BEA 2012

by BEA first-timer Danielle Barthel

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This year marked the first time that I was able to experience the awesomeness that is Book Expo America.  If you have never gone, let me tell you exactly what you’re missing.  Enormous lines for book signings by both well known and debut authors.  Manic book lovers trying to get the latest ARCs of some of the most highly anticipated books of the year.  Flying elbows, judgmental stares, huge bags of books getting swung into your shoulders.

It.  Is.  Fantastic.

I knew going in that it was going to be packed, but nothing can prepare you for the sheer masses that you will see at BEA.  There are so many people milling in and around booths that it is impossible to move without running into people.  Which meant that when I bumped a coworker of mine in passing, I didn’t think a thing of it until her client called my name and let us know what had just happened!  I’ll be honest…I was definitely in a book coma the day that I went.

This is just one example of the many stacks of books available.  You'd be in a book coma, too!  This happens to be our very own Altered, by Jennifer Rush, coming to you in January 2013:

Featured in the Little Brown booth

Another client, Dan Haring, had his book Oldsoul on show in the Pendrell Publishing booth:

Probably one of the coolest parts of attending BEA was knowing that several Nancy Coffey Literary clients would be doing signings!  I was lucky enough to attend Megan Powell’s signing for her upcoming debut, No Peace for the Damned, where she had a steady line of people waiting for her book for the whole hour!  She even had two of New York’s finest ask for her to sign their books.

On the other side of the Javits Center (a massive, behemoth of a building), Sarah Fine signed copies of her debut novel Sanctum.  She even spent time hand dying the incredible map from her book with tea bags before coming (to see teasers of it, visit Sarah's blog).  She was out of them within minutes!

Later in the afternoon, Veronica Roth had a joint signing with her other Dark Days Tour authors, Liz Norris, Bethany Griffin, and Aprilynne Pike.  The line for this signing stretched all the way across the Javits Center and around the corner.  They signed every book that was available, before having to turn to bookmarks!

After that, Dan Krokos signed his upcoming debut False Memory.  He had some hardcore fans waiting in line, and his book hasn’t even come out yet!

Kody Keplinger attended the Expo, too.  Her third novel, A Midsummer's Nightmare came out during the week of BEA, and she celebrated with her agent and Super Diaper Baby:

Between all the excitement of the books, the authors, the fans, and the weight of the bag brimming with ARCs I had managed to score, I was pretty exhausted at the end of the day.  But it was such a fascinating experience (and everyone says your first BEA is your best), and I can't wait to do it again.

Deadlines

Deadlines are tough. Deadlines are inevitable. They loom there, in the distance, and grow closer and closer as the days tick by.

Most authors and illustrators I know don't write/illustrate full time, and even the ones that do have other things on their plate, like, I don't know...family? Friends? PTA? Church? Dr. Who? Whatever it is, these other aspects of life are important, and are often higher priority. So how do authors do it?

Honestly, I don't know. I'm in constant awe of my clients who turn manuscripts in to me or their editor on time (or mostly on time) despite having a baby (or two), teaching full-time, coaching their kid's baseball team while working full-time, running a household, getting married, driving across the country, being terribly sick, etc. (All of these things and more have happened--my clients are freaking SUPERHEROES).

Other people working with writers are on deadlines, too. Editors, publicists, art departments, etc...all have deadlines. Deadlines that are directly related to writer deadlines. It's like this amazing house of cards that just keeps building and building...though, these are pretty sturdy cards. If one slips, it doesn't mean they all come crumbling down. Maybe one or two fall with it. Or if it's really bad, maybe a whole level. But your publisher has such a strong foundation, that most of the cards stay in place. (So don't worry!)

Agents have deadlines, too.

And speaking of deadlines, this has been my life the past 2 weeks:

6:00, Wake up (sometimes 5am, depending how backlogged I am on edits)

Mmmm. Cofffeeeeeeeee.

Sit down to read manuscripts/take notes/work on line edits.

*make sure iphone is charging!

7:15ish, PeeWee wakes up and finds me if Joe hasn't found him first

-Let PeeWee out

-Administer PeeWee's medicine (poor old guy....)

-Give PeeWee treat and a snuggle

-Back to work

8 - 8:40, shower, brush, do hair, pack bag, get dressed, run out to the car, realize I forgot my charging iphone, run back in for it, rush to the train station

8:44, park blocks away and curse myself for not just walking from home, run to the train with Joe carrying my third cup of coffee in a to-go cup (he's the best), barely catch the 8:48 as the doors shut on my heels

8:49, settle into a seat, take out my laptop and/or iphone and either continue editing and/or start answering emails while Joe reads a book/the paper

9:35, arrive in Penn Station, kiss Joe goodbye, join the ranks of commuters walking to work

9:50, arrive in awesome new office (post to come about said new office!)

10:00 - 12:00, emails (lots!), phone conferences, paperwork (lots), checking in with Nancy/Kathleen/Suzie

noon - 2:30, lunch meeting w/an editor or other industry professional (yes, these are most days), or eat at my desk while reading.

2:30 - 6, more emails (lots and LOTS of emails), phone conferences (usually 2 or 3 of them), sometimes an afternoon meeting, more paperwork, in-office status updates (and perhaps a discussion of a new project from one of us)

This is where the day changes. About half the time it goes like this:

6:30 - meet an industry person (editor, agent, book scout, etc) for drinks, or go to an industry event since there are many this time of year

9:08 or 9:52, catch one of these trains home (eat a hot dog in Penn Station for dinner...sorry, Mom)

10:00 or 10:30, Joe picks me up at the train station, PeeWee on his lap--go home, wind down and watch TV with my boys for about an hour.

