Book Bonanza 2019 Wrap-Up Post!

You guys, the second annual Book Bonanza was awesome!  I had a blast, and met almost every single author I wanted to meet.  I met my two biggest unicorn authors, unicorns is a theme you'll see for this event.  The resort they had it at this year was very impressive.  Expensive to stay, but totally worth it.  They're planning to have Book Bonanza there the next few years I think, so that is cool.  It was the Gaylord Texan resort.

Be prepared to scroll for all the awesome author goodness below!

Checking in we had really cool key cards waiting for us:

Here are some pictures from inside the first night we got there and had dinner:

My stepmom went with  me.  This was as we were waiting for our food.

Here's a view to my side that night.  It would have been cool to stay in one of these rooms and sit and people watch, but I guess they might have been a bit more expensive.  I might think about one of these rooms next time I go.

Here I am that first night waiting for my dinner.  Wearing my Book Bonanza 2018 shirt.

You guys, those chips were so good!  And the cheese dip!  I took the extra we had back to our hotel room. But unfortunately we didn't have a microwave in the room, and I didn't feel like carrying it downstairs to the little store to heat it up. So I had to leave it behind and didn't get to enjoy that yumminess again.  I'm drooling a bit now as I think about the taste of them together.


Just like last year we got an awesome bag full of swag, a new t-shirt, and even new books!

  This year not only did we get a tote bag, we got a little drawstring backpack. As you can see, unicorns on them!  I got a few little author ribbons the first day as well.

These are the books we got in our swag bag this year.  I'm really excited about the Lauren Rowe book, I've had my eye on int for a while.  Not sure about that Meredith Wild one, I might pass it on in a giveaway.


The first morning started with a opening event where we got to hear Colleen Hoover, Anna Todd, Caroline Kepnes and E.L. James talk about their books and their books being turned into movies or tv shows.

That was followed by three fun panel sessions - with six choices at each hour session, although some crazy people at the convention were lined up waiting to get in to see the authors for autographs instead.  Which was a little annoying since they said you couldn't line up until 2 hours before, and that was like 5 hours before, and is probably why I didn't get to see Anna Todd and Hero Fiennes.

The first panel I went to was about audiobooks and not only had some of my favorite authors, but also a couple narrators from one of their books that I love!  On the left is one of the narrators from Penny Reid's Winston Brother series.  Then Helena Hunting, JA Huss, Amy Daws, Cora Carmack, another of the narrators from the Winston Brothers series and Corinne Michaels at the end.  Penny Reid actually was the moderator for the panel. Johnathan McClain was supposed to be there as well, but he ended up being unable to make the whole convention because of a death in his family.

The second panel I attended was called Giving Us the Giggles, and all the authors there not only write hilarious stories, but they are just as hilarious in person to listen to when they are just hanging out!  The moderators were the two authors at the far left in this picture, the two authors who make up the writing duo of Max Monroe. And while I've never read them before, after this panel I went to their table in the autograph session and not only met them, but bought three of their books to give them a try.  I mean, it was $15 a book, or buy two get one three, so yeah, how could I not buy three?  The authors in order of the picture above are RS Grey, Amy Daws, BB Easton, Sara Ney, and Meghan Quinn.    Oh my gosh, the funniest stories from them, and this was a great panel.  All those people sitting in line for the autograph session missed out on some good times.

  The third panel I chose to go to was the second Audiobook panel, and I had to go because I wanted to see/meet Andi Arndt, a favorite narrator of mine.  Otherwise, this session might have been one I would have skipped out on.  Nothing against the other authors there, but it was not as great as the first two for me.  From left to right in the picture are Aiden Snow - a narrator, Robinne Lee - author and she narrated her own book, Jessica Hawkins, Eric Asher - science fiction author, Andi Arndt - narrator, and Lexi Blake. Julia Whelan was there as well. 

