Book Lovers Inc.
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Love Letter Convention – Caro’ & Susi’s adventures in Berlin
It’s finally time for our (abridged) recap of the Lover Letter Convention in Berlin ( June 2-3, 2012). We had a blast and thought we would share some pictures and experiences with you today. We although brought some goodies- not much but it’s signed so don’t forget to leave a comment.
Day 1 – The Arrival
The German View:
We (the bf, a friend et moi) started our trip in Magdeburg at 12 pm. After a 2 hour train ride we arrived in Berlin and made our trip to the hotel. With my great google maps navigation skills we only had a tiny bit of a longer trip packed with all the bags to the hotel but well I didn’t have to carry my bag. (Susi the egoistic one). We checked in and after a small break we made our way back into the city to take advantage of the movies in English. *g* When we were done we had a heartattack when my phone informed us Caro’s flight landed 1,5 hours early and we imagined her laying on the floor there sobbing that the evil Germans didn’t come to get her. Then we started thinking and realized that she should still be in Munich and without having beamed herself to Berlin there was no way she could already be here. But we didn’t want to risk it so classy as we are we went to a store, bought beer and the German version of Champagne and made the trip to the airport. And surprise, her flight was on schedule so we had 1,5 hours to wait for Caro’s arrival.
I fretted over: what if I don’t recognize her? I did and when she came out of the gate I saw I wasn’t the only one worrying. We really hit it off from the first minute. *g*
So we grabbed the French girl and her bags and made our way back to the hotel- in the rain. When we are all soaked through but finally back in the warm room we started chatting about this and that, drank some Champagne and before we realized it it was 3 am and no one was really tired. All this adrenaline is better than coffee.
The French View:
Germany is a SCARY place…I mean come on, they speak German there!!! LOL I was sooooo scared of getting lost. I admit I might have told Susi a thousand times I would roll in a ball crying for my mom if she wasn’t there to greet me LMAO. I often overreact 😉 Since we’re still writing posts together you can see we didn’t break up our friendship after meeting LOL. If you don’t all know it yet, Susi’s made of awesomesauce.
Day 2 – Bears & Dinner
After waking up and getting ready we were (or maybe just Susi) this close to tears when we realized the stupid bakery thingie near our hotel doesn’t have any coffee to go. GASP! So we had to wait for my fix till we arrived in the city.
We spent some hours sight seeing and giggling over the stupid pics we took.
Caro developed a deep affection for the Berlin bears.
We met up with some authors (Nalini Singh, Maya Banks and Lara Adrian) and the great Dutch ladies: the ROOB girls (Natasha, Leontine and Pearl), Lucy, Aurian and her besty Freya.
Nalini Singh & Maya Banks
Mr. Adrian and Lara Adrian
Dinner ( © Mr. Adrian)
These ladies are made from awesomesauce. We giggled and laughed and it could be we entertained the whole restaurant. All the ladies and Mr. Adrian were wonderful and well they all stole our heart.
Caro’s two cents: It was SO much fun meeting the Dutch Horde! ⇐ yes they invaded Germany! I had a blast! It’s hard not to love them seriously.
Day 3 – Chattety Chit-Chat
On our first convention day we got into the mood with some panels.
Historical Romance panel: Maya Banks, Michelle Styles & Lara Adrian
Susi only attended the first panel cuz she loves Caro that much. It was all about historicals- their setting, the tropes and the different characters found in them. Michelle Styles, Maya Banks and Lara Adrian talked about their experience in the genre and I loved to hear all about their research methods. Really surprising how different authors do that.
Category Romance Panel: Michelle Styles, Nalini Singh & Maya Banks
After that we went to the Category romance panel with Nalini Singh, Maya Banks and Michelle Styles. I loved to hear some more about these. I love to read a category romance when the mood for something happy and quick strikes me.
Caro & Michelle Styles
After that we thought to give the Blind Dates a try and met the wonderful Michelle Styles and talked about category romances and well romance in general.She brought us books- English books YAY
Reading: Larissa Ione & Sandra Henke
After that we attended readings by Larissa Ione and Sandra Henke (well that one was accidental and Caro REALLY enjoyed it), Maya Banks and Lara Adrian. It was nice to hear the authors read BUT after lunch it really makes you all sleepy. LOL (not to mention we were sitting on pillows on the floor *Zzz ZZzzz*)
Caro’s two cents: Listening to a German reading is quite the experience. I felt left out when people started laughing. I was all ‘what??? What happened?’ Good thing I had my own personal translators LOL. Funny enough they only translated the dirty parts…I wonder why…LOL
Susi: Because we know you!!!!!
