Jen Lancaster ate my brain

Sometime this past summer my sister emailed me about a book she was reading that she couldn't put down.  Over the course of the next few days, she kept emailing me little tidbits that had me in hysterics and then finally she wrote "I think I might have to go to the doctor because I just shouldn't be laughing this much" or something like that.  Quite a recommendation and so I immediately picked up the book in question: Such a Pretty Fat by Jen Lancaster.

And boy was my sister right!  I DIED reading this book!  She so perfectly nailed so many parts of my life -- it's like she was inside my own brain as she talked about writing, procrastinating, getting in shape, procrastinating, thinking about what to wear on tour, reality TV, etc etc (and though the book is about more than that, these are the parts that really hit home for me).  I mean, Jen holds nothing back and she's fricking hilarious.

Naturally, I bought her entire backlist and have been cyber-stalking her ever since.  Her most recent book, My Fair Lazy, just came out and in reading the first few chapters I wanted to email her a millions times and say "OMG me too!"  Her story about a rat in the house -- we had that (a mouse, but pretty much the same talk with the four legged furry creatures that their JOB is to rid the house of such things); her story about winging over what luggage to buy for tour -- been there and boy have I done that (I dragged my mom around to seven different stores looking for just the right bag); going to a "writing retreat" while under deadline and knowing that really you're going to hang out and swim and not write -- totally done that!

So you can imagine my insane glee when I found out that Jen would be signing in Charlotte!  My hometown!  We rarely get authors and I've always wanted to go see how other authors do presentations on tour and so I *had* to go.  Luckily, my mom (also a fan) was in town and so we hopped in the car and off we went.

Everyone packed in to see Jen!

Of course, we forgot it was Race Weekend so a 20 minute drive turned into almost an hour and ended with me going way too fast down country roads to avoid the interstate.  But luckily, Jen was also a little late (due to said race weekend traffic) so I didn't miss anything!  Also, granted, the store perhaps wasn't expecting such a huge crowd and the set-up was a little awkward (probably over half the people there couldn't get into the area where Jen was because of people clogging the narrow entrance so we were spread out through the store with some people literally climbing the shelves trying to see her).

this was my view, you can see Jen's
head under the D in Video

But OMG it was so so worth it!  Jen is HILARIOUS in person!  She's the type of person you want to claim as your best friend (and I know everyone else there felt the same way I did).  She's just awesome.  She read a bit from her book, answered questions (lots of questions about reality TV that had my mom asking "who?" because clearly she doesn't watch as much as I do :)

While waiting for our time to stand in line (people stood in line according to what color ticket they got when they came through the doors), my mom and I headed over to the YA section where I ran into a display for The Dead-Tossed Waves which made me all squealy and happy!

Yes, I pet it a bit.

And then.... it was my time to stand in line to meet Jen.  I'm not going to lie, I got pretty nervous.  I mean, she's just a huge idol of mine because I love her writing and her wit and the way she's so honest about so much of this industry.  I'd been thinking about meeting her for WEEKS and I was afraid that I'd sound like an idiot or forget to tell her how wonderful I think she is.  And what's funny is that I *know* authors are people too but still!  And Jen was being wonderful because she was taking her time with each person or groups of people and you could tell that each conversation meant something to her.

It was time for Mom and I to meet her and I honestly can't remember much of what I said.  I'm pretty sure I told her how big a fans my entire family is of hers (I'd bought a copy of her book for her to sign to my sister) and then how I'm a YA author with Random House and how much Such a Pretty Fat meant to me cause I'd read it right when I found out that I was going on tour so it just really cracked me up on such a personal level.

Her eyes got bright when I said I wrote and she said "Who are you?" at which point I told her I wrote post-zombie apocalypse books and she started laughing and telling me about a project she was working on.  And then she asked if I had a card because she reads a lot of YA and thankfully I did have a card and then she said she'd read my books!  *faints*  She even tweeted about meeting me the next day!

Seriously, meeting Jen Lancaster was just pure amazing.
 

Mom, Jen and I.  I <3 Jen Lancaster!