After the panels there was a sack lunch that was part of our convention fees, which was nice.   My stepmom and I took our lunch up to our room and ate in peace and a chance to just be comfortable.  I also hadn't brought the books I wanted signed down with me to the panels, in order to save myself from carrying them any more than I had to. While I did make my own autograph book, it's just almost impossible to not take some books to get signed.  Here is a picture of my autograph book if you didn't see it in my July wrap-up post earlier this month:

Now, on to my awesome first autograph day's autograph and author meeting session.  Although we had to wait so long just to get in. The line wrapped clear around the hotel and almost over to the elevators to get to my wing of the hotel that first day.  Enough about that craziness,  let's get to the goodies!

While I was waiting in line for the first author, I saw narrator Andi Arndt walk by and I got her to take a picture with me.

Even though I've only read one book by Mary Ting, Jaclyn and the Beanstalk, I still needed to meet her!

I had my picture taken again with Daisy Prescott, loved her Tinfoil Hearts book.  I had to tell her that I was a Believer!

While I met R.C. Boldt last year at Book Bonanza, I hadn't yet read her book. But I bought Clam Jam from her and read it and loved it, so had to get my picture with her this year.

As always I had to go see K. Bromberg.  Of course I also put in a pre-order with her that I had to pick up too.

It's been a few years since I read any books by Carly Phillips, but this was my first chance to meet her!

So far I've only read one book by Avery Flynn, Parental Guidance, but it was pretty good.  So I had to meet her.

I met J.D. Hollyfield at Kinky in Kansas City a few years ago, and really enjoyed her books, but didn't get my picture with her until this year.

I've read Karla Sorensen's story in my Cocktales anthology, but hadn't read any of her other books yet. However I think she has one in the SmartyPants romance series, called Baking Me Crazy, that I hope to read.

As always I have to get my picture with Amy Daws, especially since I had my t-shirt on that is about her books!

So I got my picture with Michelle Mankin again, author of Rock F*ck Club, and one of her cover models was there.  I didn't get his name though, oops!  He doesn't look quite so rock star hot here though, he's still a cutie!

And finally, my unicorn author for the whole event, Penny Reid!  I was so afraid I wouldn't get to meet her, she is one of those awesome authors that spend time talking to each fan/reader, and her line was just taking so long.  But she said she would stay until she got everyone who had gotten a wristband, and she sped up towards the end of the first session.  And when I tried to be nice and quick and just get a picture by leaning over the table for someone to take a picture of us together, she insisted I deserved a picture just like she'd done with everyone else.  So I couldn't say no!  She was so sweet and nice, and even though originally she was just going to be there Friday night signing, she ended up coming back Saturday morning to try to get to all the readers who wanted to meet her.  Even more fun was the cardboard cutouts she had of her Winston brother characters that had changeable clothes.  And her two audiobook narrators were there, so I got their autographs as well.  here are the cardboard cutouts:

She said she's thinking of putting the character designs onto buttons or t-shirts or something we can buy them on!   

The swag I picked up on day 1:

I did my best to not buy too much, and this was it for the first day.

Cockpit was a pre-order, the top three were the Max Monroe books I bought, and then I couldn't resist this SmartyPants romance book that was available early!  It's not supposed to be out until October.  Plus, it is a library theme/setting, so had to have it.  

I also pre-ordered this event souvenir Book Beau, even though I don't really use one, because it was just too cool!

On to day 2!

I had to stop by and see Kansas City author Sierra Simone.

And of course I had to see Helena Hunting again, I love her books so much!  I also had a pre-order to pick up with her.  

I loved the book Dumplin' so jumped at the chance to meet the author of that one, Julie Murphy.

I loved The Wrong Game by Kandi Steiner, so I had to meet her!

Had to meet Kendall Ryan, author of Bro Code.

So I thought it would be neat to have my picture taken with Sara Ney and Meghan Quinn together, since the book I was getting signed, Love, Sincerely Yours, was the one they wrote together.  They kind of squished me between them, they were so silly!  But they were excited because no one else had asked them to do a photo together yet!

And my unicorn author of day two, that I was so afraid I might not get to meet was Ilsa Madden-Mills.  But I was able to, and it made me so happy!

