The Lost Weekend: Daze of Books
by
Lynn Reed
One week ago, I was at one of the largest book festivals in the country, the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. This annual two-day event is held on the UCLA campus in the heart of Westwood. I spent my undergraduate years at this university (back when the earth was still cooling), but the campus didn’t look like this. From one end to the other, tents, booths, banners and signs, all having to do with books, were spread out. There were vendors and speakers and author signings and panels—a virtual Disneyland for booklovers.
I arrived on Saturday morning after having stopped to pick up a close friend living in the nearby San Fernando Valley. Susan and I go together every year; indeed this has become our ritual. We stock up on sandwiches and drinks, and off we go.
We arrived a bit later than usual (Susan had trouble deciding between tuna fish and chicken salad), around 9:00. Even though the official opening isn’t until 10;00, we wanted to get their early so we could get a nearby parking spot for the bags of books we would be lugging back to the car.
Everything looked fine, except for one thing—the weather. No, not rain. Heat. Record-breaking heat. Almost 100 degrees. And for delicate little flowers like Susan and me, it would prove to be formidable.
You’d think that with 15 hours of time over two days, I would end up seeing a lot of the panels. The fact is I ended up going to only two. However, I ending up spending a lot of money on new books and meeting a lot of wonderful authors and book vendors.
The first panel was “Novel Lives.” I particularly wanted to see this because I was interested in Brian Hall’s newly released biography, The Fall of Frost. Moderator Rober Roper and panelists Jill Bialosky, Nicholas Delbanco, Brian Hall and Marianne Wiggins discussed how their chose their subjects and what inspired them. Hall talked about the personal tragedies of Frost’s life, and why he thought that would make for interesting reading for all. Marianne Wiggins talked about the importance of “weight,” and that too many books gave the impression of padding. She also stressed the importance of conflict. DelBanco was funny—he started off by saying that he misunderstood the panel topic, and thought he was signing up for a panel that would be discussing how the novel still “lives”—and very interesting. His new book about the life of Benjamin Thompson, is called The Count of Concord. He had been working on this book for 22 years!
The second panel was “The Outer Limits, Horror and Science Fiction.” The moderator Nick Owchar; panelists included Joe Hill, Kevin Anderson, and Harry Turtledove. I really wanted to see Joe Hill, author of 20th Century Ghosts, one of my favorite short story collections. As is known now, he is the son of Stephen King, but few knew this until after he garnered critical claim for his writing. The panelists proved to be a humorous group, who left the audience laughing most of the time. Kevin Anderson is working on a new movie based on the famous sci-fi classic, Dune. He said it always amused him when people say they “hate” comics, but then comment how much they “love” the Spiderman movies. The panelists also talked about the current trend of blending of sci-fi with mainstream writing such as is seen in books of Michael Chabon, and Jonathan Lethem—books full of science fiction and fantasy placed in the literature and fiction sections of stores.
Susan and I would have gone to more panels, but for the heat. We spent a good deal of time searching for shade and downing countless frozen lemonade bars. It was my first festival without Kettle Korn.
I did end up meeting many wonderful authors, and got several signed books. Peter Robinson is one of my favorite mystery writers, and was as nice as I had hoped. Michael Connolly and T.C. Boyle were both friendly, as was Cornelia Read. I am anxious to read her new book, The Crazy School.
One of my favorite memories, one that will no doubt stay with me for a long time involved Pico Iyer. He was at the festival, signing his new book, The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama. I was delighted to see him both because I wanted this book and because my mother-in-law, Margie, is good friends with Pico. While Susan searched out another lemonade stand I waited in line and had him sign the book. He is such a delight, a kind man, and happily wrote a long passage to Margie.
As I was leaving, Susan spotted me. We began walking to another area of festival, and she asked me what I had been doing. I told her about Margie and pointed at the book, explaining their special relationship between them, how they were always e-mailing and talking to each other.
Susan grew very quiet. We walked on for about five minutes. Finally, she turned and looked at me. “You know,” she said, “I just have to tell you. I am amazed that your mother-in-law is that close to the Dalai Lama!”
I stopped walking and looked at her, puzzled. When we finally realized the misunderstanding (and began to imagine the Dalai Lama e-mailing Margie), we could not stop laughing.
I blame it on the heat.
Lynn Reed has been a passionate reader almost from birth. During her childhood, her favorite place to hang out was the library, and every summer she won the top prize for Most Books Read during the school break. Although she hasn't won any more book-reading contests, she became the mother of a genius, a lover of rock and roll, a design judge for the Publishers Marketing Association's Benjamin Franklin Awards, and a practicing attorney for more than 20 years. She's never lets a day go by without having some chocolate. And she still loves the library.
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