Jennifer Hillier

Bouchercon 2016 in New Orleans

Sep 20, 2016 | Conferences, Travel

There’s too much that happened at Bouchercon in New Orleans last week to go into great detail about, so here are the memorable bits, more or less in the order they happened:

  • I got to the convention on Wednesday evening, a few minutes before registration closed. This year, each attendee received six tickets to exchange for books of our choosing. This was awesome because I got to hand pick which books I wanted to read and lug home. 
  • While eating dinner at the bar that first night, the older gentleman beside me who I’d been chatting with invited me back to his room. I declined. Later, when I told my husband that I seriously couldn’t remember the last time a guy flat-out invited me to his hotel room, he said, “Uh, hello. ME. Three years ago. Las Vegas. The night we met.” Oh. Right. 
  • I was on a panel called “Something for the Weekend: Morning Sex” with fellow authors R.R. Gilston, James Ziskin, Don Bruns, and Colin Campbell, moderated by Matthew Clemens. A fine bunch we were, making donkey sex jokes at 9 a.m. the first morning of the first official day of the convention (okay, not ME, but I laughed . . . and then I cringed).
  • I had an extremely intoxicated man named Brad (yep, I’m naming him) try to massage my neck in the bar on Thursday night. Twice. The first time, I warned him about being touchy, and the second time, he actually moved my hair to get to my neck, after which I freaked out a little bit, because gross. Also, it happened front of everyone, which was embarrassing. But let’s not pretend you weren’t totally inappropriate with me and the other women, okay, Brad? And that you didn’t completely deserve to fall down backwards onto the floor on your ass, and flail around for a couple of minutes like a Muppet until two very nice people reluctantly helped you up.
  • I got to hang out with Ed Aymar, my good friend and the managing editor of The Thrill Begins. He took the group out to dinner on Friday night. Well, not really, we all went to dinner, and I suspect he picked the place because he liked the name Daisy Dukes.
Left to right: Rob Brunet, Ed Aymar, me, Wendy Tyson, Gwen Florio, and Elizabeth Heiter.

Left to right: Rob Brunet, Ed Aymar, me, Wendy Tyson, Gwen Florio, and Elizabeth Heiter.

  • After the Brad incident, Ed gave me this cool little voodoo cat, designed to ward off “rude and inappropriate people.” I wore it on my badge for the last couple days of the conference. Totally worked. I will keep it with me always. Thanks, Ed!

  • I had a lovely chat with Gracie Doyle, the editorial director of Thomas & Mercer, who also happens to be a friend and former co-worker of my husband’s. 
  • I got to congratulate one of my old writing buddies, Mark Edwards, on selling close to two million books. That’s almost a million more books than he’d sold the last time I saw him, which was the last Bouchercon, eleven months ago. (Be sure to read his latest psychological thriller, THE DEVIL’S WORK, about working in the office from hell – it’s creepy!)
  • I got to meet David Swinson, author of THE SECOND GIRL, whose book I was already in the middle of reading! Love when that happens. He’s fantastic, both as an author and as a person.
Not my best angle, but who cares, it's DAVID SWINSON!

Not my best angle, but who cares, it’s DAVID SWINSON!

  • I got to smell Mark Pryor again. He smells as good as you think he would. (Be sure to read his latest mystery, THE PARIS LIBRARIAN. One of the characters is a French police officer of Filipino descent named, ahem, Jennifer Hillier.)
  • I got to spend significant time with the other members of TTB who were at Bouchercon, namely Elizabeth Heiter, Wendy Tyson, Gwen Florio, and my fellow Torontonian Rob Brunet. There were lemon drop shots consumed in the bar, and many strange conversations about who would make our “Top 5 celebrities we would sleep with” list, what you would do if your spouse suddenly didn’t have any lady bits or man parts, what the ideal superpower would be, and so on. You know, casual bar talk.
The bar at the Marriott hotel, also knows as the Bouchercon bar.

The bar at the Marriott hotel, also knows as the Bouchercon bar.

  • Elizabeth, because she’s fabulous, introduced me to Lee Child. I shook his hand, and squeaked about what a huge fan of his work I am. Lee was gracious, as he always is, with everyone.
  • Sara Blaedel offered me her lap to sit on. Partly because there were no free chairs at her table where she was sitting with Lee, and partly because she (rightly) suspected I was close to passing out from the excitement of meeting Lee. I didn’t sit on Sara’s lap. I didn’t want to squish her (she’s too lovely).
  • Ed and I attempted to get beignets at Cafe Du Monde, where everybody at the convention was insisting we should go. We took a cab down on Saturday morning, because lazy. We didn’t get out of the cab when we got there, because lineup. We had the cab driver take us back to the hotel, because hot.
  • I got to say a quick hello to Joseph Finder, one of my writing heroes. He is such a nice guy, it’s all I could do not to gush (again, as I interviewed him for The Thrill Begins). 
  • Elizabeth, because she’s a goddess, made me her plus-one at an intimate panel moderated by Lee Child, which was invite-only. It was with bestselling authors Sara Blaedel, Karin Slaughter, Kate White, Alafair Burke and Lisa Unger, and the topic discussed was why more men aren’t reading books written by female authors. Y’all, I was in the presence of greatness. This panel may have been the highlight of my conference.
Left to right: Lee Child, Sara Blaedel, Karin Slaughter, Kate White, Alafair Burke, and Lisa Unger. WOWZA.

Left to right: Lee Child, Sara Blaedel, Karin Slaughter, Kate White, Alafair Burke, and Lisa Unger. WOWZA.

  • At the airport, before boarding my flight for home, I met a woman who currently works with law enforcement in Seattle and has a serious background in corrections. Over two large glasses each of “voodoo juice” made with lots of rum, she answered every question I had about life in women’s prisons, serial murders, missing persons, pedophiles, psychopaths, foster care, and the best way to get a cell phone past a cavity search. I was drunk when I got on the plane, but that was okay, as I have about fifty different ways to make my current book better now.

All in all, it was a fabulous convention. Next year, in 2017, Bouchercon will be in my hometown of Toronto. See you there?

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