Yesterday I attended the James Patterson book signing by Little Brown and Company at the BEA 2010 at the Jacob Javit Center.  I was allowed to bring two students with me, so it seemed natural to ask Jack Raisch’11 and Alex Green’11 (Block X Award winners for Book Club). By some strange luck, we also won free day passes to BEA.

The three of us were BEA newbies. But, I have been to a few library conferences to know that I would be coming back with a lot of free books, pens, bookmarks, so I was pretty psyched. With our free tote bags from the Lonely Planet, Create Space, etc., we filled our bags with free comics, candy, chapstick, pens and lots of books (even a Harlequin romance or two, and a book big on the history of Cancer, we weren’t too picky). It felt like Halloween but without the costumes. Although now that I think about it,  there was one guy dressed up as a Banana (he was part of the Bananagrams group) and Julia Gnuse, woman in the Guinness Book of World records as the most tattooed woman.

The James Patterson BEA Event was pretty interesting, although there was a little bit more of a tween than teen audience, which in retrospect was probably to be expected since Patterson was mainly talking about his new YA Witch and Wizard series. There was a Q&A where students asked him about about his inspiration, his reading and writing habits, etc. Patterson’s decision to write YA novels was really instigated by the fact that he wanted young adults to ENJOY reading, which is something he didn’t enjoy when he was a young kid. As a result, he also created ReadKiddoRead, a reader’s advisory site.

One of the more meaningful messages that he relayed was the importance of finding a job that you love, something that excites you and gets you out of bed in the morning. Or as he said, do something that will make you sing as you go up that mountain on your way to work.  Patterson writes about 350 days out of the year, writing in the early morning and into the late afternoon. For him, writing is a lifestyle. I am impressed by his dedication to his craft.

After the talk, we received a free copy of his 2nd installment of his Witch and Wizard Series, The Gift.

My right shoulder is killing me from lugging all the books, but well worth the ache. Thanks to Trish Hatch for the free day passes to BEA and the James Patterson BEA event.

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