Sunday, September 27, 2009

Rick Riordan at the National Book Festival

I was at the National Book Festival yesterday in Washington DC where several authors including Rick Riordan, John Grisham, Jodi Picoult and the like did book signings and talked to their fans. The event by itself was sort of poorly managed because the management probably did not expect a crowd on such a big scale (the Smithsonian metro station was closed in the afternoon due to too much crowd!).

But all that apart, people who went with the intention of meeting their favourite authors had a successful day, and that was perhaps the only worthy reason to go to the festival because the book festival did not have any book stalls (other than a jam packed Borders tent selling only very specific books).

Anyway, so I wen't to catch a glimpse of  Rick Riordan since I am an insane Percy Jackson fan.I got to the pavilion atleast 15 minutes in advance while the previous author was still speaking. After some pushing and jostling I finally edged into the tent and escaped the rain outside. There was hardly any place to stand but I positioned myself so that I could operate my camera.

His talk was quite funny in general and he gave his eager fans a glimpse of what is in store for them in the upcoming months:

1. There will a second Camp Half Blood series of books (yes you heard it right!) coming up soon. I forget if he mentioned when it will be out, but he mentioned that there will be more of Percy and Annabeth to come although Percy will not be the main character in the new series and there will be a new generation of demigods. The new series will probably be based on the next big prophecy that we encountered in "the last olympian".

2. May next year is going to be about Riordan's next novel that is based on Egyptian mythology. Now that is something that sounds really exciting. Riordan even read the first few lines from this upcoming book that he says is currently with his editor now!

3. Finally he talked about the Lightning Thief movie that is set to release in February next year. He mentioned that the role of Chiron will be played by Pierce Brosnan and that of Medusa will be played by Uma Thurman. Now that is some interesting cast.

Since I am travelling currently, I will upload pictures soon.