My Time at the LA Times Festival of Books

Had a wonderful time this past weekend with five of my fellow Bold Strokes Books authors at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books. The event took place on the University of Southern California campus, and over one hundred and fifty thousand people attended. There were several live bands, poetry readings, art displays, food trucks, and tons of books on every subject under the sun. The youngest writer signing books was ten years old; the oldest was in her nineties.

First off, it was a huge pleasure to have a full weekend to talk shop with my fellow writers. We laughed, we bitched, we bragged, we hugged, we had a wonderful time. We even sold books to lots of delightful readers. There are few things I enjoy more than meeting other writers and talking shop. What a joy.

The other thrill was talking to so many marvelous people, many of whom were gay, lesbian, or bi, all of who seemed very appreciative of us writers and hungry for our books. There were also a healthy number of straight people who were simply curious to find out what we were about. We had a huge banner, which announced Bold Strokes Books as an LGBTQ publisher. We had more than thirty people come up just to ask what the “Q” in LGBTQ stood for, and that, of course, led into various discussions of the LGBTQ lifestyle and LGBTQ fiction. We had a difference of opinion among us, some said Questioning and some said Queer.

I was joined by Richard Natale, Felice Picano, Sheri Lewis Wohl, Eric Andrews Katz, and Guillermo 

Luna. 

We authors found the event very supportive, and I for one can say I had an enchanting time. I will be looking forward to next year’s event.