Archive for May, 2019

May 23 2019

Weekend Sketches

Published by under appearances,authors,sketchbook

I did a lot of sketching at events last weekend.

Thursday – Politics & Prose hosted two incredible writers of short stories, Karen Russell and Ted Chiang, moderated by Everdeen Mason.

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Friday – Hyattsville started its Summer Jam series with live music by The Roustabouts (including my neighbor Pete Daniels on fiddle.)

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Saturday – Gaithersburg Book Festival was excellent as always. I did a panel first thing in the morning with Megan Whalen Turner, and then stuck around and sketched some of the other cartoonists (Alex Graudins, Andy Hirsch, Dave Roman, Michael Cavna, and Malaka Gharib).

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May 10 2019

The Iliad Tour is Complete!

Published by under appearances,iliad,travel

I’m back from San Francisco, and with that the Iliad tour is complete. I want to note that I still have some upcoming events, listed below, and then I’ll give a quick recap of how the tour went (in summary: awesome). Read on if you’re interested!

5/18 – Gaithersburg Book Festival, Gaithersburg MD
6/21-6/24 – ALA Annual, Washington DC (table 3909)
7/6-7/7 – Nerd Camp MI
11/22-11/24 – NCTE, Baltimore MD (booth 341)
Event Recap
DC Events: An incredible launch party at Vigilante Coffee in Hyattsville, with approximately 150 people!
Vigilante Alison pano
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That same week, a lovely school visit and public event with The Curious Iguana, Urbana High School, and Delaplaine Arts Center.
Curious Urbana Curious Iguana
A wonderful event at the Takoma Park MD Library – with great photos by Maurice Belanger.
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Boston Events: Porter Square Books was packed with long-time friends and supporters.
Boston Porter Square
An Unlikely Story has the best event space of any store I know, and a very good crowd came out, PLUS I got to meet one of my personal fav illustrators of comics and children’s books, LeYuen Pham, for the first time. She makes me look lazy by drawing a portrait in every book – in this case a double portrait!
Boston Unlikely Story
Unlikely Story Gareth & LeUyen pham portrait
Then it was off to the LA Times Book Fest (no pics of that, sadly) and the Texas Library Association (here’s their “Texas Tea” which was a sort of speed-dating with tables full of librarians).
Austin TX Tea
Then the last leg: San Francisco, or rather, the area around SF Bay. First, Mrs. Dalloway’s in Berkeley (in conversation with Pam Turner, author of Samurai Rising and many other great nonfiction books):
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We had a brief window to visit to SF itself and do touristy stuff. Here’s an obligatory selfie, and I found and signed my books at Book Passage (in the Ferry Building).
SF-02 Golden Gate SF-01 Book Passage
The tour finished off with Books Inc, Kepler’s, and Hicklebee’s. This is Books Inc. in Mountain View:
SF-05-Books Inc SF-06 Books Inc SF-07 Books Inc
Kepler’s:
SF-10 Keplers SF-11 Keplers
And Hicklebees:
SF-12 Hicklebees SF-14 Hicklebees SF-15 Hicklebees
Below is the full list of places I went. Sadly I didn’t get any good pictures from my events at Left Bank, Politics & Prose or Bank Street Books, but those were lovely events too.

2/28-3/1 – Write To Learn, Osage Beach MO

3/4 – Left Bank Books, St. Louis MO

3/12 – Politics & Prose, Washington DC (official launch date!)

3/13 – The Curious Iguana / Delaplaine Arts Center, Frederick MD

3/15 – Local Launch Party, Vigilante Coffee in Hyattsville MD

3/18 – Takoma Park, MD Library

3/21 – Bank Street Books, NY, NY

3/24 – An Unlikely Story, Plainville MA

3/25 – Porter Square Books, Cambridge MA

4/4 – State of MD Literacy Association, Baltimore MD

4/13 – LA Times Festival of Books

4/17 – Texas Library Association, Austin TX

4/27 – Mrs. Dalloway’s, Berkeley CA (with Pamela Turner)

5/1 – Books Inc., Mountain View CA

5/2 – Kepler’s Books, Menlo Park, CA

5/3 – Hicklebee’s Books, San Jose, CA

 

…Plus a dozen school visits. Whew!! It was a blast, and it’s good to be home. Thanks for reading!

 

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