Discussion Challenge: Meeting My Favorite Authors

I was on a roll Saturday night! I just kept thinking of other posts ideas to write about...probably trying to avoid doing necessary things but oh well! My next post idea came when I saw about writing about meeting one of your favorite authors! I've been very, very fortunate enough to have met a slew of favorite authors, sometimes multiple times, but there are still a few I would DIE to meet!

Meeting My Favorite Authors

The first one that comes to mind is L.J. Smith! The REAL one! I happened upon L.J.'s book one day looong ago while I was strolling the shelves at Borders looking for my next read. I first found the compilation of The Forbidden Game trilogy! 3 books in 1! Who would've thought that was a thing?! This was of course long before they'd re-publish her books in compilation format.

I started reading it and naturally, fell in love with the story! Julian was such a tormented character. Do I love him? Do I hate him? He's villainous, but yet, not! It was my first time ever having such conflicting thoughts for a character. Generally I was used to either loving or hating someone in a book! It was pretty much spelled out for you who was lovable and not!

I would later go on to read The Vampire Diaries, how I had I missed these?! I was DYING for a vampire book! And here were 4!! These two had their retro groovy covers...if you can call 90s covers groovy! LOL! But they were just sooo good! They were the kind of read I was looking for as a young teen who just wanted to read about vampires! Which seriously you guys, there was a time when there was NOTHING in the YA section! Trust me on this!

I still want to read L.J.'s Nightworld series, which I bought in their compilation format at those Borders closing sales. Although I did find one at TJ Maxx as well as Dark Visions! But anyway, since L.J. was one of my first ever vampire authors and quick to be favorite author, I would love nothing more than to meet this woman and thank her for her books! She gave me the read I was searching for when there was virtually none to be had!

My next author I would DIE to meet is Marianne Curley! For she too was one of the early paranormal authors that I read! Though this time it was with magic and time traveling! It was amazing!

I know nowadays everyone's tired of the ordinary girl who doesn't realize she's really extraordinary. But when I was a teen, I feel like these were few and far between. There were a few books I read where the girl was really oh-so-popular, she didn't know what boy she liked more and oh-my-god-what-am-I-going-to-do?! Seriously I feel like this was their biggest problem. Granted not all the contemporary books were like that, but they definitely had their drama and that was why I was getting so tired of them and why I turned to paranormal.

So yes, the ordinary, plain girl being a hero wasn't really a big thing back then. Also, remember, paranormal reads weren't big yet either. So this book was unique in that sense. The girl was bullied a bit, she was just kind of ordinary, except for the whole being a witch thing. It wasn't like she literally had power zapping at her fingertips though. In fact...I don't think she really was a witch. Her grandmother was the one with all the power and of course the guy we're introduced to also has powers he's unaware of!

So getting away from the book itself, Marianne was a writer I grew to love and adore! I'm even more excited that she's continuing her first series, The Guardians of Time! So you'll be witnessing my first re-read since like 2009! I re-read Old Magic several times because I loved how ordinary the heroine was and how--spoiler/not really spoiler--she gets the guy!

Basically if I ever learn that either of these two ladies were to do a signing (in the US for Marianne since she's an Aussie), I will be do everything possible to ditch work and be there!! Because these two were among my founding authors in the genre that would soon takeover my life in the best way possible!!

So what are your authors that you would do anything to meet? How/when did you discover them?