Cynsations

The Greater Houston Teen Book Convention

What a great time I had this weekend at Houston Teen Book Con!

The event took place between 10 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Saturday at Alief Taylor High School. From the official website:

The TeenBookCon mission is to celebrate and promote reading by connecting teens with authors.

Speakers included keynoter Sharon Draper and:

Here’s a peek at the festivities!

Okay, these are not YA lit enthusiasts! These fish are swimming in a pool in the lobby of the Omni Hotel, which offered a choice of restaurants and lovely rooms. We enjoyed our stay.

The event opened with a Friday evening reception for the author/illustrator speakers and the event committee at Blue Willow Bookshop, a tremendously warm and charming indie store!

Here’s Greg with author pal Marjetta Geerling from Florida.

George O’Connor from New York with his graphic novel, Zeus.

The store has a terrific selection of books for kids, teens, and grown-ups!

Authors sign the walls in blue marker. (I climbed a ladder to sign!).

Here’s one of the Fillbach brothers–illustrators may have an advantage at such things.

Houston author Judson Roberts visits with fellow speakers the following morning in the green room. In the background, Greg looks over as Sharon Draper walks in.

Sharon gave one of the best keynote addresses I’ve ever heard.

I have a few more terrific pics, but I’m going to save them for future features.

But first, let me draw attention to Elizabeth Eulberg‘s books.

Huge thanks to all the sponsors and committee members, especially everyone at Blue Willow, and the rock-star librarians! This was a first-rate event! Authors, if you’re invited in the future–go! You’ll love it. I know I did!

Cynsational Notes

I tend not to run photos of kids for the obvious security/permissions reasons, but attendance was excellent (over 400), especially considering that this was a first-time event.