Sunday, September 27, 2009

My Baltimore Book Festival Adventure

Yesterday I attended - with other UB MFA friends - my first ever Baltimore Book Festival after my creativity class. It was exhilarating! I have to say I went a little crazy on the book buys - C'mon who can resist $1 books?... I left with a box of books, my filled backpack and my friend Mike's filled backpack (sorry Mike and thanks for helping me carry all the books :)

We walked from class and all scoped out the food as most of us were starving. I ate an avacado and crab taco (Yum!) while my friends chose quesadillas or hot dogs. Once we filled our bellies, we strolled the busy walkways leading us from one book tent to another. So many tents, so little time! At one point, we all ended up at a tent that portrayed Edgar Allen Poe's the Tell-Tale Heart, by Edgar Allen Poe. A brilliant actor (I wish I knew his name) did a stunning portrayal of this chilling story.

Afterwards, our group split and I scouted for interesting book buys with Mike. We ended up making a detour up the stairs of Mount Washington. This in itself was an adventure as the spiraling staircase really only allowed one person through, yet we were constantly maneuvering our body into positions I didn't know it could do in order to let others go down past me. We made it to the top winded, and I hate to say it, disappointed. It was just as tight at the top as the whole staircase and they had four breakout windows that provided one - to two people a view at each window. The view was beautiful as you took it all in but the walk up wasn't worth the view. After we regained our breath, we made our way back down. I had shaky legs the rest of the afternoon...

What I enjoyed most was meeting several independent authors, two of which I bought books from: The Bum Magnet by K.L. Brady and Identity Crisis by Debbi Mack. I look forward to reading these books.

I would have enjoyed staying longer and perusing more books and talking with more authors but between the shaky legs and the rain, I chose to end my book festival adventure. I do look forward to next year's book festival.

I would enjoy reading other's experiences of the Baltimore Book Festival either in the comments to this post or through a new posting.

3 comments:

  1. Back-to-School Book Fair
    A Mike Koenig Thought
    I used to say that I was a writer. Of course that was when I wrote all the time. Before I turned twenty-one and bars became an option, before I graduated college and had to work 40 hours a week, but mostly it was before I let the routine of living and making a living interrupt the old routine of daily writing. I suppose that is why I came back to school— to change back into a routine where my home computer was used for Microsoft word, and writing stories instead of internet explorer, and playing on youtube and hulu.
    As I said, I have restarted school, an MFA program in Creative Writing, and joined some of my fellow classmates at the book fair last week. This was a disconcerting trip for me. Not so much the trip but for what the trip represented. My classmates were thrilled by books. I saw the excitement in them as they passed the tents of readers and authors; true joy over their faces as they dug through piles of books and said, “I’ve always wanted to read this.” There is nothing I can currently say that I’ve always wanted to read and in the last five years the only book I’ve read was the Colbert Autobiography.
    So I watched my fellow students with an envious eye. They loved books. In every sense of the word they loved them. And I knew I was at a disadvantage, for I did not, I do not. And it became clear when one of them asked me, “what do you like to read?” And I could not give a good answer because I really don’t like to read. Perhaps it’s the writer in me— I often get annoyed when the story goes a direction I would not have taken it and the work feels wrong. Perhaps it was elementary school and my parents that always made reading sound like work and to this day it has remained a chore. A chore that television and movies (my pastimes) never became. Or maybe I’m like a major league pitcher—good at one half of the game and terrible at the other half.
    So it is that I am in my first semester of grad school and I am very unsure of what I want to achieve here. I am writing again. . . which is good. But I have no end plan— no destination. A lot of people ask me about reading, even outside the book fair, and talk about reading as this prerequisite for writing. Maybe it is. I have yet to find a writer who says they do not like reading, not in the way that I don’t like reading. And seeing my classmates and the love in their eyes makes me feel so out of place. And I have to ask myself, “what are you doing here? Who are you fooling?” And I cannot answer the questions. I don’t know what I’m doing and I do feel this is experiment is destined to fail. I am not a writer, not in any sense of using the word as a title. I don’t think I love writing enough to ever get published in any real sense. And my classmates, through their excitement, seem like they may. I just do stories, thoughts, and hope that’s enough.
    As we left the book fair I had three books in my bag and about ten in a box in my arms. It was ten years worth of reading for me, maybe more, though none of the books belonged to me. I was merely the mule hauling Wendy’s love to her car. I plopped them into her trunk and wondered when she’d read these, where was the time. And then I wondered who would read my books, should they ever exist?

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  2. So, you wanna be published, huh?

    Come to Cyclops on Friday night for the latest in our recurring series of Open Mics with the Smile, Hon, You're in Baltimore people, brought to you by the fine folks at Eight-Stone Press.

    Read on:

    SMILE, HON, YOU’RE IN BALTIMORE! is accepting submissions of your Mobtown-related stories, essays, poetry, photography and other artwork for the forthcoming SMILE, HON No. 12 through Saturday, October 31, 2009. Creative non-fiction is preferred, though all submissions will be considered. Articles (100 – 2,000 words) are preferably received via e-mail (wpt@eightstonepress.com) as attached Word documents. Image files should be approximately 5” x 7”, 300+ dpi (.JPG or .TIF format). All contributors will receive a byline/artist credit for their work as well as two (2) complimentary copies of the issue in which their work appears.

    From the harbor to the hills, SMILE, HON, YOU’RE IN BALTIMORE! collects the tales of those on whom Mobtown has left her indelible mark. Polished, professional essays; barroom sermons delivered from the sanctity of a favorite stool; the poet’s fleeting sentiment, captured in both word and snapshot – SMILE, HON offers a slice of Baltimore as told by Baltimore, presented with the time-honored DIY accessibility of a limited-run, handcrafted zine.

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  3. Open Mic Wednesdays @ Cyclops!
    And, if you're not already, please be our Fan! Facebook.com/CyclopsBmore
    Host: Cyclops
    Type: Music/Arts - Performance
    Network: Global
    Date: Wednesday, September 30, 2009
    Time: 7:00pm - 10:00pm
    Location: Cyclops Books and Music
    Street: 30 West North Ave. at Maryland (next to Windup Space, catty-corner fm Joe2)
    City/Town: Baltimore, MD

    Phone: 4107524487
    Email: andy@cyclopsbooks.com

    Every Wednesday we've got our mic on and ready for you. Bring your poems, stories, essays, sonnets, songs, whatever you wanna do!

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