Author Event - Kelley Armstrong Signing

This past Saturday (April 16th) I was lucky enough to attend one of Kelley Armstrong's book tour stops. As you probably know her newest young adult book, The Gathering was just released and she was out promoting it. I rarely get to attend author events, since the closest city to me is Nashville and its known more for its musical roots then literary ones.

After Kelley did a little introduction of who she was and why she was there, as if anyone there didn't already know, she read the prologue to The Gathering. I always think its so cool to hear a book being read by the author that wrote it. She then explained how The Gathering and its two upcoming sequels are essentially companions to her YA Darkest Powers trilogy. The characters from those 6 books will eventually met up and then go off into a new trilogy together. So in total their will be 9 books and you should probably start with The Summoning (Darkest Powers #1) if you've never read any of her YA books before. Then Kelley mentioned that she hadn't kept a good track of all her swag, so now she was pretty much out. Though she did promise to give the first few people who asked a question her email address, so that she could sent them proper swag, LOL!

After the reading, Kelley did a short Q & A. Although I don't remember everything that was said, I can share a few things. One person asked whether or not any of the characters from Kelley's adult Otherworld series would ever interacts with any of her YA characters? Kelley's said possibly, but it would be her YA characters going to her adult series because she'd never bring her adult Otherworld characters into her YA Series. Someone else asked how she came up with the powers for her characters? Kelley said she always though about which powers would bring her characters the most trouble and then she went with those. I asked her what made her decide to start writing for the YA genre? Kelley said she starting thinking about it around the time her daughter turn 13 as she then had a teenager she could openly observe, LOL. Also she found out many tweens were interested in reading her adult Otherworld series and wanted to write something which would include younger characters and be directed at them. Soon after, Twilight blew up and then she had a deal for two more books. Kelley's YA books have quickly become her most popular series and its why she's now locked in with her publisher for a total of 9 books, which could also easily turn into 12.

Lastly we all lined up to to get our books signed, there was a total limit of 5, so the line moved rather slow, but it was well worth the wait. Kelley was so lovely, I thanked her for coming and told her good luck, plus I got to take a picture with her! Please ignore the fact that I look about 12 in it, LOL! I bought all 5 of my books from the Barnes & Noble where the event was being held, I think its so important to support the stores when they are holding signings so they can do more in the future. Unfortunately there weren't any other YA book bloggers there, but I did met some really nice people.

I hope you all enjoyed reading about my experience at the signing. I really hope to attend another one soon, but I'll just have to wait and see which authors are headed my way next. Thanks for stopping by and I'm always glad to hear from you, so leave your comments below.