You might be thinking this looks more like the site for Dragon*Con, and if you know anything about Bouchercon, you may be thinking there is a cool mysterious bar at the top of the egg, and a rocking hotel at the base. You’d be wrong. On both counts.

 All weekend, my running joke when coming up against obstacles, odd/poor planning or just easily remedied stuff that slipped by -all of Albany- was, “That must be the mystery part.”

So, here’s the deal. I’ve been to enough of these conventions and conferences and workshops to know what works and what doesn’t and to know that what isn’t working can be fixed with a good sit at the bar. Or a short respite in your room…. both of these were missing, so I’d have to say ALBANY  was a fail. Book sellers and fans in the signing lines assured me there were equally screwy problems in Austin, in Monterey , in… yep, the list goes on. But that said, this is non profit and run by volunteers.

So, what’s a girl to do? Make the best of it. I let the older fans and folks with troubled knees and legs have the chairs, and the buses. Though I had failed to pack any flat street shoes, I forged on. Even made a wonderful new talented friend, Nancy Bilyeau, when I chimed in on her Twitter whining Day 1. She not only managed to turn it around, but ended up looking like a rock star in my eyes.  As did all the new authors out there, and some– who were only new to me. Apologies to Charles and Caroline Todd, and Margaret Maron- for not knowing your work.

Before this night began, I was invited to join some amazing writers at the Beer Hall. Thank you, Nancy,for including me. I have so many new and established writers to follow now. What a great deal on pizza, right? Wish I had known about the panel at 2pm next day. Sorry to have not spent more time with y’all.