[2024: London Book Fair Mar 11-14, The Shard March 15, Liquid History Tours Mar 16 – London UK]
London Book Fair (LBF) is an annual event (held in Olympia Exhibition Centre) in London. Publishers from around the world descend into London and every square inch of the convention center is filled. I went to LBF to hawk Rebecca O’Donnell’s books as well as my stuff.
The trip was interesting. At MSP (Minneapolis) airport, I boarded the Delta Airbus 330 with a Comfort+ seat (which is between the Economy section and the First Class or Delta One section). The plane was oversold of course. Some guy comes up to me and says I am in his seat. I am like, no, this is mine. So he gets the gate agent ad the gate agent takes my ticket – and returns and tells me I was upgraded to First Class! That was cool.
Pre-LBF trade show, on Monday, there was a Writer’s Conference sponsored by LBF. Met a bunch of writers from all over the world. The talks ranged from how to self-publish and get noticed (social media, social media, and social media) to how to get it published traditionally. Yeah, well, doesn’t everyone want to do it “traditionally” – which is excessively difficult, of course… Anyway, the talks were interesting. The seminar included lunch as well as a wine and mingle afterwards.
The next day at the London Book Fair, the guy who kicked me out of my seat just happened to be the VP of Sales for Lerner Publishing Group! Not missing a beat, I said I represent Rebecca O’Donnell, and here is one of her children’s books! He said he was upgraded to my seat; hence I got upgraded to first class. (He gave me his card and I contacted him a week later… he said he’ll “pass” on it – oh, well, still was cool encounter.)
So I went every day and dumping flyers on tables and trying to see who I can bump into and so on so forth. No luck of course. On the last day I saw the Alliance of Independent Authors booth and went around the corner to talk to them when I bumped into the CEO of a small publishing house. We talked for about fourty minutes and to make the long story short, she gave me her card and told me to have Rebecca O’Donnell call her! (When I got back, I told Beck to talk to her and they ‘clicked’ immediately. So now I am formatting all of Beck’s books to get it pushed through the publisher! Is that cool or what? That was a great last day.
Time to leave Olympia Exhibition Centre. And, the most annoying and worthless tube stop in London is the “Kensington Olympia” station. It’s supposed to be open on weekends and special events (oh, like the LBF) but it wasn’t open, and even when scheduled to be opened, it doesn’t. So, don’t ever count on it ever being open! Use the Overground for that station, even though it’s a pain to connect to the tube (underground). At any rate, continue with more adventures below…
After the London Book Fair, I went to The on a “Mastercard Priceless VIP Tour of the Shard”. (If you have any Mastercard, you can book this, just search on “Mastercard Priceless VIP Tour of the Shard”.) The link always changes, so do a search. (For general information on the building, click here: The Shard.) Go to the bottom of this page to see all of the pictures.
Back-to-back, went to the Ting Afternoon Tea in the Shangri-La Hotel. I had to take the elevator down from the observation deck to the ground floor, then walk around the building to the Shangri-La Hotel and take the elevator back up to the hotel level. They continually rotate the theme of the tea so you will get a different experience each time. Go to the bottom of this page to see all of the pictures.
Third time is a charm. I booked this tour twice before but had to cancel due to unforseen issues (conflict of events the first time and the Iceland volcano going off which may have caused flights to be cancelled on the way back…) So made it this time! And the tour stopped at the Black Friar’s Pub so that was awesome – I always walked or “tubed” past it but never went in, so that was a super cool treat. Tours are really inexpensive if you want to go (and the tour does not include drinks but plenty of time to drink at least one pint – or two half-pints.) Go here for information: Liquid History Tours. Go to the bottom of this page to see all of the pictures.
During the “Liquid History Tours”, it’s an eight-TARDIS building 🙂
