After a long train ride from Montreal to NY, I stepped out of Penn Station at 9:40 pm last night to the bustle and street chaos that is so typically and alluringly NYC! Thank goodness I only had to roll my luggage across the street right to Hotel Pennsylvania, where I'm staying.

Bright and early the next morning I walked the four blocks to Javits Center, an impressive cavernous glass building on the Hudson. Here's a fun fact about Javits: The 15-story building is made of 16,000 panes of glass, and the lobby is high enough to accommodate the Statue of Liberty! (According to my hotel's guest guidebook.)

Maureen Johnson

So the conference's morning keynote speaker was author Maureen Johnson who was funny, honest and unpretentious. The message I got from her was that your blog's content and how you present it are key to building an audience. The sessions I attended afterwards were interesting and I picked up some good pointers on how to improve my blog.

I spent the day with Elizabeth who blogs at Silver's Reviews ....

me with Elizabeth

and Alex who I just met today and who blogs at Randomly Reading and The Children's War.

me with Alex

Both are former teachers and lovely people. I thoroughly enjoyed my day with them, and I want to thank them for all their tips on how to navigate BEA. And a big thank you to the publishers that provided ARCs at the end of the conference! Here's what I picked up: