Haunted Tour in Phoenix

Thank you, Phoenix, for an absolutely phenomenal first leg of the HAUNTED mini tour!
Weather couldn't have been better; the city and suburbs were filled with baseball fans for the start of Spring Training, and I met readers and teachers and booksellers and librarians who are all totally and wonderfully committed to literacy, reading, and supporting authors and books. Librarian Greg Kinder, the teen event coordinator at the Velma Teague Library in Glendale is passionate about kids and books. Tracy Weaver, whose AP English class I visited at Mountain View HS in Mesa has a happy room filled with posters and books and absolutely wonderful, brilliant students, well-versed in literature, folklore and mythology! And the people, esp. Robyn, at Changing Hands in Tempe (where I'm at my signing table above) run the best indie in the city! You guys all rocked my world! That and happy hour at BLT in Paradise Valley - where I ate a popover as big as my head with butter and sea salt - made for a wonderful trip. Plus did you know that my KIA rental car had roll down windows? :)


Here I am below with Robyn at Changing Hands

Below is me and Tracy Weaver in her classroom at Mountain View HS in Mesa. I even got my
very own AP English t-shirt

Below is me at Velma Teague Library in Glendale, with Greg Kinder. Thank you to all the teens and college students and also adults, who came to listen to me read and to the wonderful bookseller from Barnes and Noble who supplied books for the event!

In Which I visit the kid in Phoenix and Sign at Changing Hands

Family pumpkin carving in AZ. Mine's the middle one.
Presenting AZ Blogger Shellie with her signed Dreaming Anastasia

What I didn't eat at the State Fair

Talking Dreaming Anastasia at Changing Hands

Dreaming Anastasia at Changing Hands in Tempe AZ

So the trip didn't start out too well - 2 hours sitting on the plane at the gate in Houston while maintenance tinkered with a part in the cockpit. Long enough that I graded two sets of essays, drank my complimentary cup of ice water (oh c'mon folks - isn't 2 hours at the gate enough for say, a Diet Coke?), watched all of The Proposal with Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds and chatted with a delightful history prof from England, who'd been sitting on planes since Heathrow and was resigned to it all.

But after that - what a great weekend!

To whit:

• Visited with son and girlfriend and the adorable Bernie the dog - the best mutt in the world.
  
• Signed Dreaming Anastasia at Changing Hands bookstore in Tempe - an amazingly wonderous indie that you must support if you are ever in town. They had graciously pushed me into their schedule for an hour and I was even able to present blogger Shellie of Layers of Thought http://www.layersofthought.net/ with the signed copy of Dreaming Anastasia she'd won through Book Butterfly's contest! Some other interested folks dropped by; I signed stock, and I do believe a good time was had by all.


• Visited the AZ State Fair and debated on eating the deep-fried bacon, but instead consumed part of a corn dog and all of something called Dole Whip which is pineapple soft serve yumminess! Other than the food, we watched sheep shearing, llama obstacle course, and other assorted ag stuff. Played a few midway games. I lost. Kellie won an orange stuffed lobster by tossing ping pong balls in a bowl.


• Did the official family pumpkin carving event. Everyone lied and pretended that my pumpkin didn't suck. You can judge for yourself above.


• Ate and shopped and generally enjoyed the wonderful AZ fall weather.

And now I'm home. Back to school. Back to grading. Back to writing. Onward it goes. Sam Houston State Conference coming up 11/7. Chicago mini tour coming after that. What a crazy wonderful fall! I am totally thankful for it all.

Til next time...