BEA Podcasts Begin!

It must be spring, the trees are getting green, robins are digging for worms and BookExpo Cast has an idiotic interview with me. Yup folks, that's right, the cavalcade of BookExpo podcasts is upon us, like a grand marshal of a virtual parade, my show update interview marks thew beginning.

We have interviews lined up with a ton of authors that will be at the show inlcuding Sherman Alexie, John Krakauer, Neil Gaiman John Hidgeman and I personally get to interview Dan Pink this Sunday afternoon. I'm extremely excited. I mad e alittle visit to my former bookstore in New Canaan this afternoon and pulled Johnny Bunko off the shelf to explain to them what Manga was!

I'll feature as many as I can here, but visit the official podcast home for the show over at BookExpo Cast.

I'll post as many of the casts here as I can once I get an updated widget built, but in the meantime, visit BookExpo Cast, sign up for email delivery or get the iTunes feed.

-L

Celebrate Spring with NYAF!

Ahoy! Spring has finally come to New York City, and with it the blossoming of thousands of cherry blossoms. Now, at the highest of cherry blossom season, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden proudly presents their 27th Annual Cherry Blossom Festival -- Sakura Matsuri!

Sakura Matsuri takes place this Saturday and Sunday across the full expanse of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden -- with performances, exhibits, and workshops going on from 10 AM to 6 PM both days. Samurai drama troupe Samurai Sword Soul (who performed at NYAF 07) will be at Sakura Matsuri, too, and they're just the start of a schedule that includes taiko drummers, koto recitals, and even some guests who've come all the way from Japan.

I'll be there wandering about with a backpack full of NYAF goodies, and if you come to Sakura Matsuri all cosplayed up, odds are you'll walk away with some Anime Festival chopsticks.

Learn all about Sakura Matsuri right here...

http://www.bbg.org/exp/cherries/sakura.html

I hope to see you there!

Librarians Rule at BookExpo

FOBEA (Friend of BookExpo America) Nora Rawlinson has a great BEA preview form a librarians perspective over at her blog Early Word. Check it out here. And take a good look at Early Word, Nora has put in a ton of work on the site and it looks great......

Uber FOBEA's Library Journal also has it's BEA preview out which you can see here: L.A. Confidential

Lest we forget Super Uber FOBEA's The Unshelved Boys and the kick ass giveaways, contests, panels and programming they've got which you can see here: Unshelved@BEA

BEA is wicked Librarian Friendly......

-L

myBEA Is Live!!!!!

At long last myBEA the social networking and show planning site is live and running......

Check it out here - myBEA.

My favorite feature of the site is the ability to see EVERY event happening at the show, select those you plan to attend and view other BEAers that also plan to go, it's really cool.

This is a social networking tool we launched last year and it was very well embraced. I had ambitious plans in the "off season" to create, with a partner, a custom built social networking site for BEA. However, about 6 weeks ago those plans fell a part in a heap of scripting and codes. Thank god for our partner on this project, Event Mingle who quickly (very quickly) updated, adjusted, tweaked and prettied up the original myBEA for a launch.

As Paul Harvey would say, now you know the rest of the story.

Stop reading my blog and update your myBEA profile, it's only cool if you use it!

-L

The Hunt for Stan Lee

Check out this vid from The Middle Show at Black20. The quest for a Stan Lee interview is great, but selfishly, just about every NYCC staffer is in it! Roger, Phoenix, Peter, Emily, Carlucci, they are all there. Enjoy and thanks to the Virgin Blog for the link....In fact, check out the vid from Virgin of Stan greeting thousands of fans before the con, see that below the Black20 clip.....

BookExpo Educational Sessions Online

I'm often asked what sets BookExpo a part from the other major international book fairs, and I firmly believe that chief amongst the differentiators is our world class educational program. Almost 200 sessions in all, the BEA conference will educate you on leading trends in the global industry and updates on the smaller niches of our business.

You can get a full listing of all of the conference sessions here.

Highlights this year include:

An immense digital track which Mark Dressler our Director of Education promises to be, “The best collection of digital educational programming ever offered anywhere.”

Our Global Markets Forum will take an in depth look at the Chinese marketplace but will step beyond simply academic study and include pragmatic matchmaking to help you business. The sessions will include high level representatives from the Chinese publishing industry.

