October in Review

Books Read & Reviewed:
The Other Side: A Teen's Guide to Ghost Hunting and the Paranormal by Marley Gibson, Patrick Burns, and Dave Schrader
Defining Twilight by Brian Leaf
Anastasia's Secret by Susanne Dunlap
Prophecy of the Sisters by Michelle Zink
Give up the Ghost by Megan Crewe
Hero-Type by Barry Lyga
My Rotten Life by David Lubar
Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Darkside by Beth Fantaskey
Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
If I Stay by Gayle Forman

Book Read, still to be reviewed:
Monster and Me by Robert Marsh
A Crooked Kind of Perfect by Linda Urban
The Zoo with the Empty Cage by Steve Brezenoff
Medina Hill by Trilby Kent

14 books! So-so for me.

In other news:

• I got married on October 24th! I have a video up on facebook and here is the slideshow I made and posted on my wedding day of past pictures of the two of us. Chris and I were dating for 5 years before we got hitched. Someone needs to bother me about posting pics up!
  
• Speaking of my husband, Chris wrote a review of Titanicus - a sci-fi book he read and let me post it up! Please leave him some comments so I can con him into writing more.
• I decided this month to participate in Misty's, The Book Rat, Halloween Challenge. Didn't come close to reading all the books I wanted to though...
• On Saturday, October 10th - I had my own little 6 hour read-a-thon. The idea was thought up by @stargirlreads on twitter whose blog is Books make great lovers! I couldn't participate in Dewey's read-a-thon since I was getting married...
• For Halloween, I created a list of all the paranormal/Halloween-y books I read recently.
• I started a new meme - most likely monthly (vote in the poll!) - called If I Had All Day To Read.

I need to catch up on my book signing stuff, so you are now going to be inundated with my latest book signing conquests!

This first one was from September, but I need to post it!

I went to a YA Book Conference, hosted by Anderson's Bookshop and met up with Andrea from Book Blather.

It was a full day event with four break-out sessions and then signings at the end. I bought too many books.. seriously.

Here's a list of authors that were there that day!
Judy Blundell
Libba Bray
Gennifer Choldenko
Ellen Hopkins
James Owen
Kaza Kingsley
Kerry Madden
Lisa Sandell
Jill Wolfson
Lisa Yee
Michelle Zink
Susan Fine
Jula Keller
Daniel Kraus
Cynthea Liu
Claire Zulkey

Here's a slideshow from that day:

Okay, next up - I saw Sarwat Chadda a few weeks back, author of The Devil's Kiss. Lo and behold, I was the only person who came besides the bookseller! So, Sarwat pulled up a chair and we had this awesome three person chat about books, research, his future novels, travels, etc. It was so freakin' cool. I feel a lot more at ease when it's that type of situation.

And I got a picture with him! I still have yet to read his book, but it's on my list, I swear!


I think I'm almost caught up.. maybe?


Okay, next up I went to John Green's signing! It was a freakin' mob! So many groupies that I felt so darn old (I'm only 25). It was a live show.. in LaGrange, IL. It's up on Penguin's POV website.

Last, but not least - I went with Erica from The Book Cellar over to Oak Park to see Stephanie Kuehnert - author of Ballads of Suburbia. You put Erica and I together and we're just so darn shy. We did both manage to ask a question each. There was a decent group - 10 to 15 people at the Borders for her signing.

And pictures!

The brownie I couldn't resist at the cafe - so pretty:


And... Stephanie and me!:


After this signing, Erica and I went to three other bookstores. An indie bookstore in Oak Park, where I saw James Dashner. I just had to show her it. Not only that - I knew they had some awesome bookmarks - so we snagged a ton!

We wanted a cookie and saw this cookie shop... little did we know it was for DOGS. I wondered what kind of cookies smelled like dog food.. #fail.

Then we headed to another Borders to search for something particular. And THEN Eric remembered there was a Half-Priced Bookstore on the way back to my place - so we HAD to stop. We are so bad.

And that's it for book signings this month! Going to one tomorrow - Justine Larbalester.