RWA Loot + Photos

Going to the RWA Literacy Autographing was amazing- but rather than just tell you let me break it down for you...

Tuesday June 28, 2011

5:55 Wake up, alert and excited for that afternoon's RWA Autographing!

5:58 Realize that actually involves getting out of bed.  No longer so happy.

6:30-7:30 Run to catch the Metro to get to Union Station to catch BoltBus to NYC...
which sounds simple except five different Union Station workers gave me different directions to BoltBus, and the bus lines to NEW YORK and NEWARK were two feet apart (really, who does that in a loud, crowded terminal?!).  Luckily, I got on the right bus just as it was ready to leave.

11:50 Arrive at Penn Station, NYC.

12:00-3:30 Shopping on Broadway!!!
While the Autographing was the purpose and highlight of the trip, I was really looking forward to spending some time walking around Times Square area.  My three favorite places I visited were:

Toys R Us

It has a Ferris Wheel inside the building!  How cool is that!  No, I didn't go on it (there was quite a line, mostly of little kids) but I thought about it. 

Each one of the passenger cars represents a different toy. There's a pink Barbie car!

The Disney Story

This place really is magic.  You can't tell from the picture, but the tree is an LED screen of some sort- the images move and change!  Whoever designed the store was a genius.  The place was fun just to walk through.

A kids area.  It has a touch screen so people can choose to watch clips of any particular Disney movie.  The Princess and the Frog was on when I went by.

The entrance to the Princess section of the store. Apparently I wasn't the only one who thought it was photo-worthy :)

The M&M Store

There is an entire store dedicated just to M&M's- key chains, magnets, plushies, and of course, the candy itself.  Huge vats of it in every single color.

One of their fun little in store gimmicks was a "mood analyzer".  Stand under the beam, and the screen tells you what kind of M&M you are.

I was Dark Pink.  I guess the scanner knew I was off to RWA!

3:30-4:50 Chill in the Marriott's Atrium Lounge

I get to the hotel two hours early, read the Marriott's events board (at the main entrance) and see the Autographing is on the sixth floor, and decide to people watch in the hotel's bar for the meantime.  While hanging around the Atrium I spotted Roxanne St. Claire and Julie James, and chatted on and off with some RWA attendees.  I really wished I could have come back after the signing, but NYC buses wait for no gal...

4:50-5:05 Essentially, I was lost and confused

Forty minutes before the Autographing was about to start, I return to the sixth floor only to be told the line starts on the first floor (because of it's huge, wrap around the block length).  Really?!  It would have been nice if they had made that clear earlier on (i.e. at the main entrance!).  But- it turns out there are some advantages to being places you aren't supposed to be...

First, I meet SB Sarah!  Fun  fact: This photo was taken by Jaci Burton, just as Jennifer Crusie checked in behind her.  Oh yea.  (Kat- this picture is for you <3 )

And... while taking the elevator back down to the first floor, I was given some free books by a volunteer from the Librarians Luncheon.  Moral of the story- always smile to people on elevators!

-The Iron King by Julie Kagwa

-The First Love Cookie Club by Lori Wilde

5:05-6:40 Wait in line

This was the not-so-fun part.  But I was in good company.  All of us loved romance novels, so there was always something to talk about.  I met both Rita from Not Another Romance Blog and Jamie from For the Love of Romance, who were quite a bit of fun to talk to. 

6:40-7:30 Collect Swag!!!

Then, finally, I was in!

Here's what I walked out of the signing with:

-Yours for the Taking by Robin Kaye
-Start Me Up by Victoria Dahl
-Something About You by Julie James
-A Lot Like Love by Julie James
-Here Comes the Groom by Karina Bliss (unfortunately unsigned, Karina Bliss couldn't make it herself)

-The Countess by Lynsay Sands
-Unveiled by Courtney Milan
-Nowhere Near Respectable by Mary Jo Putney
-The Perfect Scandal by Delilah Marvelle
-Eleven Scandals to Start to Win a Duke's Heart by Sarah McLean
-The Darkest Hunger by Juliana Stone

-Rules of Attraction by Simone Elkeles

-The Perfect Play by Jaci Burton

-The Princess in His Bed by Lila DiPasqua

I didn't take as many photos during the signing (I was crunched for time, and I didn't want to hold other people up either), but here's a couple shots I snapped:

Robin Kaye, holding up Yours for the Taking.