The AAP sponsored Smaller and Independent Press Conference. A full day of intense education for smaller and indie pubs.

A strong focus on Graphic Novels including the GN Breakfast sponsored by Diamond Book Distributors.

Dedicated conference sessions for Librarians and Educators.

The American Booksellers Association Day of Education.

That’s juts a few highlights. Check out the full programming and be sure and grab this weeks Publisher’s Weekly as it is the immense pre BEA issue – all 160 pages of it!!!!

Oh yeah, if you haven't registered for BEA yet, what are you waiting for? Do it now!

-L

Bukowski in L.A. - Now This is My Kind of Tour

The first writer I fell in love with - well the second after Judy Blume - was Charles Bukowski. A 9th grade English teacher snuck me a copy of Ham on Rye and it was there that I first discovered that writing didn't have to be boring, like The Good Earth or The Scarlett Letter, but in fact it could be ugly, violent, drunken, belligerent, filthy, all stuff that my rebellious 15 year old mind was craving....

So, I guess I'm inviting you to come relive my childhood with me on this really cool BEA tour that Esotouric and City Lights Books have created! Here are some details......

Esotouric and City Lights Books Present Charles Bukowski Bus Tour During BookExpo Convention Weekend

WHAT: BookExpo Edition - "Haunts of A Dirty Old Man: CharlesBukowski's LA" bus tour
WHEN: Saturday May 31, 5pm-9pm, departs from Arnie Morton's Steakhouse, 735 South Figueroa St., Downtown LA
COST: $55/person, snacks included
FREE SWAG: BookExpo attendees with badges who get on the bus will receive a complementary Tony Millionaire Bukbird beer coaster and aprerelease copy of City Lights' forthcoming Charles Bukowski anthology" Portions of a Wine-Stained Notebook: Uncollected Stories and Essays,1944-1990"
MORE INFO: visit http://www.esotouric.com/ or call 323-223-2767

-L

A Few More NYCC Thoughts……

Well gang, it’s been a weird week. I was talking with Ice Pick (aka Larry) from the NYCCC team and we compared how we felt this week to a constant low grade hangover. It’s weird to all of a sudden be done with a huge event that you’ve worked on for nearly a year. Strange. It’s like postpart-y-um depression. Sorry for the lame word play.

A few quick hits for you.

Kids Day – We had nearly 3,000 kids under 13 at the show on Sunday. Wow.

The Blog – I’m now gonna start writing about another medium, the global business of publishing via BookExpo America heavily and Peter is already starting to write on the Anime Fest. I had a comment form a friend that I should break the blog up into multiple platforms for the different events/businesses, but I have to say, I’m really resistant to do that. I know that readers have specific interests, so is an Alex Ross fan really interested in the translation trends of American fiction in Belgium? Maybe, maybe not, but someday, those trends may bring Ross’s work to Belgium. The point of this blog – Medium At Large - is that comics, books, rights, authors, artists, anime, graphic novels, film, tv, booksellers, comic retailers, librarians all have a common thread and it’s creativity and the written words in varying forms. The ideas are being applied in different mediums, but all these branches spread from the same trunk.

Tell me if I’m right or wrong on this by your comments and your readership.

The Show – Gang, the team worked our asses of to build a good show for all of you, and I know we fell short in some areas, but it was not because we didn’t care or didn’t try. A big one is the ticketed signing events. This will be changed, we will get it right next year. I talked to a lot of you on site and I’ve talked to a lot of you via email to get your feelings and your ideas of how we can improve this. With your help will make it better for all next year. I’m sorry for those of you that were frustrated and lost out on a chance to meet the person you really wanted to meet.

The same can be said about the crowding in the conference areas. I’ve got a meeting with Javits tomorrow about space for 2009, 10 and beyond.

Guys, I am not going to get it right all the time and some of you saw that. But I do want everyone reading to know that my goal and what I work towards is to build a kick ass event for all of you. I reply to nearly every email, every call and every blog comment I get to show you how committed we are to making NYCC the best con out there. So thanks for your help in doing that and if you’ve got ideas or suggestions, by all means let me know, we are already starting to build NYCC 2009!

-L