Romance Writers of America (RWA) invade Anaheim, California

On Wednesday, July 25, we attended the RWA Annual Conference at the Anaheim Convention Center. The RWA is an network and organization of over 10,000 dedicated romance writers.

We spent the afternoon and Disneyland then headed over to the Convention Center which is located across the street. At first, we didn't know what to expect, we knew that well over 200 authors were scheduled to appear.

Some of the young adult (YA) authors included: Ann Aguirre (Enclave), Jennifer Echols (Such a Rush), Simone Elkeles (Perfect Chemistry) Robin LaFevers (Grave Mercy), Sophie Jordan (Firelight) Syrie James (Forbidden) and quite a few more. I read the night before that Myra McEntire would be at the signing but she wasn't on the map nor could we find her at any of the tables, believe me, we checked! But it's okay because I fangirled out on two of my favorite authors, Echols & Elkeles.

Meeting Jennifer Echols was such a pleasure,  I got to tell her how much I love her and how I've read and reread all of her books. Her latest release is called Such a Rush and if you're a fan, you should definitely read it. We asked her to make a shout out to one of our favorite book-blogging buddies, she was so sweet and patient while we had technical difficulties. Check it out below.

Another honor was meeting Simone Elkeles, she was hilarious and amazing. She had some awesome swag and we left with Perfect Chemistry pens, bookmarks and these really hot posters featuring the Fuentes brothers who starred in the Chain Reaction book trailer. We told her how IN LOVE we are with her and her series and how we couldn't wait for her next series Fullriders to be released in 2013.

While we were at the event we bumped into some of ya buddies, Crystal and Thuy, it was such a fun event and we were happy to run into these two. In the fall, Mary and I plan on attending Crystal's annual event at the Vegas Valley Book Festival.

We left with several signed copies but lucky for you, we purchased Chain Reaction and asked Simone to sign it for us as a giveaway for one of you. I'll post the giveaway soon, sorry but US only for this guy.

The amazing part about the event was that all the proceeds from the books purchased went to "Readers for Life" a literacy program. This year they raised almost $53,000.

As always, thanks for stopping by!