And Eloisa James and me!

7:45-1:05am Pay, dash out to Port Authority and take the bus home. 

A very successful day :)

New Books Cheer Me Up

I am in the midst of a really bad stomach flu, so to say the least it hasn't been the best week for me.  I'm happy to finally be going home today.  I haven't gotten much reading done (I haven't gotten much of anything done!) but some fun books came in the mail this week for me, so I thought I'd go ahead and celebrate that.

Love in the Afternoon and His at Night have been on my To-Buy list forever, and both Lisa Kleypas and Sherry Thomas are autobuy authors for me.  I've been hearing a lot of buzz about When Beauty Tamed the Beast and What I Did For a Duke, so I decided to add them to my Amazon order.  Since next week is my Spring Break hopefully I'll get to read some of them!

Facing The Week Ahead

I'm not that much of a slacker, but after charting out my upcoming semester I've come to the conclusion that the upcoming week is going to be hellish.  I have this theory that professors try to scare everyone the first week (done!) and then work everyone to death the second week (about to happen) to weed out anyone who isn't serious about the course.  Now if only I didn't have four professors doing this at the same time...

Because of the intensity of the upcoming week, I doubt I'll be able to fit in much more than one book or novella, but we'll see how things roll.  As a motivator, I ended up buying a few books I had planned on one day reading.  Sort of a buy-now/read as an "I survived the first month!" celebration.  Here's what I ordered:

Julia Quinn's When He Was Wicked and It's in His Kiss
I love the Bridgerton series.  I have On the Way to the Wedding sitting on my bookshelf, but I'm refusing to read the books out of order.  I know it doesn't really make a difference since they're stand alone novels, but I've read them in order up until now and I would hate to break the pattern.

Captive Bride by Johanna Lindsey
It's her first novel and I heard it was awful.  So I had to read it.  I've been told several times I might enjoy it for the sheer horror of it.

Her Colorado Man by Cheryl St. John
I've never read Cheryl St. John but I know a lot of people really like her.  And I really like the Harlequin Historicals line, so this seemed like a good place to start.

Finally, I redesigned the blog!  It had a "makeunder" I guess.  Since I have zero capacity for HTML/CSS, I tried to pick a blogger template I thought I could work with in the future, and I'm pretty happy with the result.

The Final Countdown

It’s that time of years again. No, not the holidays… FINALS WEEK!!! Only ten days until that hellish period marked by excessive amounts of caffeine, poor personal hygiene, and overwhelming anxiety about escaping graduating.

Whoever thought of jamming everything important into one week is an idiot. Really, colleges would be much healthier if we got rid of finals week… and fraternities… and Four Lokos. I’m still waiting for them to ban it here in Maryland. For those of you out there who don’t know what Four Lokos is, observe the horror:



I’ve been dealing with the stress pretty well *knock on wood*. I don’t have class on Fridays, and since I’ve been worried I’m getting sick I took today easier than planned. I stopped by Goodwill to check out their book selection. I was mildly disappointed- there were tons of paperbacks, but almost all of them were Danielle Steel or Harlequin Presents from the ‘90s. I think I’m just spoiled by some of the truly awesome thrift stores I’ve found back home. I did manage to find a few I wanted though.

