Inspiration in a Crowded Room

PNBA, 2009 - Tradeshow Floor

Okay, so I was lucky enough to attend PNBA’s (Pacific Northwest Bookseller’s Association) fall tradeshow this past weekend in Portland.  In a word?  Wow.

For those creative writing folks out there who’ve never seen the publishing world from the “other” side, let me try and give a brief perspective from a newcomer.

It’s overwhelming.

To see a breakdown of events, click here to see the actual schedule. Intense, right?

So you enter the building and head to the registration desk, pick up your name tag and then ENTER this magical place. And try not to get dizzy with the overpowering presence of books books and more books.  Publishers and venders have displayed their wares for folks (like booksellers and librarians) to see and, hopefully, buy.

Since this was my first time, I didn’t know what to expect. But I was told by many attendees that this year’s show was a huge success – attendance was up from previous shows. Isn’t that great!!  Hopefully we can extrapolate that to mean more people are reading again!

One of my favorite things to see were the catalogs from the various publishers – what golden nuggets they’re coming out with throughout the next year.  There’s everything from literary to urban fantasies to magical picture books… well, there’s everything. If you’d like to see the lists yourself, you can visit each publisher’s website. Trust me, it’s exhilarating!!

As far as inspiration goes – after seeing the hope in that room, I now just want to hit my keyboard.  C’mon. Join me in creating something that could be in one of those future catalogs!!