Friday night, however, we went to the Family Christian Bookstore in Frisco for a book signing by 3 of our favorite authors: Beverly Lewis, Tracie Peterson, and Terri Blackstock! We got there way ahead of time because we thought there would probably be a line out the door. Instead, there were only about 5 people in line to meet the authors. We waited until they were finished and then took our turn. I have to say that Frankie and I were pretty nervous considering the fact that we were about to meet some of our favorite people in the whole world! It turned out to be an AMAZING experience!!! We spent almost 2 hours talking with all three of them, asking questions, listening to their stories, and learning about the inspiration for the books they write. The first one we met was Beverly Lewis:
Beverly writes Amish novels based on her experiences growing up in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, in the heart of Amish country. They are very sweet, heartfelt books that give lots of insight into the lives of the Amish. They're the kind of books that just make you feel good!! Beverly is my favorite Christian fiction author to date, and both Frankie and I have read and re-read most of her series! She was so sweet and answered all of our questions. I think we were a little star struck! There was a VERY small turnout for the book signing, and all the authors were very appreciative of our love for their books and couldn't believe how big of fans we were! Beverly told us about her newest book, which came out last week. It's based on her grandmother's life in the Amish community. The next author we met was Tracie Peterson:
Tracie was SOOOO much fun!!! She was very talkative and personable and told us all kinds of stories about her experiences in researching her books. She was telling us about Alaska and the places she stayed in and the animals she saw there. Tracie writes a lot of fictional romances set in frontiers such as Alaska and Montana, to name a few. Having never heard of her before, I gave Frankie her Alaska series for Christmas and she loved it! She, in turn, gave me the audio recording of Tracie's Broadmoor Legacy series. I'm loving it so far, and it made it even better to meet her in person and learn about her inspiration for the series! The last author we met there was Terri Blackstock:
Terri Blackstock has been one of our favorites for a long time. Our friend, Grace, introduced us to her books about 3 years ago, and we have not stopped reading them since! Grace, Frankie, and I impatiently awaited the release of the third book in the Redemption series and had so much fun talking about it!! Terri writes suspense fiction with lots of drama, romance, and mystery combined. They're AWESOME books!!! She was so nice and we asked her all kinds of questions! We really enjoyed meeting her.
After all that excitement, Frankie and I had a hard time sleeping, let me tell you!!
On Saturday we got up early, packed all our stuff in the van, and set out for the Expo. There were WAY less people there than we expected, so it wasn't hard to move around the exhibit hall or find where we needed to go. Frankie and I had planned our schedule the night before, so we set off to our first destination. We went to see a Joint Publisher Fiction Showcase hosted by Liz Curtis Higgs. She asked various authors such as Terri Blackstock, T. Davis Bunn, Mindy Starns Clark, Jerry Jenkins, Beverly Lewis, Robert Liparulo, Bill Myers, and Janette Oke many questions about how they write, what they write, and to give advice about writing to aspiring authors. It was very interesting, and we got to say hi to our new "BFFs" Terri Blackstock and Beverly Lewis. They both remembered us from the night before and were glad to see us again.
Throughout the day, Frankie and I went to various workshops and panel discussions. We also walked around the exhibit hall and looked at the THOUSANDS of books! There were a few booths that gave us quite a few free books. Let's just say that we have plenty of books to last us for the rest of the year! One of the authors, Erynn Mangum, gave us a free copy of her book "Miss Match" and signed it for us. That was the first book I read when I got home, and I must say that I have never laughed so hard while reading a book in my whole life!!! It's hilarious and a definite must-read!!
That day, we met even more authors. The one I was most excited to meet was Janette Oke. She has written hundreds of Christian fiction books and is considered by the other authors to be the pioneer of Christian fiction. Her first book series was Love Comes Softly that is now a series of Christian movies. She was very sweet and Frankie's little sister, Emma, adored her!!
That same day, we met Wanda E. Brunstetter, who also writes books about the Amish. She signed my book for me and told me about the history behind my favorite of her series.
That night, we attended a worship service. The musical guests were Nicole C. Mullen, Joy Williams, and Lenny LeBlanc. It was an AWESOME concert, and the speakers were amazing!! Afterwards, we got to meet the artists. We were completely starstruck, yet again!!
A special part of Frankie's birthday celebration was getting to stay in the Fairmont hotel in Downtown Dallas!! We were so spoiled and felt like royalty!! The hotel was beautiful, but unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures. :-(
We convinced my mom to come down on Sunday for the last day of the Expo. Our moms went off together to see some of their favorite authors such as Sheila Walsh and Stormie Omartian, while Frankie, Emma, and I had Starbucks and walked around the exhibit hall. We had seen most of it the day before, so we went by to visit Beverly and Tracie again. We ran into them so much during those 2 days, that they probably thought we were stalking them!! :-) Which we were not! My mom is also a HUGE fan of Beverly Lewis, so I had the opportunity to introduce them, and of course my mom wanted a picture too!
Overall, we had SOOOO much fun and came home with more books than we knew what to do with!!
Thank you, Mrs. Reedy for taking us and making this such a special time to remember!!! And Happy Birthday, Frankie!! :-)
P.S. Don't forget to comment!
No comments:
Post a Comment