1. The Heir- Johanna Lindsey

2. Not Another Bad Date- Rachel Gibson

3. Fast Women- Jennifer Crusie

4. Anyone But You- Jennifer Crusie

I also ended up going to Buffalo Wild Wings with one of my friends. I’m a total wings fanatic, and just last week she turned me onto their Blazin’ wings. On the menu the Blazin’ wings come with a disclaimer- “Keep away from eyes, pets, children: The hottest sauce we got.” Later I looked it up on the internet. It’s 200,000-350,000 Scoville units, which is 70 times hotter than a jalapeño pepper. And. They. Are. Amazing. Both times I thought I was going to die, but the endorphine rush is absolutely incredible. Even if you don’t like spicy wings, I would still recommend Buffalo Wild Wings. Their Sweet BBQ and Garlic Parmesan sauces are delicious without the zing.

In My Mailbox

Ok, this isn't breaking my challenge because I did buy these at the beginning of February, way before I decided to go give up book-buying for a few months. It took them so long to get here because of the blizzards. All from Half.com, all totally old-school.

This is the book that started the round of book-buying. It was on one of the Smart Bitch's Help a Bitch Out pages. It sounded interesting so I decided to look it up, and of course one thing lead to another...

I was actually really excited to find this book. I was browsing through the seller who had Night Games when I saw this cover and recognized it immediately. I've been looking for it for years- it's one of the first romances I ever read, probably around when I was 13 or 14. I found it on my grandma's bookshelf when I was visiting for a week. Pirates, amnesia, men who don't communicate- classic. I suppose I could have just called her and asked, but it just felt too awkward.

Both the category regencies are throwbacks to the beginning of my romance reading days as well. I used to buy a bunch of Harlequin Historicals at yard sales. I always like having them around for short, light reads.

Thanks everyone for your support of my no-buy challenge. It's daunting to see how many other people have tried and failed, but if I don't make it at least I'll be in good company!

New Babies

It's almost ironic that my last post was about addictions: I came home today with four new purchases from Borders. To be fair, I had a $10 off $30+ coupon and five Border's Bucks, which seemed like a deal just too good to pass up. I ended up choosing a dozen romances then staring at them all for twenty minutes trying to decide which ones I was actually going to buy. I splurged on some YA romances as well. I don't read YA too often, but as I was browsing through the shelf I realized I was in the mood for something light and fun. I'm hoping to get a review up in the next day or two, but in the meantime, here's what I got today:


Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side was something I saw on Anna's Book Blog a while ago. YA fiction seems to be drowning in vampires/werewolves/paranormal (and the never ending gossip girl) so I wouldn't have picked this one up except for already having read a review.

Summary:
The undead can really screw up your senior year ...

Marrying a vampire definitely doesn’t fit into Jessica Packwood’s senior year “get-a-life” plan. But then a bizarre (and incredibly hot) new exchange student named Lucius Vladescu shows up, claiming that Jessica is a Romanian vampire princess by birth—and he’s her long-lost fiancé. Armed with newfound confidence and a copy of Growing Up Undead: A Teen Vampire’s Guide to Dating, Health, and Emotions, Jessica makes a dramatic transition from average American teenager to glam European vampire princess. But when a devious cheerleader sets her sights on Lucius, Jess finds herself fighting to win back her wayward prince, stop a global vampire war—and save Lucius’s soul from eternal destruction.

After reading the first page or two, it seems like what Twilight would have been if it hadn't taken itself too seriously.


I read a review for this (possibly years ago) on Dear Author. It reminds me of the sort of books I read and loved as a pre-teen. I was into anything historical (and still am). It's a bit of a walk down memory lane, fuzzy feelings included.

Summary:
After the Russian revolution turns her world topsy-turvy, Anna, a young Russian countess, has no choice but to flee to England. Penniless, Anna hides her aristocratic background and takes a job as servant in the household of the esteemed Westerholme family, armed only with an outdated housekeeping manual and sheer determination. Desperate to keep her past a secret, Anna is nearly overwhelmed by her new duties—not to mention her instant attraction to Rupert, the handsome Earl of Westerholme. To make matters worse, Rupert appears to be falling for her as well. As their attraction grows stronger, Anna finds it more and more difficult to keep her most dearly held secrets from unraveling. And then there’s the small matter of Rupert’s beautiful and nasty fiancée...


