At the beginning of July, I went to the Young Adult Literature Convention (YALC for short) and honestly I had no idea of what to expect. I have never been to YALC before, but I did really enjoy it overall. So I thought I’d write a blog post on my experience of the weekend! And publish it almost a month later, which was you know totally my plan all along...
On the Thursday I met up with bookish people in Hyde Park which was lovely, I mainly chatted to @allabouthepage and @sophias.thoughts about our excitement for the weekend which was really good! And it helped me to relax a little about it because I’d already met some friendly faces before the big weekend! I also managed to visit Waterstones Piccadily to see their pop-up set for Charlie’s bedroom from the Heartstopper video which was cute and I managed to trip and fall and buy two books (Honey & Spice by Bolu Babalola and The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy) which both look fab! Keep an eye open for my upcoming summer romance revival post to see my thoughts on Honey & Spice!
Then on Friday evening Rhiannon (@welshreader) came to stay and we chatted for a while about what we were excited for etc and then went to sleep and woke up early on Saturday to get to YALC as soon as we could! It was hot and busy but very exciting and we were trying to guess everyone’s costumes in the queue because we were in with the people for London Film and Comic Con (LFCC)! We got in fairly quickly and got our tickets for the authors we wanted to see and had a look around the stalls which was fun, it was quite overwhelming at first because there was so much to go around and see and honestly I was just amazed by it all.
Saturday was mainly spent chatting to various bookish people and just wandering around in awe! I got to meet Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé and get Ace of Spades signed which was really cool, she was so lovely and it was really nice to have a chat with an author I’ve followed for a while! My main purchase of the day was a Crescent City inspired ‘light it up’ pin from the @Geek_and_artsy_bookish stall down in LFCC which Ro (@wanderingwxrlds) and Spoops (@spoopyhol) introduced me to. I had a ticket to see Samantha Shannon but unfortunately, they closed the queue early while I was waiting with Rhiannon to see Cassandra Clare, but we made it to the panel where Samantha Shannon was interviewing her which was really cool. I haven’t read her books because honestly after the Shadowhunters show I didn’t care to, but the panel did really inspire me to write my own books, and to read her newer historical based fantasy in the same world!
The Sunday was a bit more chill and was spent wondering around chatting again and I went to a witchy panel which was really cool and made me add several books to my wishlist, then I made it just in time for my slot to meet Alice Oseman which was insane! The people in the queue were so lovely though and we just ended up chatting and sharing our excitement which was lovely. I got to meet Alice and tell them how thankful I was for them writing Heartstopper because my students love it and seeing that I have been reading it they have shared their excitement with me and feel safe to open up to me which has been a really touching experience. Luckily, the event staff took photos for people which was lovely but because I was busy chatting to Alice I forgot to pose for it and now hate the way I look in the photos. It was all over so quickly as they were trying to get through so many people!
I bought quite a few books (including the Cruel prince series and Chain of Gold after hearing Cassandra Clare talk about it) and a few bookish items and wondered around LFCC for a bit before deciding to head home. There’s probably a bunch of stuff I’ve missed out but reflecting on it all a week later there are some things I wish I had done more of which I want to share (partly so I can remind myself later!).
I wish firstly that I’d had more courage to go up to people I knew or followed but unless the people I was with were going up to them I was too nervous and didn’t want to bother people, even though I speak to them online which makes no sense at all! And also kind of related, I wish I’d taken more photos with people but again I didn’t want to bother people and felt too awkward and got wrapped up in it all and forgot to even think about it a lot! So next year I think I’m going to try and work up the courage more.
I also wish I went to more panels, going to the Cassie Clare one really inspired me and gave me an insight into writing which I found really valuable and I had the same feeling after sitting in on half of the I put a spell on you panel! I think there were some really cool panels which were unfortunately on when I was busy meeting other people or queuing for signings etc. I think next year I really want to visit more of these even if I don’t know the authors because it did put new books on my radar, which I’m now really excited about!
I also wish I’d read more books from the authors that were there because some I had heard of but hadn’t had time to read the books so didn’t get them signed so this is something I will definitely try to do next year! But also, just going with a bit more of a plan, I wanted to get a book signed by Jacqueline Wilson but because all of my childhood books were at my parents’ home I didn’t want to buy a new copy that didn’t have the years worth of childhood reading, so really I should’ve gone back and got one before! I really do regret not doing that.
I think it’ll be interesting to see what YALC is like next year because people did have some valid critiques i.e. noise from LFCC, LFCC queues going into YALC space, not a lot of merch stands as it was mainly publishers, some signings/talks being dramatically reduced even though they knew they’d be popular and a lack of space at times. So I really hope that they take these into consideration when they’re prepping for next year.
I feel like as others have said, YALC for me was about meeting people I know from online and sharing excitement which I really enjoyed! Stopping my channel and taking my face off of my booksta has made me feel a little less involved in the community but this weekend reminded me of how much love there is within the community and how excited everyone was to see each other and chat about books.
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