Tour Day 1 - Abbotsford, BC (Canada)

What a fun-filled first day to kick off the Fantasy Fiction Tour. Six of the eight authors flew in to Seattle from all over the country (I believe I flew the furthest, from Orlando) and we picked up the Miller Brothers (Christopher & Alan) who live in Seattle and just finished their first book. We all hopped in our 15-passenger van (driven by Bryan Davis) and headed north. Pictured here is Donita K. Paul - The Dragon Keeper Chronicles and Sharon Hinck - The Restorer Series.

We had to leave our swords in Seattle, due to customs at the Canadian border. Judging by the face of the border guard, they take security very seriously! After road construction traffic, we made our way through the lush green countryside, surrounded by mountains on the horizen and showed up 10 minutes before we were due to speak. The Mennonite Education Institute (MEI) Middle School was impressive. Great facilities, wonderful leadership kids to take us around, and a very friendly staff. Each of us spoke for 25 minutes to two different classrooms with 40 kids or so in them and then joined together in the library afterwards to spend time in small groups of 3 kids per author for in-depth discussions on writing. We then headed to our hotel to check in for a short 1-1/2 hr break before heading back to the school.

At 5:30 pm we had a fun-filled hour of pizza with prize winners from the St. James Bookstore that were invited to "dinner with the authors." We then made our way into the auditorium for a 2 hour time of storytelling and Q & A, led by our MC - Christopher Hopper. If you haven't checked it out, go to http://www.fantasyfictiontour.com/ and you can watch all of our presentations "live" and even send in questions while we speak. During the Q & A we answered half a dozen questions from the web. At the end we spent time talking and signing books for all the great fans who had attended. A super way to start the tour... at 7 am tomorrow (Sat) we head South to Seattle for an interview with TBN at noon! Oh... and my roommate for the trip so far? Jonathan Rogers - The Wilderking Trilogy.