- Greg Rucka is one of my favorite authors. That's why he has his own tag on my blog. So when his latest Queen & Country novel, The Last Run, was released, I had to run out that day and pick it up. But I should have remembered the trouble I had trying to find the prior book, Private Wars, on release day because it also was nowhere to be found. I gave up, whined a little on Twitter, and told myself that at least I knew one way I could pick up the novel. I just had to wait a couple weeks.
- This Saturday was the day I was looking forward to. My wife asked me if I was excited and I had to admit that I was not, but not for the reason you might think. I hate driving into Los Angeles for even the best of reasons, so I was again dreading this trip. Once the drive was made, though, that excitement built quickly. Greg Rucka! One of my favorite authors! All the way down for a signing just for me! Okay, maybe not just for me. But it was so worth it.
- Along with Greg was Michelle Gagnon, author of The Tunnels (which my wife picked up that night), Boneyard, The Gatekeeper, and her newest, Kidnap & Ransom. I've never read any of her books, but hearing her speak made me quite interested. And she sounds exactly like an author my wife would love to follow.
- The two authors were really great together. I suppose doing a number of signings must train you to speak in front of people. And since authors are storytellers by nature, they must like sharing their tales with an audience. I enjoyed hearing their tales of digging deep into their research and the stories about irate readers nitpicking with their books.
- I brought two books along with me, the Batwoman: Elegy hardcover and the Queen & Country Scriptbook, the latter of which I think caught him by surprise. As well, I finally got my copy of The Last Run, now signed and bookplated. I'm already halfway through the book and you don't know how hard it is for me to stop writing this and jumping right back in. Actually, I'll do that right now.
© 2010 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.
Awesome, back when I could still afford comics and had friends that would do this with me, we'd look up creator appearances and show up to get our stuff signed. It was easier back then too because I worked at a comic book store, and I just loved hanging out at these big gatherings with other fans. I mostly focused on artists, but I have gotten a few things signed from writers. I remember Bendis drew me a little sketch (a very bad one) of spider-woman. Rucka would have been a great writer to meet.
ReplyDelete@ MMOGC - I haven't been to too many signings. I did catch Ed Brubaker at the LA Festival of Books. And of course there was the Joss Whedon signing I went to when the Firefly DVD set came out. I geeked out so completely I could bearly talk.
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