RT Convention: Day 3

Friday was kind of a chill day at RT, at least for me. Unlike Thursday, which had so much that appealed on the agenda, there wasn't all that much I wanted to see Friday.

I went to the Shooting Stars Gala where I sat at the lovely Delores Fossen's table. It was basically glorified Bingo (I swear there were 3 reader panels that were bingo related), but it was nice to sit and chat in a more relaxed atmosphere with authors.

I tried to attend the Contemporary Romance Booze, Books, and More event, but the line was so horrendous and the room so small that I just skipped it.  Instead, I sat in line for the 1001 Dark Nights Sparkler and read. That event was also not really my thing, so I skipped out early there, too. Long lines to ask authors questions for a raffle opportunity. I did get to take a photo of Carrie Ann Ryan for my mom, who is a superfan.

The highlight of my day was the Urban Fantasy panel I attended. Patricia Briggs was there just for the day (she was accepting an award later that evening). The panel was on the future of Urban Fantasy, and like the other UF panel I attended, it was packed.  (Photo is beyond awful. I hated this room.)

My takeaway from this panel was that although Urban Fantasy isn't an easy sell anymore to publishers, there's still plenty of room for new authors with unique voices and ideas.  There's also a strong shift to repackage UF as horror, mystery or something else. Cover art is changing, too.

The last event I attended was the RT Book Awards Ceremony. It's usually a snoozer, but there are always a few speeches that really move me so I go anyway.

My tweets of the events can be found here.