I actually met and talked to a lot more authors, but as the lines seemed to be crazier, I often skipped the pictures.  So there are a lot I don't have to share.  Like I got to see Kylie Scott again, but her line was so crazy I didn't spend the time getting another picture with her.  Now, let's look at the swag and the things I bought on the second day.

So the amount of swag from day 2 was crazy!!!  Some of this I actually sent along to my friend Sara who was supposed to go with me, but since she got an awesome job with MacMillan Publishing a few weeks ago, she was unable to go.

I found another book from the SmartyPants series that was also in the library part of the series that was available already, so I had to buy it!  And Katie Ashley also had a deal on her books, so I bought two and got one free.  But since I'm not much of a MC romance, I may do a giveaway for Vicious Cycle.  Pucks and Penalties was my pre-order. Then I saw a physical copy of the Team Player anthology, which I never got to finish reading, so I had to buy the humongous book.  And I had actually pre-ordered a bunch of the candles, but had to cancel that order.  So I ended up buying a few when they put them on clearance at the end of the day on Saturday.

I decided to buy one of the Bookworm Box packages that had a chance of having passes to next year, and got an awesome book, one of my favorite authors, Emma Hart.  Along with buying that I got three free books, the three on the bottom by Tamara Hanscom.  Those may be part of a giveaway as well!  I also had to buy the BB19 Christmas ornament since I have the one for BB18.  

I'll have to skip Book Bonanza 2020 because it will once again be in August, and I had to finagle a bit with my Principal in order to miss the first two days of school this year. But in 2021 it is supposed to be during the summer again, so I'll have to try to go again then.  

If you get the chance next year, I highly recommend going. The resort is so cool and the authors are great and it is so much fun to be surrounded by so many fellow book lovers!

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Book Bonanza 2018 Recap

So the last two days have been both awesome as well as mega-crazy.  There were so many awesome authors to meet, but there were also so many fans there to meet them!  I've been to a few different book conventions, BEA, Romantic Times Convention, NOLA StoryCon, Apollycon, Kinky in Kansas City, and last month, ALA.  This weekend was the first ever Book Bonanza, and I'd say it was a pretty neat experience, even if it definitely had some growing pains that will hopefully be easy to fix before they, hopefully, have the 2nd one next year!  In fact, by the end of today's last signing time, things seemed to really be going pretty smoothly!  While I didn't get the chance to go meet a lot of authors I didn't already know, I got to meet or visit with all of my top planned authors. 

This is going to be a looooooooonnnnngggg post.  Lots of pictures!  

Below is a picture of all the planning I did from the beginning list of authors I had until late last night when I was trying to streamline the final two signing times based on what I'd learned at the first one.

Last minute purchases of post-it notes and highlighters - needed because what I did have was at school and I couldn't get to over the summer because of construction.  A pad of regular size post-its from a fellow BB attendee that was very useful in marking my name on the pages I wanted signed by the authors.

When I got to Denver and went to registration on Thursday night, I got this awesome tote bag filled with all these goodies.  Now, for some reason I got a 4XL sized t-shirt, which was way big for me. But the awesomeness and organization that went into this made me able to stop back by the registration desk on Friday morning to switch it out for the XL that was the actual size I needed.

Here is a video I took of the book I made to get autographed when it arrived a week before the convention.

Book Bonanza Attendee Group on Facebook

All the book bloggers were invited to meet with the Bookworm Box to talk about how we can work together to help them promote what they do, especially since what they do is all in a great support for different charities.  Here is the picture of all of us after that movie.

There were some awesome panels.  I took a couple pictures.

Rachel Hollis panel - She was such a great motivational speaker!
Jenga Writing - From A to B:  This panel had some great ideas to help with writing.  Authors included:  Rebecca Donovan, Kenzie Hart, Rachel Higginson, and KA Tucker.	Words and Cliches We Love to Hate - How do you avoid the slippery slope?  And then we had the awesome and hilarious panel where it was discussed the words that we all cringe over such as moist, turgid. The authors talked about their preferred terms for body parts, etc. and other funny things about writing sex scenes.  Authors on this panel included:  Willow Aster, K Bromberg, JD Hollyfield, Raine Miller, and Tabatha Vargo.