Forbidden love. Childhood friends turned more. Undeniable passion. Yup, sounds up my lane. But really I got it because of that sticker on the front: $4.99. Take that Subway!

Summary:
Millicent “Missy” Armstrong is entering her fourth London Season, but not for lack of suitors. Since her debut three years ago, Missy has received twenty marriage proposals. But she is interested in only one man—her brother’s best friend, James Rutherford. As a child, Missy looked up to James. As a grown up, her admiration has blossomed into the longings of a beautiful, sensuous woman—and she won’t rest until James admits his love—and desire—for her…

James Rutherford rues the day he let his physical weaknesses get the better of him by kissing Missy. His best friend has made it clear that Missy is off limits, and though he’s avoided her for three years, he hasn’t forgotten the feel of her soft lips pressed against his—and it seems neither has she. For no matter how much James tries to discourage Missy, he keeps winding up in her arms, sharing heated caresses that promise the most delirious pleasure...


This was an unexpected pick. I haven't read anything from this author before or read any reviews. I liked the title, the cover and the summary, so I took the risk and got it.

Summary:
Nell Anslowe and Julian, Earl of Wyndham, are an unlikely couple in every respect. Injured in a riding accident ten years ago, Nell was left with a fiance who abandoned their engagement, a slight limp, terrifying nightmares, and the firm belief that she will never marry. The abrupt end of Julian's unhappy marriage formed his resolve to remain a bachelor until the end of his days. But as Julian chases down his reckless stepsister, he seeks shelter from a summer storm in a cottage - and finds it occupied by Nell, who has escaped from a fortune-seeking libertine bent on carrying her off to Gretna Green. Discovered together by Nell's family, the couple's hasty wedding is the only way to save Nell from scandal - but the polite union each of them expects blossoms into something much more powerful...

The Loss of a Treasure

Anyone who lives in Delaware or the DC metro area has (hopefully) heard of Lambda Rising. To sum up: for 35 years Lambda Rising has been Washington's premier LGBT bookstore, with one of the largest collections of fiction, erotica, memoirs, nonfiction/history, and tons of other odds and ends. They have some of the most wonderful and knowledgeable staff and has created a real sense of community.

That being said, I was upset to learn that both Lambda Rising stores are closing. Lambda Rising has always held a special place in my heart. It was where I bought Sweet Lips by Mel Smith and first discovered homo erotica five years ago. Since then I've developed a soft spot for the genre, though the bulk of my reading is still mainstream romance. I felt slightly better when I found out that it is closing because the owner is retiring, not because they are going out of business. Still, it won't be there anymore.

The second thought that crossed my mind: OMG yay a sale!

It was so awesome to walk in there and find all books 40% off! Despite having a $20 cash limit, I was able to walk away with some goodies.



It took me quite a bit of time to settle on one piece of erotic I wanted to buy. I ended up sitting in the middle of one of the aisles with my friend, flipping through a stack of books trying to pick one. I narrowed it down to three and with my friend's advice picked this one. The plot sounded fairly interesting, I liked that it's a historical, but mostly did you see that cover! Best. Erection. Ever.

Speaking of erections, this book was irresistible as well. I've been flipping through it and never realized until now just how much thought goes into a blow job. There is also this awesome chapter for guys about etiquette and considerations for your partner. Fellatio has never been so equal! The other reason I just had to get this is because my friend bought The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex for Women. Maybe we'll switch when we're done reading our own.

I had the funniest cashier when checking out. The ridiculous cover of The Price of Temptation lead to some witty banter about the absurdity of many Harlequin covers and Nathan Kamp's abs. His exact comment was "I don't like a guy to be too ripped. I don't want to get rug burn just from going down on him". FTW!

Merry X-mas Everyone!

I hope everyone is having a great holiday season! For me it has been a quieter Christmas than usual. Family, friends and I agreed to cut back this year, so gifts were really only sent to the little kids. Almost all the gifts I gave were baked goods. Everyone loved the kits I put together, though my waistband is really starting to feel it.