If there’s one thing we realized very quickly, it’s that if you wanted seats in a panel/reading/Q&A you just had to avoid where Nalini Singh went LOL. She was very very popular.
The end of the day was the book signing. We were a bit late- and by that I mean not 30 minutes early. LOL We waited 45 minutes to get into the room because Nalini’s line was going all through the house. But we got all the good stuff signed and left the convention with a smile on our face.
Day 4 – Let’s Talk About Sex
Workshop Let's Talk About Sex: Shannon McKenna, Lisa Marie Rice & Maya Banks
If there was 1 panel we didn’t want to miss it was the Let’s Talk About Sex one *sings* (admit it now you have that song in your head too!). This panel was hilaaaaaarious. I haven’t laughed so much in ages. Maya Banks rocked that panel. ⇐ Yes I have a huge Maya crush now. See there were a few guys at the convention, not many but they were there. And during this panel one of them asked questions that really had us laughing our ass off. It was super fun to see the men side of reading romances.
As much as we were reluctant about the ‘blind dates’ concept at first when we read the schedule it soon became obvious it was a great idea. We really wanted to have a blind date with Maya and yes we ‘arranged’ to be at her table at the right time Muahahhaaha. It was such a great idea, 5 of us readers with 1 author for 1 hour. Just fun!
Susi & Maya Banks
We first had one with Shannon McKenna, then with Maya. (Yes we basically spent our time in Blind Dates LOL). Shannon was great- she’s funny, witty and made us giggle. I love how ironic and sarcastic she can be. I can’t stress enough how much fun Maya was. Susi and I both agree on that. She really rocked. Well all the authors were really super nice (at least the ones speaking English…I have NO idea about the German ones LOL)
We also attended a game each day- it was fun to enter a competition with an author and I have to say we met some great Austrian gals there. Larissa Ione was so wonderful and well she did help us with the romance genre questions. But well the others cheated- I’m sure about that. *wink*.
At the end of the day we went out to dinner again with the Dutch ladies, Nalini and her mom and had a great time recapping all the fun we had over the weekend.
Dinner with the Dutch ladies & Nalini Singh
Well and as it goes at a convention we got books. Here they are:
books, books, books (you can click on it to see a bigger version)
And well here are the books of all 3 of us stacked. LOL
PS: When we came back to the hotel, we had a big laugh at some scenes from one of the German books. Let’s just say a garden hose was used in a very unconventional way LMAO.
Susi: This whole weekend was such a blast. It wasn’t only great because of the convention- it was awesome for me because I met the crazy French gal. *sobs* We had so much more fun and finally someone didn’t roll their eyes at my silliness. But well the convention was great too. I didn’t expect it to be that meet-and-greety. We really got to talk to the authors and well be silly together. I still can’t believe how great they were. I adore Maya Banks- her humor and well everything about her was made of awesomesauce. And well Nalini was soooo lovely I felt like hugging her all the time. So well great times- as Aurian told me today- if I could register for next year already I would do so in a heartbeat.
Caro still crying: *sob* I didn’t want it to end! It was just SO much fun. I tried getting into Susi’s suitcase but with all the books and underwear it was impossible to fit LOL. I’ve added SO many books to my TBR-list now. I just want to gobble down all of their books.
My 2 ‘coup de coeur’ are Nalini (adorable!) and Maya. So different and still both made of awesomesauce. (Now you believe me when I said I fell in love with Maya? I’ve only mentioned her 100 times already and that was the Abridged version)
Did you ever attend a book convention?
Any funny or cute stories you can share?
Which one do you ever really WANT to attend?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~*~*Giveaway*~*~
We have 2 little swag packs for two lucky commenters.
All you have to do is answer one of our questions or leave a meaningful comment about the post(fangirl squees are acceptable too *wink*).
(You can read our full giveaway policy here)
Please be sure to include a valid email address in the comment form (need not be in the actual body of the comment).
