The Weekend I YALC-ed for the First Time
It’s been a while since I last blogged as life has been crazy (in all the right ways!). But I have a few minutes sitting here on the couch, drinking tea, so I thought I’d try and catch up with a blog post or two, as this week has been full of brilliantness, which began with a trip to YALC at the weekend.
If you haven’t heard of YALC I should explain that it’s not the onomatopoeic name for a mass vomit-fest, it’s the acronym for the first ever large-scale Young Adult Literature Convention in the UK. It was organised largely by superhuman Children’s Laureate Malorie Blackman, who had the inspired idea to make it part of the London Film and Comic Con, adding a brilliant surreal note to the event. Check out my friend Sarah Sky (author of the ‘Jessica Cole: Model Spy’ series) making new con buddies.
I have to confess that despite having tickets for both days I chickened out of Saturday’s event as my Twitter feed was full of people commenting on the heat and the crowds. I strongly suspect I was a pickled sardine in a former life/death as I have an intense phobia of being squashed among other bodies . . .
I have been known to freak-out rather foolishly in large groups of people even when those people don’t include Darth Vader, Malificent and Hell Boy. So I bypassed Earl’s Court arena and headed 5 minutes away to the pub garden at the Troubadour, where we had our own mini YALC among the fairy lights and strawberry daiquiris (from left to right: Marieka Nijkamp, Dawn Kurtagich, lovely ‘Luna’ from ‘Luna’s Little Library’, Kat Ellis and my favourite crit buddy, Tatum Flynn).
On Sunday, I conquered my sardiney-squeamishness and braved the conference. I’m so glad I did, because I met some wonderful people including:
-My friend Shazia from university, who I haven’t seen for 10 years and is now part of the Book Trust and was as funny as ever
-Lindsay Moakes, who became my instant best mate for life by lending me her Converse when my stupid shoes broke
-Bloggers Jim and Debbie who were full of great book recommendations
-Authors Keris, Liz, Beth, Gary, Sophie, Suzie, Sarah and others whose names I have very rudely forgotten, who gave good book chat
I went to three fantastic panel discussions:
1)The ‘I’m too sexy for this book’ panel, featuring Cat Clarke, Non Pratt, Beth Reekles, and James Dawson, which was innuendo-tastic and as hilarious as you’d expect from a discussion featuring repeated use of the phrase “alternative hole use.“
2)The “Crossover: not just for kids” panel, featuring Nick Lake, Matt Haig, Meg Rossoff, David ‘Hello Stan Lee’ Maybury and Anthony ‘Death Wish’ McGowan, who made the interesting decision to criticise fantasy fans who dress up in costumes in a room full of fantasy fans dressed in costumes.
3)The “Sisters doing it for themselves” panel, featuring Tanya Byrne, Isobel Harrop, Julie Mayhew, Holly Smale and Sarra Manning, which was soundbite-tastic: ‘Bad girls are more interesting – we’re only a few bad decisions away from disaster’ (Tanya ‘fab hair’ Byrne), ‘There is so much pressure on women to be perfect. Authors don’t help if all their characters are shiny and perfect.’ (Holly ‘really rather perfect’ Smale)
I could waffle on endlessly about what a magical time I had and how wonderful all children’s/teen booky people are (even Anthony McGowan). But the sun is shining outside, so all that’s left for me to say is that the conference was brilliant and I can’t wait for the next one. YAY YALC!
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