12:00, catch up on email (still lots), read and edit until I fall asleep.

The other half of the time it goes like this:

6:13 or 6:39, meet Joe at Penn station to catch the train home

7-9:00, get home, take care of PeeWee, eat dinner, wind down and watch TV with my boys for about an hour, an occasional client/film call during this time.

9:00 - midnightish, catch up on emails, read and edit

There have been a few almost all-nighters in there these past weeks, too. After all, it's deadline time! (Heck, look at the timestamp on this post...I've been up since three!).

But guess what? I get to read things like the second installment in both the Something Strange & Deadly series, and the Ever Afters series. And the second book in The Shadow Reader series, too! I get to work on Kody Keplinger's latest project, and read through the final revisions on Insurgent. I get to drool over the ending of Erica O'rourke's trilogy, and laugh at the twisted humor in Allan Woodrow's latest, and feel a chill down my spine from one of my newest projects by Gemma Cooper. I get to be transported back to the Progressive Era, or 200 years into the future. And I even get to play around with illustrations and text by author-illustrators like this one and this one.

When I get to do all of that, isn't all the hectic running around worth it?

Hells yeah it is!

And what especially keeps me going, is knowing that all of my clients are running around the same way (well...not the same way, but they've got other jobs and other lives outside of writing, too!). And they never complain.

We're all in it because we love books.

That's a rush that's even better than coffee.

Good luck on your pre-holiday deadlines, everyone!

We're Back!

Hi All,

So. We were waiting a bit to make sure the query email was working consistently (because at first when it was *supposedly* fixed, it was not).

And now...it is!

Our query email address is officially working. It's been tested. Many times. w00tz.

Now. If you have received an Auto-Response, that means we've seen it (or are going to read it shortly).

If you have sent a query in the past 3 weeks and have NOT received an Auto-Response, then that means we have not seen it. Please resend.

And if you're unsure or worried that we haven't received the query, resend anyway!

Also, read these awesome posts by Mike Martin and Veronica Roth. So inspiring!

# 6

No one says it better than Veronica herself, but hitting the New York Times list in the first week is wonderful, exciting and very, very well-deserved for this book and author.

Congratulations!!

Image Courtesy of Brooks Sherman 

Contest for DIVERGENT

***So, um, for some reason this blog post went up all sorts of messed up--part of my post was missing (the part after The Call), and the author interview was HUGE?  Something I'm still not able to fix--if anyone has a suggestion, I'm all ears! Apparently I'm having blogging issues.  All should be fixed now!  And...what are you waiting for?  Enter the contest!!***

So we have this book coming out called DIVERGENT by Veronica Roth in May.  And it is made of awesomesauce (and paper and binding, of course).  If you want to know what it's about, just listen to Veronica give you the details herself:




I met Veronica at a conference in Indiana (shout out to MWW!), and I could tell right away that she was just an all around great gal because she laughed at my weird jokes.  (Now that I think about it, maybe she was just being polite....). I discovered that she was professional and talented as well as we corresponded after the conference. Then she sent me Divergent. And then I started reading.  A few sleepless nights later and everyone in my office was buzzing over it.  It was time to make The Call--which included a black out, a storm, driving all around Long Island for reception, and a late night rendezvous to Steak n' Shake. You don't want to know.  I'm just happy I was able to get through to her!

Now most people will have to wait for pub date to read this.  But for one lucky winner here, you can win a copy by entering this contest!

DIVERGENT CONTEST:

Please answering the follow two-part question:

Which virtue is most important to you?  

a)honesty

b)selflessness

c)bravery

d)kindness

e)intelligence

And why?

The Rules:

1. You must follow this blog.

2. You must answer the 2-part question in the comments section of this blog.

3. You must comment on this post.

4. You must tweet, facebook, vlog or blog about this contest and include the link in your comment.

5. You can enter only once.

6. US participants only (OR anyone with a US address for mailing the winning package).


The winner will be chosen at random and the results posted.


**You have until 11:59pm EST on Monday, 1/24!  Enter quick!

What a DAY, man

So, all sorts of hawtness today.

For one, our Ms. Veronica Roth has posted a little bit of a DIVERGENT tease on her blog here. Seriously, go look. SO hawtness. We'll be posting more on this little teaser next week.

For twos, Lisa Desrochers' debut novel, PERSONAL DEMONS hits the shelves today and it's super hawt because it's about two hawt dudes and a kickass girl. It's one of the best YA

paranormals I've ever read, and I'm not just saying that because Lisa's agent is my gal pal Suzie Townsend. It's because it's so good that I read it in one sitting then thought about how hawt Luc is for days afterward. Who is Luc you may ask? Well, you'll just have to read to find out. To win some PERSONAL DEMONS swag, enter these contests: Confessions of Suite 500 (yay swag!), or EPIC CONTEST (iPod shuffles anyone??).

For trice, we have an Omg, DUFF! winner--woohoo! This will now be

dubbed the DAHC, the Designated Awesome Hawt Contest. And the winner is...Erin! Erin, please email us at nclitblog(at)gmail(dot)com. Here's her comment:

Erin said...

I'm so excited to read this book! I've heard nothing but good things about it! Really hope I win :D
http://twitter.com/erin_forbees

For last, don't forget to enter Sara's hawt Brooklyn Book Festival contest--the winner gets a copy of Mitali Perkins' BAMBOO PEOPLE. It sounds fantastic! (she snagged me a copy too, so looks like I've got something good to read over the weekend....)

And...um. Hawt.