This giveaway is open to all!
Giveaway ends on Saturday, 23 June 2012; we will announce the winner on Sunday.
Good luck!
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You guys had obviously sooo much fun and to think that you had a “blind date” with one of the authors. I mean people will always ask you questions like “If you could meet five famous people to dinner …” but real life is (at east for the lucky two of you) so much better!
P.S.: I hope the garden hose will be explained in the near future! 😀
Believe us- you don’t want to know. Seriously I’m not a prude but OMG >.<
*snort* I’m not a prude either but that scene was O_O o_o o_O. Too bad there isn’t an English translation of that book lol
What a great post ladies, I am still working on mine. Such great memories, such awesome people we met. And yes, I love Lara Adrian Maya Banks and Nalini Singh too! Dinner with them was fantastic.
So can’t wait to see your recap. It was lovely to meet you! <3
Yes!!! Can’t wait to read it *g* I will truly cherish these memories. It was Awesome to meet real book lovers
Aww thanks so much for sharing the photos and details of your adventure, it sounds like you two had a blast! 😀 And how amazing that you got to participate to such intimate dinners with the authors, that is truly awesome! 😀 (and that book pile wow, how many English books did you get?) Thanks, your photos made me smile and giggle as well 🙂
I think I got 3 English books- the rest I brought to the conevention.
As it is partly financed by German pubs the books are German but pretty. LOL
Yes the best parts were the intimate moments with the authors. It was great that we also met them between panels or outside the convention.
I came home with a lot of English books because I brought 5 or 6 of them for the signing LOL
Great post, ladies! Love the pictures of you two 😀 So glad you got to meet in RL (I didn’t realise you hadn’t :-)), and it sounds like you all had a huge amount of fun at the convention! Yay!
Yes we were so excited about that- perhaps even more than about meeting the authors. It was a blast- next time convention in the UK to hopefully meet you!
Yes, you must both come to the UK (convention or otherwise :-)) Would love to meet both of you! 😀
Yep it was the first time meeting each other. I think I haven’t spent a day without talking to that crazy German in the last 2 years but first time we met for realzz! 😉
Ohhhh this is SO awesome. I’m so glad you guys had a blast!
“Caro’s flight landed 1,5 hours early and we imagined her laying on the floor there sobbing that the evil Germans didn’t come to get her.”
BWAhahaha! ^____^
LOL I really was worried. Caro was sooooo excited and scared about all the Germans. But it did work out! Without sobbing. 😉
My USian brain does not comprehend this sentence. Flights landing EARLY? Does not compute.
LOL well it was a few minutes late after all… really bad joke. LOL
LOL I was so scared I puked my guts out when I woke up that day! So I might have cried if left by myself at the airport LOL
I have a dream….one that will surely make international headlines: “Ladies of BLI Take [insert book con] by Storm” ^____^
That would be awesome. 😛
Lovely recap ladies. Mine was very bare, compared to that. Maybe that I’ll write and extended one. But that’s going to be in Dutch.
Had a great time and until next time!!
Dang, but my Dutch is so bad. LOL I will make Caro translate for me again but since Berlin I suspect she played me or you all were constantly talking about my “beauty” LMAO
Don’t listen to Susi, I translated exactly what you were all saying. Not my fault you only talked about our awesomeness LMAO 😉
I’ll look at your extended version in Dutch and I’ll see if I understand anything *g*
You had champagne!! The morning we went to Berlin we had a group of ladies sharing 3 bottles of the bubblies together. Next time I’m crashing your room 😉 A great recap…and the pics…you two ladies are made for each other 😀 Glad you both had an awesome experience! Next year, we’ll definitely do it again!
LOL *g* Caro even brought french sweets. *g* I <3 her. Same here!
Yes!! Next year we do this again! *g* I’m already so excited!
Oh yes we had alcohol aplenty! Champagne and German drinks. Of course we wrote the postcards while very tipsy. It was hilarious.
I’ve never attended a book convention, but I enjoyed reading the recap of your adventure. It’s good to see y’all finally meeting and having so much fun.
Thank you! It was great to meet so many likeminded ladies.
I am just heartbroken that I did not dare to fly to far away Germany and speak Deutsch. You girls had so much fun!
You should dare it next year! Caro was a strong gal too! 😉 I will even get you from the airport.
