23.52
The perfect birthday gift for my favorite almost 9 year old?  A writing workshop with her favorite author of all time, Johnathan Rand.  She met him at a book signing two years ago at this same indie book store in town, but this was an afternoon of epic epicness, as she says.  She was so thrilled.

And Johnathan Rand is the nicest guy.  I chatted with him for a bit before the workshop.  He’s from northern lower MI, so of course we compared snow falls.

Miss W got to be his assistant for a few activities, which she loved.  At one point he gave them a paragraph and told them to continue the story.  He had a couple people read theirs aloud.  When he heard Miss W’s he had her stand up and read it again so the whole place could hear it, he liked it so much.  He thought it was a fantastic example of writing a complete story in just a few sentences.  I told her they sometimes call that “sudden fiction” or “minute fiction”.

At the end he gave them all signed posters and a book of American Chillers Word Searches.  Miss W got her favorite book, Dangerous Dolls of Delaware, signed, along with a couple of other things.

Not bad for a snowy Sunday afternoon.

Dangerous Dolls of Delaware

Rand chatting with Miss W before they got started. She made him laugh a few times.

Book Bug art

Waiting in line to get more things signed.

That’s pretty much complete happiness right there, people.