Entering Earls Court Exhibition Hall was like walking into an alternate universe inhabited by superheroes, Doctors, Jedis and wizards.
I was dressed up myself as Isabelle Lightwood from The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare, as per my instructions from The Guardian. It was absolutely surreal, and also the perfect atmosphere for the UK's first ever Young Adult Literature Convention (YALC).
The highlight of the event for me was getting to interview the amazing Malorie Blackman, the woman responsible for creating this incredible event who was so inspirational to talk to.
I also loved the author panels. The first of these, The End Of The World As We Know It, focused on the dystopian genre and featured Malorie Blackman, Patrick Ness, Sarah Crossan and James Smythe as chair. The authors decided that dystopian fiction is so popular because it represent all the fears teenagers are scared they can't handle - Patrick even compared it to the uncertainty of high school. Malorie added that there's also an element of hope involved too: dystopias show that individuals have the power to make huge changes.
The debate finished with an interesting question from the audience about the relationship between dystopias and politics. According to Patrick, no dystopia is really about the future - it's actually about the right now. Definitely food for thought!
The next event I went to was perfect for Comic Con, as it was called Superfans Unite! It was made up of Tim O'Rourke, Rainbow Rowell and Lucy Saxon (who came in an amazing Captain America costume) and was chaired by Andy Robb. Of course, Andy began by asking the authors which fandoms they're a part of: Lucy is a multi-fandom girl and loves the Avengers and Harry Potter; Rainbow is a Trekkie and is also Sherlocked; Tim loves Sherlock too, but the book series rather than the television programme.
Regenerating The Doctor was yet another brilliant panel, made up of Malorie Blackman, Patrick Ness, Charlie Higson, Markus Sedgwick and Andy Lane. It included, obviously, lots of talk about Doctor Who, since all the authors on the panel wrote a short story for a Doctor Who's 50th Anniversary anthology. This chatter ranged from Malorie's love-fear relationship with Daleks, to Patrick's alien-interpretation of the Doctor to Charlie's explanation for why the Doctor chose Rose .
The Heroes of Horror panel, made up of Charlie Higson, Will Hill, Derek Landy and Darren Shan, and chaired by Rosie Fletcher, had to be one of my favourite events. The best part was when the authors were asked about boundaries. Darren told us about his editor asking him to change a scene in one of his Demonta books, Lord Loss, in which the young protagonist finds his family ripped apart by demons. Darren made just one change: originally, the decapitated body hanging from the ceiling had been the boy's mother – Darren changed it to his father and "it was fine". His advice: "leave mothers alone"!
Day Two
The next day started with a bloggers brunch, where I joined the newly crowned Queen of Teen himself, James Dawson, the brilliant Holly Black, the lovely Non Pratt and the amazing Matt Haig. The authors all spoke about their upcoming books before we split up to explore.
The first event I attended was the I'm Too Sexy For This Book, which was great! The panel included James Dawson, Cat Clarke, Non Pratt and Beth Reekles and their talk grew more hilarious (and a bit outrageous!) each minute, with numerous euphemisms, talks of "sexy fun time" and the Zuul-like Gatekeepers (ask Google - search Ghostbusters).
James asked why they risk putting "sexy sexy scenes" in teen books, to which Cat responded that some teenagers have sex. All three women write different types of so-called sexy-fun-time, although all portrayed sex in a positive way and without judgement.
The Crossover event was amazing too and was made up of Matt Haig, Anthony McGowan, Nick Lake and Meg Rosoff. It was really interesting to watch these big players in the crossover genre debate what exactly "crossover" means. Nick, who's also an editor at HarperCollins, said that "no one" really knows but the general consensus was that lots of the old great books would be classified as YA today – Nick added that there has been a "cultural shift" and that books are slow to catch up.
The Sisters Doing It For Themselves panel (made up of Julie Mayhew, Tanya Byrne, Isobel Harrop and Holly Smale ) was all about girl power and exploring different kinds of "strong" female characters. The chair, Sara Manning, began by claiming that this was "the best panel at YALC", with "more boobs, X-chromosomes and oestrogen" – it was. The authors were asked about their literary heroines when they were teenagers. Julie liked the unpolished girls (like Carrie), Tanya found her heroes around her, Isabel liked Jacqueline Wilson books, Holly loved Anne from Anne of Green Gables, whilst Sara liked first the "loud" (like Petrova from Ballet Schools) and then the "mad" girls (like Sylvia Plath).
Sara moved on by saying that the word "heroine" generally refers to a girl in a dystopian book and that the panel all write "real" books, asking if they owe it to girls to make it real. Tanya believes her job is to "tell a story" and that there is "more than one type of teen girl" to represent. Holly added that she wanted to write someone she could relate to, someone who was "brave" in a different sense: a vulnerable person with inner courage.
One of the last events I went to was the Sophie McKenzie and Robert Muchamore In Conversation panel, in which the authors were quizzed on their tips to getting published: Sophie's tips were to "read a lot", sit down, get on with it and "just keep writing". Oh, and ignore those who say there's "better things to do with your time". Robert said his best tips are to "experiment", don't be over ambitious and don't give up if you feel frustrated.
Phew, this was a packed weekend! Can you tell I adored YALC? No? And here's me thinking it was obvious!
