Markus Zusak!!

(This photo is courtesy of Marie Teemant; the rest are mine.)

Yesterday, Markus Zusak, author of The Book Thief, Getting the Girl, Fighting Ruben Wolfe, and I Am the Messenger, came to my favorite library. I had begged and pleaded to be able to work at the event, and was able to do just that...and ended up working a 13 hour shift! Yikes! However, it was awesome! I got meet Markus just before the event, and he was very gracious and kind, and then he spoke for about an hour, and was funny and charming and delightful. Then, he set about signing books--for over six hours. Each person had a two book limit, but he personalized them all--drawing pictures and writing little messages and such. It was great to see how humble he was; I mean, we have this amazing New York Times bestselling author thanking everyone for being there and just genuinely trying to make everyone happy. As a member of the staff, I had to wait 'til the very end to get my books signed (and my sweet husband waited for several hours to get a couple of books signed for me as well), but it was worth the wait. I definitely hope he comes back--and apparently this was his second-biggest book signing ever, so maybe he will. (He said he'd like to. I'm sure we'd all agree to host him again.)

I hereby proclaim this the best day in my library career. (I also just asked Adam if someday we can name a child Markus Zusak Everitt...we'll see how that goes...and no, we are not expecting.)

Markus's presentation:

Markus signing away

Markus and meA couple brief videos...which don't really have complete stories, but still, they give you a little bit of a feel for how awesome Markus is.

:)