Ilona Andrews San Diego Signing

So awhile back I found out that the universe had aligned itself the husband and wife writing team Ilona Andrews would be visiting Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore in San Diego as part of their tour for Magic Rises
Yes. That Ilona Andrews. 
At this point, imagine me jumping around the house doing wildly uncoordinated fist-pumps while the hubby looked on in amused bewilderment. Keeping up a steady manta of "I want to go to there," I immediately called upon my dear friends Becca and Gladys to make the three hour road trip with me to meet one of our favorite writing duos.
Here we are at Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore.
Despite my almost normal expression here, imagine an entire colony of juiced up butterflies pinging around my stomach at this point. I was a wee bit excited.

The bookstore was packed but somehow Becca and I wound up literally sitting at Gordon and Ilona's feet during the Q&A session. Which Gordon opened up by simply saying "So. What do you want to know?"
By the end, my butt was numb and my legs were all jittery from sitting still for so long but it was totally worth it. We are such book nerds.

Because this totally happened... 
I got to meet them!!!! And they kindly agreed to sign all my Kate Daniels books.
I cannot even begin to tell you how super cool and nice and gracious and funny they were. Maybe you can tell by my crazed I'm-a-swimfan-grin I've got going on here but they pretty much were amazing. Also. Ilona hugged me. I think I died.

Still high on endorphins and sheer giddiness, we met up afterwards with Maggie from Young Adult Anonymous (who is incredibly cool) 
 and enjoyed some seriously delish sushi while we rehashed every single hilarious thing Ilona and Gordon said (and the fact that they sorta matched, which was kind of funny). 
Like the fact that even though we all knew that Ilona was from Russia none of us expected her to actually have such a killer Russian accent... 

Or that some of the things Gordon said would remind me so much of Curran. I think at one point when they were talking about some changes they wanted their editors to make to Magic Rises very late in the publishing stage he said: "We're not asking you. We're telling you. It's our name on that book." I sat there giggling to myself just thinking of all the times Curran said something like that to Kate or to one of the Pack...

Or that Aunt B is their favorite character to write *sobs*...

Or when asked if Derek is ever going to get the girl and his own happily ever after Gordon responded with "Well he should!"

It was an incredible day. I could not have imagined them being more candid or funny or working so well together. Frankly, I'm still a bit in awe of their abilities. And of their books. Thank you so much for doing what you do so well. This is one loyal fan you've got in your corner forever.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Looks like you had an AMAZING time! I'm so happy for you. I would have been just as excited if I ever get to meet Ilona and Gordon in person. I LOVE their books, they're such an awesome writing duo.

I'm glad you met up with Maggie as well - meeting the two of you in LA was one of the highlights of my trip there earlier this year.

YA Anonymous said...

I love that you and Curran, I mean GORDON *ahem*, are standing in the same pose. :)

Ilona Andrews + sushi + book shopping is basically the perfect day and I'm so glad I got to share it with a fellow swimfan. Let's do it again next year, yes? Hopefully this time in Redondo Beach.

-Maggie

Holly said...

Reading this post and seeing the pictures just about killed me. And now I totally want to at least hear Gordon speak! Curran. *sigh* I'm jealous of anyone who's gets to hang out with Maggie, too. I loved this. Thanks for sharing the awesomeness.

Michelle said...

Chachic - I know right? They were so cool. Just as amazing in person as you'd imagine they'd be from their blog and books.

Maggie - Girl I am so glad we met up!! And yes, we must do more bookish events! I am always up for it!

Holly - I thought of all you ladies while we were at the signing. We had such a wonderful time and I was just basically giddy the entire time: thinking "Am I really here?"

Angiegirl said...

This is the best thing ever. I'm not even jealous I'm so happy for you!

Love that you met up with Maggie. Hi Maggie!!

Also, you look gorgeous, Michelle.