My NYC Bookcon14 Experience
After looking for a place to park for a half hour and almost getting hit twice, we finally parked about 10 blocks away from the Javitt's Center. By the time we got to the Javitt's Center, it was 8:45 AM, which is all well and good, since tickets for autographing started at 9:00. All we had to do was go pick up our badges, but when we got to the counter, they told us that we had never purchased tickets (even though the transaction had been completed online)! Fast forward through much frustration and bargaining, it's a little past 9:00 and I finally have my badge and am waiting in the incredibly short line for autographing tickets. [Cassandra Clare autographing was a ticketed event, so you had to pick up one of the limited tickets to get her signature.] When I got up to window, I was told that ALL TICKETS WERE GONE. Every single one of them, for every single author! I mean, that's impossible, since tickets were supposed to start at 9:00 and it was currently 9:05. (At least, the website said it started at 9.)
What happened was that since people started waiting in line by 5:30, the staff just opened up the ticket booth at 7. IF ON THE WEBSITE IT SAID IT STARTED AT 9:00 THEN IT SHOULD HAVE STARTED AT 9:00! Fuming, I went to wait in line for the Veronica Roth panel, but I am not a patient person and I'm also claustrophobic, and that didn't work out well for me. There was no organization to the line, and people were cutting up ahead like it was their job. So, I decided to skip the panel (even though I love Veronica Roth) and head on up to the third floor. [This was where all the publishing houses and editors and book companies were.] I was hoping to get some great advice about the publishing industry, so that I would know what I was in for when I try to sell my manuscript, and maybe talk to someone from Scholastic or Simon&Schuester.
And all the publishing companies were there, but there was little information to pick up and it was mostly to promote new and upcoming books (not that that's bad). There was a small silver lining though, since there were some not-quite-famous authors signing books and giving them away for free! They were really nice and I had a lot of fun. Eventually, I calmed down enough to venture back down to the panel area of the convention center.
Originally, I was going down to see a panel on "How to Survive Publishing Your First Book" or something fancy like that, but we were stopped when we tried to get down to the 1E Hall [where every panel was except for big ones, like Veronica Roth and John Green-- they were in the Special Events Hall]. The security guard on duty told us 1E was at fire-level maximum compacity and there would be no one going down until it was cleared. Now everyone knows that clearing a massive hall DURING A CON when there's very little staff is pretty much saying, "You'll get down there when pigs fly." The panel that I wanted to go to was starting in 20 minutes, and there was no way we were getting down there, so we were told to wait in line until there were less people (luckily, we were first in line). BUT, the security guard kept letting people down into the Hall! Tell me this: How can you let more people into a place that's at fire-level compacity and still turn people that were there before them away? (Most of the people that were let through were exhibitors, but still, not all of them were.)
30 minutes later (11:20-ish) and after bonding with the people in front of us, we were finally able to go downstairs. My group combined with the group in front of us, and we all headed straight for Room 1E07, where the Maggie Stiefvater/ Cassandra Clare/ Holly Black panel was going to be at 2:00. [There was a rule at Bookcon that no one was allowed to wait in line prior to one hour before a panel or they would be kicked out, but no one followed that rule and no one enforced it.] While we were waiting in line (and we were line number 1 yay!!!) they saved my spot and I was able to pick up some really good booklets on self-publishing and talk to a representative from NaNoWriMo. The rest of the wait passed and we were finally let into the panel, where we got EXCELLENT seats!
Maggie, Cassie, and Holly were all hilarious and amazingly entertaining! Holly and Cassie were there to talk about their upcoming collaborative, Magisterium Book 1: The Iron Trial, and Maggie for the continuation of her Wolves of Mercy Falls series, Sinner. [Everyone that attended the panel got free advanced copies of both books!!] I loved this panel so much, and it was probably my favorite thing of the day.
After that, we got in line for the John Green TFIOS panel. (I was wearing my "Okay? Okay." shirt and I was so ready for this panel, where I could finally meet John Green.) Well, turns out everyone else was ready for this panel, too. We were at about the halfway point in an extremely long line, but the staff said the Special Events Hall could hold 3,000 people. So we waited in line... and waited, and waited, and waited for an hour and a half before we finally started moving.
And then they told us the panel was closed and was at maximum compacity.
WHAT?! I really couldn't believe it. They should have known how many people were going to fit in the panel, and turned people away automatically instead of letting them get in line if they never had a chance of getting in. And then they gave us all a TFIOS special poster from the tour as a consolation prize. Cool, but it's not John Green.
At that time, it was 4:00 in the afternoon, and Bookcon was supposed to close at 6:00 PM. But already, people were taking everything down and packing up. And the worst part was that all the staff were already gone, leaving the security and the vendors to take everything down for them. Customer Service had already vacated the premises, so I couldn't complain even if I wanted to (and I did). The rest of the panels were already in progress, so I couldn't get into them, and the publishing floor had ended at 3:00. So I packed up my consolation poster and my advanced reading copies and headed home. (Gee, that sounds like a sappy end to a sappy story.)
If you're thinking about going to 2015 Bookcon: DON'T. It's not worth it. I'm not sure if this was experimental because it was the first year, but there was a lot of frustration. There was absolutely no organization, no one enforced the rules, all the free copies of books and autographing tickets were sold out before 8:00 AM, it was so overcrowded, and the staff let the security do all the work. 0/10 would not recommend. I spent over $250 to get into one panel and wait in line for the rest of the day. I'm grateful for the panel I went to and that was totally worth it, but the rest was not. So don't.
