Tampa Book Buzz

local authors book signing last saturday

On my way to work last Saturday, I stopped by the local authors book signing at the South Tampa Barnes and Noble store. When you walked in the door, the first things you saw were the six tables set up in the front of the store and the smiling faces of some of our local authors, eager to say hello, give you a bookmark and tell you about their books.

Skip Allen was there, selling his thriller Out of Ashes and being his usual charming self. He kept telling me snippets about the sequel, for which I accidentally repaid him by knocking over a bottle of water on his table. (Luckily, no books were harmed in the making of this story.)

Barbara J. Sorey was there with a big smile on her face, as always, letting people know about her book Know Where You Going? You Gotta Know Where You Been!. Sharing her table was veteran journalist Steven Sims, promoting his thriller Spy Wednesday. I introduced myself to him and we had time to chat for a little while; he’s a really nice guy.

The gracious No Coincidence author Ann Baker was at one of the front tables. We commiserated with each other about having to go to work later in the day (although she was going to put in a 12-hour shift as a law enforcement officer and I was only going to my piddly Second Job for a few hours).

At the table behind her were authors Daisy Parrado (Grandma Reads My Thoughts) and … Bill Pearce (I hope I got his name correct!), both of whom remembered me from the recent panel discussion I participated in at the bookstore, which made me feel like a mini-celebrity. (Plus, Parrado had candy!)

I met the very polite John A. Pristell, who gave me a copy of Boy versus Girl, a collection of his poems. One of Pristell’s friends happened to be videotaping while he and I were talking and exchanging business cards, so the Pristell family videotape collection unfortunately now has a good ten minutes of very unflattering side shots of Yours Truly.

There was another author there whose name I didn’t get, which is ok, because he was a little grumpy.

I’m having trouble getting my photos from Saturday to load, so I’ll post them separately.