Book Expo Shmook Expo

So did you happen to hear about that Book Expo America that went on last weekend? Yes, I thought you did. With the likes of Alan Greenspan, Valerie Plame, Stephen Colbert and Dog, the bounty hunter attending this year, it might've been hard to NOT hear something about it. I wasn’t there, just in case you thought that's where I was going with all this. No, I was quite busy doing some networking in my own neck of the woods. And had you been in Chama, New Mexico’s public library last Friday afternoon, you would have found me in the corner of the main room scarfing down cucumber sandwiches and sipping Earl Grey tea while trying to look important in a nonchalant, jaunty kind of way. For the second year in a row, I wore a name tag over my left boob that read Author Catherine Dix. I listened intently as other authors summated their latest works. I kept eye contact and asked lots of questions and took mental notes about how a person goes about doing THAT… answering the many, many questions about their book in a succinct yet sensical kind of way. I did everything I could possibly do to keep the subject on THEM. Because as most of you already know, my book is not in selling form yet and so I’m that creepy girl that eats all the treats and keeps showing up without her book. I hear third times the charm, so maybe next year, eh?

I must say, though, the not showing up with my book wasn’t nearly as bad as the not showing up with my brain. This event, which was called a Writer’s Round Up/Book Fair, had a keynote author in attendance. His name was Max Evans. The Max Evans who’s been writing westerns since the late fifties. The Max Evans who’s fiction has been turned to film a couple of times. THE Max Evans who has worked with Martin Scorsese and Penelope Cruz and Woody Harrelson, too. THAT guy. If you must know, I didn’t know who he was. Not from Adam. (Or is it atom?) Consequently, I didn’t know what he looked like, either. So when an older gentleman came over to my dark corner and extended his hand, I shook it like I shook all the others… firmly, while giving every ounce of concentration to my sandwich and tea in hopes that sheer concentration could keep them from landing on the floor. Meanwhile he said his name and beat me to the punch of asking him about his latest work. “Well…” I fumbled. “It’s called Rosetta Stones, and I hear it’s due to be out in January 2008 now. Cross your fingers, please!” And before I could change the subject to HIM and his latest work, he went on: “So tell me about your work, Catherine. That title is awfully intriguing.” I cleared my throat. “Well, it follows 36 hours in the lives of four teenagers as they skip school just before graduation to take a camping trip in the forests of southern New Mexico.” I'm more than sure I said it just as monotonously as I had rehearsed it hours before. But he was kind and sounded interested anyway. “New Mexico. Really! What part?” And it went on and on like that for what felt like two hours. He was so charming that, in fact, I almost forgot about my scheme to change the subject to HIS work. Almost. “So what genre do you write in?” I finally asked, pretending that I didn’t notice the leather vest and boots or the western scarf around his neck. “Oh, mostly fiction. But I’ve done a little of this and that.” And then it occurred to me… he wasn’t wearing a name tag like all the rest of us. Could he be… “What did you say your name was again, sir?” He chuckled. “I’m Max Evans.” And so not only was my upper lip asserting the fact that I’d just had something with mayo. But I made Max Evans repeat his name to me… like it was THAT not important.

Aside from all that embarrassing business, the Writers Round Up was a complete thumbs up. There were treats. And amazing people. Informative seminars. Yodeling cowboys. A rambling river. And SCADS of fresh air. Take THAT my Book Expo friends.