Howdy!

Spring break has finally arrived and so I’m taking a break from doing nothing to recap an awesome weekend. A first annual Comic Con was hosted in my area this past weekend and I got to participate as a vendor! This was exciting on so many different levels. First- I’ve never been to a Comic Con before and I’ve always wanted to go. Check! Second- My first copies of The Wildcat of Braeton arrived the day before Con began! Third- My older sister came in with my best friend ever to help me out! My artist sister is also in town on spring break so she kept me company two of the three days and I got to brag on her to Con goers.

    Me and my sister Jocelyn! She’s an amazing artist and just an OK sister. 😛

This is my best friend Paige! We roomed together at A&M and have no shame as overly attached best friends. She moonlights these days as a car salesman and she did an outstanding job of luring people in to the booth and helping me make the sell.

Apparently I don’t have any pictures with my other sister. Whoops! But she’s awesome too!

Recap

The Con went from Friday evening to Sunday evening. We put in two long days on Saturday and Sunday but it was most definitely worth it! I sold over a hundred books (The Rise of Aredor and The Wildcat of Braeton combined)! We also did prints of my sister’s artwork from the books and that went over really well. I had a LARPer stop by and gush over the phoenix picture for five minutes straight. He and his wife bought both books and with a heavy heart (not!) I cut them a deal on all four full sized prints. I think they were some of my favorite customers.

There was a wide variety of people there. We’re in a smaller town so everybody wanted to come out and see what the event was like! Visitors to my booth ranged from about 11 years to probably around 65 years. It’s always interested to see what people like to read. It was a good feeling to hand over a book to a younger kid who said they don’t really like to read but they were interested in my book. It was great to see people’s faces, especially the younger kids, light up or show a lot of interest as I gave them the verbal synopsis. The kids seemed to like it when I got to the part where I compare the second half of The Rise of Aredor to Robin Hood. Thanks again Robin Hood- stealing from the rich and giving to the poor!

I did get a little warm and fuzzy inside when people returned throughout the Con telling me how much they like the first book and wanted to buy the second. I had one girl tell me she was only 50 pages in and absolutely loved it so far so she had to get the second book. Her mom stopped by later and almost thanked me for the books, saying her daughter doesn’t usually like to read but she’s loving my books. And then to hear the director of the Con tell me he heard people talking about me around the building? My mind basically got blown. I had someone recognize from another signing in the area. Another guy saw the ad my publisher had put in the paper saying I’d be there. Some friends of my sister stopped by to get the second book. I was pretty overwhelmed. It was a great experience. I think I gained some new fans. I got some good advice from another author and from a veteran Con-goer. Per his advice I think I will start up a newsletter sign up sheet for people to keep up with me. There were some awesome cosplayers there. Unfortunately I didn’t get a picture with the giant Dalek. 😦 I chatted with some hopeful writers and hoped I gave them the right advice! It was a ton of fun and I really hope I can participate again next year!

Cosplay Pictures!

Deathstroke stopped by-

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So did Deadpool. My sister actually had to tell me who it was because the only exposure I’ve had to Deadpool is the Wolverine movie and he didn’t look like this.

 

I don’t play Halo but this guy (who’s a friend of my sister) made his costume! He’s also read the first book!

 

 

 

 

 

 

This guy made his costume. I asked him who he was and he said an original character! The mouth of the headpiece was hinged and moved so it looked like the dragon was talking!

And since I was wearing a dragon shirt (actually for the BBC Merlin show) I had to take a picture with Daenerys!