HEART 2 HEART ~ "There and Back Again"

Yep, lifting from Bilbo Baggens, I am! "There and Back Again" BEA style, I am!

I just returned home from my first-ever BookExpo America in beautiful downtoan LA. La de da, la de da, la de da, as Annie Hall would opine. It was a star-studded, information-packed, publisher/writer-packed house to be sure! Being a small town mountain girl, I still feel like Dorothy visiting the Great OZ, returning from the colorful world of books, "There and Back Again," to hearth and home in black and white. I do miss the color.

Signing in the Romance Writers of America booth, with the likes of Diane Pershing and Elizabeth Boyle was a BEA moment for me, indeed. What an honor to be in the company of such writers! Then, to meet romance writers Heather Graham, Iris Johansen, and Linda Lael Miller ... well can you meet any better in the business? I have their latest "signed" books and couldn't be happier. I was happy, too, that all of my "signed" copies of A...My Name's Amelia went out the door quickly.

Only in LA guys would you be at lunch and the ever-handsome George Hamilton walks by, giving you "that smile." I turn around and guess who's sitting right behind me? Dr. Ruth, herself! Very nice. Very tiny. She wanted to know what I thought of GH's tan. At breakfast the next morning, I heard Alec Baldwin, Magic Johnson, Phillipa Gregory, and Andre Dubus, III! I mean, come on. Their comments were insightful and entertaining, not to mention personal. Of course I got a "signed" Phillipa Gregory! I met Garrison Kellior (Evan Handler from Sex&theCity butt line but was very nice in so doing) and William Shatner ... Captain Kirk and Denny Crane couldn't look better. See what I mean? Annie Hall was right: la de da, la de da, la de da!

Every publisher on the planet was there! The Disneyland of the Book World! I did visit the Gale-Cengage Learning Exhibit and had a nice chat with wonderful Ginny Raye and Laurie Taylor from Gale-Cengage. They are THE BEST and couldn't have been nicer. I'm so happy to be published with them!

Another day ... perhaps another BEA ... There and Back Again.

Love you, mean it,

Jo(anne) Gregg Sundell

www.joannesundell.com
www.myspace.com/joannesundell

A...MY NAME'S AMELIA, LP 8/08
THE PARLOR HOUSE DAUGHTER, 12/08
MEGGIE'S REMAINS, 7/09