Bouchercon Recap

Earlier this month Baltimore hosted Bouchercon, the mystery/thriller conference. Carol Fitzgerald (of The Book Report Network fame) was in town and asked me to have dinner with her. I know Carol from my "job" as contributor to the blog at ReadingGroupGuides.com, but we've never actually met in person.

Last Saturday night Carol and I had dinner at a little restaurant in Federal Hill. The weather was still nice enough that we could sit outside - that was a nice bonus. We had a wonderful dinner and great conversation. Of course we talked books and book clubs (what do you expect?!) but we also talked about our families and our lives. All in all, it was a lovely evening.

After dinner we went to the bar at the convention hotel. There Carol introduced me to several author friends of hers: William (Bill) Lasher, Gayle Lynds, Joseph Finder, and Melodie Johnson Howe. Unfortunately, the bar was a bit loud. But we still managed to have some great conversations! I spent most of the time talking with Melodie since we were seated next to each other. She's a fascinating woman with quite an interesting history - she was a starlet for Universal Pictures in the 1970s among other things. Of course we spoke about the growth of book blogging. Melodie is a weekly contributor to the blog Crime Brief but blogging is still relatively new to her. And since I'm a novice when it comes to mysteries and thrillers, we both had things to teach each other.

Around 11pm I decided to head for home, since I did have to get up early the next day. The entire evening was quite enjoyable. A big thank you to Carol for inviting me out!

Carol and I at the hotel bar