Absolutely incredible time as an author in Indie Alley at the return of BooKCon at the Javits Center this past weekend. The fandom for book culture and reading was palpable, visible and lived. To Love Like Venus was the star of my table, with some lucky readers getting free copies from Bookfinity, highlighting me as an indie author at the show (and an excited reader showed me her win!). People were hungry for the artistry and originality of Event Horizon: Stories of No Turning Back, my prose, comics, photography and original canvas work collection themed around the lure of black holes and their unforgiving boundaries.
Some quick observations from an Indie Alley “Avenue G” perspective (not official, just from what I saw from where I was):
– this was a dominantly female consumer and author event
-it was romance and fantasy dominant in fandom and content, and provided such a loving place for women and other genders to be themselves and live their book fantasies and feel regal. There were some other genres there (I am literary fiction mostly, with sci-fi, historical, non-fiction), and so my table provided something different, and I think this will continue to grow in future years (if such readers also attend). Let’s be mindful to love the romance and fantasy sector, which is predominantly women, who have struggled for the respect and space in what they love, to be where we are now.
-supportive partners were there (I loved the t-shirt: Husbands against book boyfriends)
-someone else commented on this: authors signed books happily for free and with glee (again, female dominant). In comic conventions, people ask to be paid for signatures (mostly male convention and creators). It is an interesting observation.
-I have never tabled at an event with so many hungry readers willing to drop $ on books, not requiring hard pitches, some literally telling me: I came here to drop a ton of money on indie authors I love. And also, connecting with the person too, not just the “product”.
Truly special event.
If you have BookCon FOMO:
here’s a discount to help offset some shipping on To Love Like Venus direct from Ingram (printer), offer expires May 4th 2026. https://shop.ingramspark.com/b/084?params=qB7nKA8gHhTshZW07KqQ8R6mZ1be82TpJHAZaZs4y0f
