On October 8th, I participated in the Great Valley Bookfest in Manteca, California, for the first time. I had an author booth at the very end of the line-up (or the very beginning, depending on where you parked), just under a tree and in front of a little duck pond. More notably, I happened to be just across the street from the entrance to Bass Pro Shops, whose bathrooms I far preferred to the parking lot porta-potties. As you can see from the photo, I selected the cloth purple color of my book cover as the official color of the day. Although I was not the most popular booth, by any means, I had a steady trickle of visitors throughout the day and was never idle for more than fifteen minutes at a time. Many people only stopped to glance idly at my booth before moving on, some people stopped to chat or grab a business card, and some stared at me in amusement and remarked on how young I looked. But the main attraction of my booth was the writing contest: participants were given 2 min...