Looking Forward To: BookExpo America

One of my favorite things about Lara's posts is the "Looking forward to" section at the bottom.  It's not always there, but it's there enough to make me wonder why I don't put more things to look forward to on this blog.  Because you can't take those "looking forward to" things for granted.

All night I can't stop thinking about the annual BookExpo which I will be attending here for three days in two weeks.  I've started to look up who's going to be there, advanced readers' copies in tow.  This is what I know so far:

• (One of my fave fiction wrters) Sherman Alexie's showing up with a collection of new and old stories (even though I kind of hate when writers and recording artists do this)
• Neil Young (yes, THAT Neil) will be there with a book (is this weird or not?  I can't decide),
• David Bowie's ex Angie's going to be there with a tell-all.  
• Also, children's/YA lit super celeb Lois Lowry.  
• But I'm most looking forward to the appearance of a local classic rock dj Carol Miller. 

She is married to the brother of A's old drummer and she was at our wedding.  More important than that, however, is that she has one of my dream jobs, and she had it during FM radio's heyday.  You can read it about her book at the bottom.

Looking forward to:  the eclectic nature of the BookExpo.  It's this wonderfully monstrous catch-all for the high brow and low brow--from lit fiction to self-published crime fiction, from poetry (I met Kay Ryan there last year) to rock memoir (I shamelessly had my photo taken with the author of this book last year), I find the whole thing kind of thrilling.

On that note, I love that Lara and E went to the movie they went to tonight.

Carol Miller's Up All Night:

Growing up in a traditional, intellectual ethnic Jewish household in Queens, New York, Carol Miller was supposed to be a doctor or, at the very least, a lawyer. But hearing a doo-wop trio in the alley under her window changed the direction of her life: she fell in love with popular music. During the late 60s, as the rock explosion and rebellion hit American colleges, including the University of Pennsylvania where she was a biology student, Carol joined the underground airwaves of progressive rock radio. Carol pursued radio with the dogged intensity and ambition that made her an exceptional student. But mysterious symptoms that she developed as a young woman seemed to grow more intense and painful by the year. She and her family were haunted by an unnamed and never discussed illness that claimed most of her relatives long before old age. Carol knew that she might be as cursed as her elders and it drove her to make the most of what she always feared might be a short life. She landed increasingly high profile jobs in Philadelphia and New York, eventually rising to the top to work alongside Scott Muni, Cousin Brucie, and other legendary personalities she admired growing up. As one of the nation's top DJs, Carol introduced the music of Bruce Springsteen to New York radio, was on a first name basis with Sir Paul McCartney, shared vitamins with Lily Tomlin, and dated Steven Tyler. She changed the business itself, creating an on-air approach that has been imitated and adapted by stations nationwide.