4/26/16

RT Booklovers Convention 2016 Recap

I'll start out by prefacing this with the fact that I'm not a Vegas kinda girl. It does absolutely nothing for me. So when I first heard that the convention was going to be in Vegas, I was going to skip it. I knew everyone would want to go there and that it would be crowded. I should have gone with my gut.

That's not to say that there weren't some high points, like seeing my online friends in person, but overall, this was by far the worst RT I've been to (out of the 5 total I have attended.)

The Good:

There were some good panels: the ones about diversity and feminism were especially well done.
The Book Fair was well organized and the smoothest I've experienced. Check in for the convention was open early, well staffed, and easy to find. Security was present and for the most part did pay attention to who had badges and who didn't. There were several good restaurants on site that were able to handle the huge crush of people and the food was decently priced. Not great, but not as bad as other RTs.

@younglibrarian, @SuperWendy, and me
Christine Feehan


The Bad:
The hotel sucked. The walk to the convention space was horrific. There were not enough staff at check in or at the Starbucks. There was a fridge but no microwave or coffee maker in the rooms. The smoke was a problem. And when I say a problem, I'm speaking as someone accustomed to Reno where there are older casinos and older filtration systems. The Rio's was substandard. And the bar... The bar was a huge disappointment. The highlight of every RT is hanging out in the bar with a gradually changing group of authors, readers, and bloggers, but the location of the Rio's bar in smoke central (and the laughably inadequate bar in the convention area) meant many of us missed out on that unofficial social part of RT. And, of course, there was the fact that by Saturday, our sink was backing up with water any time the toilet flushed.

TBR Challenge Review: My Kind of Wonderful by Jill Shalvis

Format: mass market paperback
Pub Date: December 2015
Publisher: Forever/Hachette
Length: 323 pages

Jill Shalvis is one of the few remaining auto-buy authors I have. But since I'm still digging my way out of the reading slump from hell, I am just now getting around to reading this one. I bought it, then set it in my TBR to get to eventually. I brought this with me to the RT Booklover's Convention, intending to finish it and get my post up ASAP when I got back before our April 20th deadline. Ha. Ha. I knew better. So anyway, my tardy post follows.

This month's theme was contemporary romance, and Jill Shalvis is one of the best at the small town variety. She and Victoria Dahl are pretty much the ONLY authors who can pull off the small town romances and not have me nitpick them. And I suspect it's because both authors live in relatively small ski/tourist towns, so they don't ignore the irritating fishbowl-ness that is small town life.