This is a repeat of what happened last year, but with some differences. Last year I drove by myself to Sydney to attend the Book Fair Australia and I had the best time. Last year I wandered through the entire hall and looked at, or spoke to, every single stall on the Saturday. On the Sunday I went back and bought the books. This year I drove with my Travelling Companion who let me attend Book Fair Australia on the Saturday by myself, but joined me on the Sunday. This year I bought books on both days. Books are heavy.
Last year there were about 104 stalls, mostly with books, but this includes graphic novels, comics and book related stuff such skulls and dragons. This year there were about 190. That’s an increase of almost 100%, totally insane growth. It just proves that reading is important. Well, it proves to me that reading is important, I’m sure I’m not biased.
Last year I bought 15 books. Four of them were earmarked to go into a box for giving out to people for Christmas gifts. I bought them from Story Factory which provides after school writing workshops for school children. They had published the children’s stories in anthologies and it felt like this would be a good thing to give to other children to encourage them to write. I’m fairly certain there’s a similar program happening in Melbourne, but I haven’t sought them out yet.
At 26 books I’ve not quite doubled my loot from last year. I’m ignoring the fact that I sold most of my button badge collection to a guy in Sydney, brought them with me in the car, he gave me one of his books he’s written about badges. I will enjoy that book more than once, I do like looking at badges. I was also bought a cookbook, and went into the QBD in Parramatta where I only bought one book, although I was given another book free. If I include those four books I’m taking home 30 books.
Does this seem excessive? Possibly, but I will read most of them during the year. Yes, I haven’t read all the books I bought last year, but I’ve also attended a number of mini conventions during the year and bought books at most of them. After this weekend I’m going to try and set aside time most days to read. It’s good for my soul, or maybe good for the author’s souls, either way it’s a good thing to do. Even half an hour will be good.
Is 190 stalls too many? Certainly not, I’m not sure how many is too many, but 190 is fine. Too many might be if they have to move locations, or if the admin becomes too hard. Not sure, that’s something for the admin team to talk about.
I just remember when I was young reading was frowned on. I was the odd person as I admitted to reading. Now, to attend something like this and find thousands of people there looking for books and finding their tribe was just amazing.
I only attended two talks this year, as opposed to none last year. My friend, Annie McCann, interviewed Shaun Micallef. If you’ve not seen Micallef on any one of his comedy programs over the years then you’ve really missed out. He’s very funny, and very clever.
I also sat in on a panel. Deciding to sit there in that audience was interesting. I sat down for a bit to eat in the middle of the day. A lady came by and sat with me. We got talking as happens and apparently I said some things that helped her. I sat in the audience at this panel because of her. It was an interesting discussion on finding your tribe. The same discussion could be had for writers, readers, artists, in fact any type of hobby. Whatever you do, it’s better to do it with friends, like-minded people who can admire or give constructive criticism about what you’ve done. Together we can be better.
One thing I found odd. Some people remembered me from last year. Some times it was because of my up-front request for no romance, other times it was for the wings on my stick. The other times? I’ve no idea. I didn’t think I was particularly memorable, but it’s always hard to judge these things for oneself.
This year I met more people I previously met on the Book Fair Australia Discord Server. It’s great to meet up with people I know, even if I only know them by their words on screen. We may not speak much at the Book Fair, but that’s fine, we’ll catch up during the year on Discord.
Yes, I had the best time at the Book Fair Australia this year. Will I go again next year? I certainly hope so, but the future is so hard to predict. Next time I hope to do more panels, or interviews, they are such fun. It is such a great place to meet and talk to new authors, to talk to authors you’ve read before and to make new friends.
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