I realllllly hope you will next year! Those Germans aren’t THAT scary (she made me say that) .
I’ve never attended a convention but would love to some time. They appear to be so much fun and look at all the lovelies you bring home ;).
Will cross my fingers for you. It was fun! And yes the pretties are a plus 😛
i hope one day i will be able to attend something like that, germany isn’t far but still too far for me ( being sick and…exams!!!!! oh my my exams are starting tomorrow and that 3weeks i didn’t open a book ç_ç)
Oh my. Poor thing. I will cross my fingers for your exams. I know all about how painful those can be. *cheers* You can do it!
I had soooo much fun in Berlin and with you girls. I do hope to see you all next year in Berlin again (if there is another convention)! Hugggsss
Ditto ditto!!! Would love to see you again and I really hope they will do it again. It seems they were sold out- if you look at the amount of ppl we saw at the signing.
Well they’d better have another next year or I’ll start a hunger strike! AH!
But next year I’ll try staying longer or something.
It was just so much fun meeting you guys *g* My favorite Horde of all!
It looks like it was a blast. But more importantly….OMG guys, you are toooo cute!!!!
Thank you sweety! <3
omg you already know how totally jealous i am that you got to see larissa ione and nalini singh, not to mention hang out in germany with each other. i and i am so the same when it comes to going to new places. I really want someone to meet me there/drive me to the hotel. i get mad anxiety. thanks for the recap, ladies!
I think it sounds scarier than it is. Just be strong and bite through (not sure if that actually makes sense in english) LOL
I’ve never been to any convention; no stories to tell; any one where Nalini Singh attends I would be happy to be at.
Which author were you most excited at meeting?
I was most excited about Nalini. But in retrospective Maya totally rocked my world. She’s awesome! Well Nalini was too but we had more contact with Maya and her super nice assistant.
I agree with Susi. I mostly went there for Nalini and ended up falling in love with Maya Banks. She was a hoot!
Looks like you had a great time. I’m a little bit jealous, but who knows: Berlin isn’t that far, so this is one con I might actually attend someday.
And my dream is to attend one in the US
You should so come if they do it again next year! So much fun- seriously we were giggling so much!
Sooo sad that I didn’t know about this. I live in Switzerland and would have loved to attend. Oh well… From your pictures I would have thought that Nalini Singh was older then she looks (she looks like she’s a teenager). I am glad you were able to listen to some really interesting panels.
Oh no! We will try to make more tam tam before if they do it again next year. 😉
Damn! Ok next year we’ll post about it very early to rally the troops!
And YES Nalini looks WAY younger in real life than on her books. She’s adorable. Seriously. Even her laugh is adorable. <3
Oh girls I love all those great picks and trip details! Wish I was there too, you seem to have had a GREAT time!!!! So nice 🙂
It was beyond amazing for me. It was all I could wish for and some more. =) I hope one day we’ll meet too!!!
Ohhhh it would be. Perhaps some day we will get that done. *hugs*
It sounds like you guys had a great time!
We did! 🙂
Looks like you had a really fun time. I attended a book lover’s convention and had a really good time. I met a lot of author’s and learned a lot about books so it was worthwhile.
A Book Lovers Convention. We should totally go to one of those with the BLI team 😉
I love to read this post, i hope one day i will be able to attend something like that. Almost all my favorite author in that event, Nalini singh, Larissa Ione, Lara Adrian.. etc.
Thanks for sharing, i like to see your photos and read your adventure 🙂
YAY so happy you enjoyed. Will cross my fingers for you and perhaps it will work 😀
How great to meet all those authors. It sounds like so much fun. I’ve never been to a convention, but would like to attend any of them.
It really is. You should give it a try!
Hello from the USA!
I just want to add my thanks to all of YOU for making the LoveLetter Convention so much fun. I loved meeting everyone (or seeing you again, in some cases!). Having a chance to hang out and chat during the blind dates and during the convention gatherings was extra special to me. Also, dinner Friday night before the con was a blast!
Big hugs from a grateful author and your friend, Lara 🙂
I hope you had a save trip home. It is always great to meet you and I agree it was a great event. And yes that dinner was unforgettable.
Thank you for taking the time and making these trips- your European fans love you even more for that. 😀