I had the pleasure of being a part of two very cool events this past weekend. (I also had the pleasure of enjoying the lovely warm Texas weather — very chilly back here in Toronto!)

On Friday, I flew to Houston. I got my first thrill before I even got on the plane: I found The Way We Fall face out in the airport bookstore!

The event in Houston was TeenBookCon, an amazing conference for teen readers (as well as adult fans of teen fiction). I met with a couple dozen wonderful authors at the reception at the beautiful Blue Willow Bookshop on Friday night, which you can see pictures of here.

On Saturday we zipped off to the high school where TeenBookCon was being held. More than a thousand enthusiastic readers showed up! I was on the Dystopia Rising panel with Michael Grant and Marissa Meyer, and we had a full room every session (you can see only part of the audience below):

I may have gotten a little over-excited seeing a girl in the front row holding Give Up The Ghost during the first session. 😉 The teens asked a lot of thoughtful questions which led to some in-depth conversations about books, writing, and publishing.

And of course we had to take a picture with all the authors and the conference organizers:

(More pics from TeenBookCon here.)

The next day, I left Houston with fellow Hyperion authors Robin Mellom and Inara Scott to zip over to Austin, where we had a school event planned for Monday. When we got together for dinner after checking in, we all squeed about the incredibly lovely surprise we each had waiting for us in our rooms: a tray of treats including an edible version of our book covers!

We arrived at Hill Country Middle School in style, to a parking spot specially reserved for us:

Inside we found huge stacks of books waiting to be signed…

…as well as three teen book bloggers who interviewed us, and a large group who’d gathered to hear us talk about our books, read from them, and answer questions. They cheered when we came in! It was a great crowd. I’ve never spoken to a school group anywhere near that large before (I’ve usually just done single classrooms), but after meeting those kids, I’d love to do it again.

And now, of course, I am back home. Happy to see my husband, missing the warmth and new & old author friends. Can’t wait to visit with more of you at Rochester’s Teen Book Festival next month!