Next are all the books!  Even though as I showed above I made my own book to get signed so that I wouldn't have to carry a bunch of books around, well, let's just say my weakness showed when there were book to buy.  I mean, I drove, so it's not like I have to worry about how to get the books back.  Just don't probably need them all?  But you know, they're books!

So these are the free books I got. The bottom two from Book Bonanza just for coming!

These are the books I brought that I got signed.  You can see my book I made at the top.  In the middle you've got Cocktales and Felony Ever After both had multiple authors for me to get.

These are the books I bought.  Only 11, that's not horrible, right?  Two on the top are coloring books, and then another two are ones I'd read as e-galleys and wanted a physical copy to get signed.

And then there is all the awesome swag!!

Cool pens.  Yeah, the top one is from Meghan Quinn.  It is what it looks like.	Bookmarks galore!
Cool buttons.	Lots of stickers!  Some temporary tattoos, which are cool, but I'd rather have them as stickers to keep on my blogging calendar.
Then there were the interesting odds and ends of random type of swag. Some coasters, a tote bag, bracelets, fans, candy, magnets, post-its, and more!	Of course there were the cool postcards and even a signed picture of one of the cover models.

Other than the t-shirt that came with the tote-bag for the event, I was able to get another free one from the Bookworm Box, as well as I bought a shirt with a cool Outlander quote.

Free shirt from Bookworm Box!

Cool Outlander quote t-shirt from The Bookish Shop.

Okay, now, here is the reason I really had to attend Book Bonanza as soon as I heard about it, all the awesome authors!  Some I'd never met but am now in LOVE with their books, and others that I'd read a story by and wanted to read more, and finally ones that I'd met before, but still LOVE all their books and had to say hi to again.  There will be a lot!  So hopefully you don't get bored and enjoy looking at them!

