When Fierce Reads announced their tour dates for this summer, I was terribly disappointed. I’ve given up on the idea of any of the big, fun tours actually coming to Vancouver, but at least one a year can usually make it to Seattle which, crossing an international border aside, is an easy trip.
But there was no Seattle. There was no Washington stop at all. Even though they were doing a west coast leg of the tour. It was very disappointing.
But then I saw a light. There was a Portland stop. Now, Portland is a much farther drive than Seattle. But, it’s doable. I just had to convince some friends that they really wanted to go as well. Thankfully, Portland is a pretty awesome city even without a book signing so it wasn’t that difficult to convince Heather and Alita that we need to get up stupid early and go buy shoes, dresses, and books in Portland.
They were both okay with this plan with the added caveat that we also buy donuts.
So, my alarm went off at 4:05am and we were on the road by 5:15, across the border by 6 and in line at VooDoo Doughnuts before noon. I got the VooDoo Man, Alita got the Double Bubble and Heather almost didn’t get the Maple Bacon doughnut but I made her do it because she’d been talking about it for so long and I knew she’d regret it.
Then we went to the big downtown Powell’s Books, which was basically heaven. Like, we only had an hour free parking and we wanted to get in a bunch of shoe and clothing shopping before going to the book signing so there was a time limit on our adventures there. And, yeah. I could’ve spent all day just wandering the aisles and finding good deals and new books and and and it’s just heaven. Why don’t we have a Powell’s Books here?
I limited myself to only buying one book there, (a hard cover copy of Jellicoe Road because I like having hard covers of my favourite books) and then we moved on to Outlet Shopping.
I’m not going to go into details about the more girly portions of the day but let’s just say we found some good deals and stocked up on dresses, shoes, and necklaces. But were sadly disappointed by the Disney store. Also, I didn’t find a wallet. I really wanted to buy a new wallet.
Then we went to the Beaverton Powell’s Books for the book signing! Yay! I bought four books this time. Three to get signed, and one a hard cover copy of A Discovery of Witches, which I’ve only seen in paperback since I’ve read it. My life follows this trend of trying to find hard covers.
And then the authors talked and I didn’t take any pictures because by this time I was really tired and just wanted to sit there. They were all funny and interesting and I’m probably going to regret not getting one of the books, but oh well. I got two pairs of shoes instead.
And then we went up to get our books signed and this, I knew, was my moment. It was my moment to claim a victory.
If you follow both Wendy and I on twitter, or on GoodReads, you may notice that we sometimes get into a bit of an argument. And, well, I wanted to have a really good argument on my side regarding this. Plus we’d driven for six hours to see these authors so I thought Leigh Bardugo might be nice and write something special for me in my pretty new copy of Siege and Storm.
And she did. And it was awesome. And then we drove for six more hours and struggled to stay awake. But today I get to wear my new teal shoes, and show this picture to Wendy as often as I want to. So it was all worth it.
I kind of want another one of those doughnuts though.
Click here to see if the Fierce Reads Tour is coming near you. If so, you should definitely go.