The most exciting part of Comic-Con was getting to meet my favorite author, John Scalzi. He was nice enough to pose with me for the photo shown above!
There were two panels featuring John as well as autographing. There was some confusion about the line, but the folks at the Tor booth did a great job. In fact, after hearing about what Tor has allowed John to do and how they’re selling their e-books DRM free now, I’m very happy with Tor.
Before signing at the Tor booth, comedy and musical duo Paul and Storm played a little song about George R. R. Martin. It was a fun way to start an autograph session. After the song, we were given free copies of Old Man’s War and then got to meet John!
gem had John sign her vinyl, which I posted about earlier, but I’ll show here as well. He signed in red on the hand. It looks like bloody knuckles!
I asked him to sign Old Man’s War, the first book in his fantastic series (soon to be a movie), and told him it was an honor to meet him. He said, “no, it’s an honor to meet you! In fact, I’m going to write that!” That was pretty cool!
I also asked him to sign Zoe’s Tale, the fourth novel in the series. Afterwards, I asked his wife Kristine and daughter Athena to sign as well. I felt excited to meet them too; it feels like I know so much about them from John Scalzi’s blog, the Whatever. They said yes, so now I have a family-autographed novel! It was shortly after the signing that I saw him walking away from the booth and asked for the photograph shown at the top.
To get good seats for the Spotlight on John Scalzi panel, we caught the end of the previous panel and then moved to the front. While waiting for the panel to begin, the audience ended up singing together. John came into the room and decided to help. He led us in a rendition of Don’t Stop Believing before showing us that it’s possible to turn any song into a B-52’s song.
The panel itself was a lot of fun. I managed to record the whole thing. I don’t think John would ever read this, but let me just say sorry anyways for sitting in the front row with a camera aimed at you for an hour. Honestly though, I’m sure he’s used to this.
My final encounter with John was the panel he moderated on comedy in science-fiction and fantasy. It was a very entertaining panel, and I left with an interest in some new books and authors! Again, I was sitting in the very front with a camcorder. It was the last day of Comic-Con, but we woke up early and lined up early to ensure good seats. It paid off!
It was such a pleasure to meet him. I hope someday I can do something awesome enough to get on his radar. It’s a longshot, but you never know!