Had to find Amy Daws right away!	Kami Garcia.  I've met her before, but only have a picture with her and Margaret Stohl, so now I have one with just her!
Helena Hunting was one of my MUST meet authors!  She was so nice, and so fun to talk to.  Her husband was there and he was nice as well!	Celia Aaron was there Friday night, wasn't expecting her till Saturday.  Loved her husband's shirt which said "I make Celia Aaron moist.  Ask me how."  He said no one had asked him yet.  I was not going to be the first one.
Sara Ney was another MUST meet author.  Also sat in on a panel with her that I forgot to take a picture of.  But she was a blast!	Yet another MUST meet author was Cambria Hebert.  Also, I'd lost my sunglasses when I went to register on Thursday night.  I was saved from having to either drive to find a Target, or buy the $25 ones in the hotel gift shop because she had some for swag giveaways - bonus - they were pink!
Aleatha Romig was another MUST meet author.  She was so excited that there were so many people in her line she ended up having to have wristbands because the line got so long.	I'd only read one by Daisy Prescott, but she was also in my Cocktales anthology, and there was one of her books, Tinfoil Heart, that I've wanted to read ever since I did a blog promo post for it. So, I bought it.
Shirl Rickman, I've only read one of her books, but did enjoy it, so had to go meet her as well.	Now, I met Michelle Mankin earlier this year at Kinky in Kansas City, but since I hadn't read her books yet, I didn't get a picture then. But now that I have, and loved it, I had to get a picture with her.
Had to meet Rachel Hollis and get the book I bought at work last week, Girl Wash Your Face, signed.  Haven't read it yet, but her keynote speech was so good that I can't wait to start!	So, you've probably noticed all the reviews for books in the Man of the Month  series that I've done throughout the first months of 2018.  I had to meet J. Kenner. When I told her I loved the series and would need to read on, she suggested that I needed to try her Stark trilogy, and gave me the first book to read!  That was so awesome!  So that will be a book I read soon!
Jana Aston was one I really wanted to meet, she had her own page in my book that I made, with a quote that I love from that book.  I ended up buying Good Girl, because I've heard so much about it!	So, Meghan March was one of my MUST meet authors.  But as of Friday night, I was scared I might not get to meet her, because she had so many people they handed out wrist-bands, and didn't get through them all. So they were going to start the next day, and they said they wouldn't be handing out any more.  Friday night, around 11:45 pm, 15 minutes before the end of that first signing time, I was sharing my sadness about not getting to meet her at all, and the person in line in front of me gave me her wristband so I could meet her on Saturday!  Book people are the best.  Now, they did end up doing new wristbands, so I probably would have been okay, but this was still awesome!
Audrey Carlan was high up on my list to meet, and she brought the cover model from her new series with her!	I've only read/listened to one book by JA Huss, and I haven't even had a chance to review it on my blog  But, when I was able to get a wristband to go ahead and meet this author, I was very excited!  Plus, they were giving away copies of the new book, Sexpert, that I can't wait to read!
So, I've met Jay Crownover before, and wasn't going to worry if I didn't get to see her again, but as you can see, I did!  And since we always seem to have the photos with the crazy mouth, I saved that one.  I suck at it, while she always looks so cool!	Rachel Van Dyken was one I was really hoping to meet, and I did!  I accidentally left my copy of Cocktales at her table, and didn't realize it for awhile.  I was so close to tears until I had gone back to a lot of the tables I'd visited, and when I got to her table, it was there!  Yay!
I was lucky enough to slip in and see Abby Glines when she stayed into part of the 2nd Saturday signing to finish up the wristbands she didn't get to in the first signing that same day.  Love the photo bomb, by her daughter?	Yes, I've met K. Bromberg before, but I LOVE her books, and am so excited for Passionflix's movie of her book Driven, which comes out in August.  Plus I'm on her audiobook review team, so I had to go see her if I could.  And she seemed to remember me by name!  Coolest thing!
So, Meghan Quinn was a MUST meet for me, especially since she was the only author I'd done a pre-order with.  But getting a wristband to see her?  Well, let's just say that was crazy.  But I finally got over to meet her, and she was really cool!	And while I've met Anna Todd before, I really wanted to see her again and talk about the After movie that is now starting to film.  I think she was probably busy and tired by this time, she was still sweet, but not quite as bubbly and friendly as when I met her the first time.  You can tell by my picture here though, I was sweaty and tired, so I'm sure everyone else was as well.

Okay, this was an awesome event!  I'm hoping to attend next year, but we'll see.  I also hope to get to sell my house and move next year, so we'll see how I'm doing financially as well as time-wise.  

A fun time, but I was so exhausted when I got back to my hotel room Saturday night that my body just ached all over.  I had marks on my shoulders from carrying bags full of books all day, two days kind of.  So I didn't go back to the event hotel across the street for the concert.  Maybe if I'd been staying there, but now I'm in my room and just relaxing.  

I drive back tomorrow, but am happy to get to sleep in a bit.  Friday morning wasn't horrible, just got up about 7:30 am, but this morning I had to get up about 6 am in order to get in line for the 8 am signing.  I wasn't ready for school morning time yet.  It's not August!

Oh yeah, I forgot to talk about the awesome food trucks!  They had food trucks for us outside for breakfast, lunch, and dinner both Friday and Saturday.  I had them for all three on Friday, but on Saturday, I didn't make it out there.  I wasn't over in time to get breakfast and still get a good place in line on Saturday.  Then, they weren't going to start serving lunch till 11, and I was ready to get something to eat earlier so I could get back to get my last few authors from the first signing on Saturday, so I ate at the restaurant in the Marriott.  Then for dinner tonight, I just went to the restaurant at my own hotel.  I was going to just do room-service, I was that sore and tired, but needed some ibuprofen, so I had to leave my room for that anyway.

Food Truck Pictures:

These waffle cakes were to die for!! This one was a banana Nutella.

Friday's lunch was from this Mac and Cheese Truck.

This was my Cheddar Mac with Bacon.

I had pizza Friday night, but didn't take a picture to share.  Sorry!

As I said above, a great time!  You should keep your ears open for next year's info!