While I loved everything I got this year (despite the recession I had a fairly good haul) I was thankful to see that someone did think to send be a Borders gift card! There was a 25% off sale today at Borders.com, and that $25 card was gone by noon.

Here's what will be arriving in the mail soon:


A classic. It's one of those books I didn't want to read until I owned a copy of it. Now that I had some spare cash I decided it was time to go and get myself a copy.










I own both Bound By Your Touch and Written on Your Skin, but couldn't find The Duke of Shadows the last two times I went to the book store. The buzz around Meridith Duran's books doesn't seem to end, but I can be really obsessive sometimes and didn't want to read the other two until I'd read the first, even if they're not a series.








I have a signed copy of Knight of Pleasure that I got at the RWA convention this past summer. I wasn't blown away, but I did enjoy it a lot. Stephan is the hero of this one, and his character was my favorite part of Knight of Pleasure so I still want to give this one a try.










I have a soft-spot for M/M romance. I didn't use to read it that much but it's grown on me. I think I find that many of them have more of an emotional thrill than hetero romances. False Colors got rave reviews on Dear Author and sounded irresistible from their reviews, so I figured it was time to by myself a copy.






Best holiday wishes to everyone!

What I Did on Labor Day

I haven't even finished my current read and I'm already buying new books! In my own defense, there was a Labor Day sale at a Thrift Store in my area, so all the books ended up being 50 cents. Hello, two quarters each!!!! It was a hugh practice in self-restraint not to grab more.




The last of the Bridgertons. I have Francesca and Hyacinth's book's to go, but I found Gregory's with a stepback so I just had to grab it.

I remember that this got lukewarm reviews, especially since Mr. Cavindish, I Presume apparently just repeats most of this book. And the cover is pretty

aweful too. It's got this vapid-heroine-with-a-neck-crick thing going for it. But for 50 cents I'm willing to give it a go.

One of the Bow Street Runner's series. I haven't read any of the series yet, but I love Kleypas. I'm so excited for Tempt Me at Twilight's release!!!! In the meantime, I've gotten my mother hooked on Kleypas (major score) and she's now read the Devil in Winter and Scandal in Spring (my personal fav), and is ready to sink her teeth into the Hathaways. She seems to have develped an attachment to Cam because wherever we go she keeps comparing ever tan-skinned male to him....

I think I originally became interested in this because I keep confusing the title with The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie (which was a fantastic book, fyi). From reading the back I can't see anything exceptional about it yet, so I'm reserving all judgement until I read it.

I'd never read a Medeiros, and I vaugely remember some buzz about her last year, so into the cart it went!

Finding this book was somewhat of a disappointment for the simple fact it was so much less vivid! I don't think it was because it was thrift since the spine wasn't cracked. Luckily cover color doesn't affect reading enjoyment.

New Pretties

There are reasons you should never let me in a bookstore unsupervised...

I went shopping in Seattle yesterday, and though I'm on vacation, I managed to start getting anxious. To calm down I ducked into a Border's to purchase a copy of Nora Robert's The Villa, which was strongly recommended by a friend (Since I have yet to actually read something by le Nora, I thought it be good to start with something recommended). But of course, since I was upset, I left with more than just The Villa.

I saw this being pimped on Dear Author. Not only did it look good, but I realized I've never read a western! There's a whole romance subgenre which I have neglected. So when I saw this lovely cover peering out at me from the shelf, I had no choice but to get it.

Anyone who knows me knows that I love Lisa Kleypas. Of course I've been wanting to try her new contemporaries. I went and purchased Blue Eyed Devil about a week ago and was smacking myself when I relized I got them out of order. Mistake fixed.

I've been wanting to read Meredith Duran since The Duke of Shadows first came out, so I've been waiting a while. I was fairly bummed out that by the time I made it to her booth at the Literacy Signing she was already sold out. I'm probably not going to start these until after I have The Duke of Shadows, but I'm most certainly looking forward to them.