I had another great time at the book festival. How could I not? Surrounded by books, meeting authors and great people watching. OK, I could do with less people but it wasn’t horrid. For those of you unfamiliar with the two day Festival - it’s held every year on the campus of UCLA - they have numerous panels with well-known and best selling authors, booths filled with books and authors signing. You can read more about it at the official website and in “Readers
Feast”.
Sunday morning, I went to the first panel of the day - Mystery: the LA influence with Moderator, Tod Goldberg and authors, Denise
Hamilton, T. Jefferson Parker and Gary Phillips. The three authors base their works in LA or So.Cal. area. They talked about the influence of LA, Hollywood, Raymond Chandler, East vs West Coast, etc. on their works and others. An entertaining panel because Goldberg is a funny man who kept the panel lively and the authors relaxed. I just finished Parker’s latest bestseller “The Fallen” - this is the first book I’ve read of his and I’m definitely going to read more. I bought Hamilton’s latest “Prisoner of Memory” and the first book of her series “The Jasmine Trade”. I haven’t read her yet, and I’m looking forward to it. The danger of going to panels - finding new authors you may like (therefore more books to buy) and the opposite - finding out an author you like to read, you don’t like in person. It’s right up there with unattractive author photos on the back of books. Maybe not unattractive, but the picture doesn’t match your imagination of what the author “should” look like. Really, there are some authors that shouldn’t have their pictures on their books. And also an author you were considering reading, you decide not to because you disliked them in person. A money saver.
The next panel was Mystery: Hip Chicks Packing Heat with Moderator, Emily Green, and authors Susan Kandel, Harley Jane Kozak and Patricia Smiley. Can you tell my interest is mysteries? These authors write “humorous” mysteries featuring female amateur sleuths along the vein of Janet Evanovich, Jennifer Crusie and Helen Fielding (Bridget Jones’ Diary) aka Chick Lit mysteries. The first question asked was what they thought of the label “Chick Lit”. Kandel said she wasn’t particularly fond of the negative connotations that comes with it. Best term of the day by Kandel - “They don’t label books about middle age men with beautiful twenty-something girlfriends, sports cars, guns and such as “Dick Lit”. But they are resigned that it is a marketing tool that sells books. It was a good panel - they discussed their various characters, writing experiences, movie options etc. One question was that why in their books, the heroines were younger (30s) than themselves and single - Kozak - 49, Kandel - 43 (?) can’t remember exactly, each married with a couple of kids and Smiley wouldn’t say (my guess 50s). Kozak said it was because she started her first book she was single and in her 30’s at the time - though she would someday like to write/explore a character closer to her age. BTW, Kozak is an actress you might recognize. Smiley said her age shouldn’t matter and that she remembers her “wild” thirties vividly (or something like that. Whateverrr.). I bought Kozak’s two books - “Dating Dead Men” and “Dating is Murder”. I mean, how can you pass up books with those titles?
I had tickets for another panel, but decided I was paneled out and besides it was time to go Shopping! and lunch. So I spent the rest of the sunny afternoon exploring the booths and books. See the pictures /slideshow below. I can’t wait until next year.
