I WENT TO MY FIRST EVER YALC AND IT WAS AWESOME.

Seriously, July was just great because I got to attend the Northern YA Literary Festival on the 21st and then on the 27th-29th it was YALC at the London Film and Comic Con. Honestly, my favourite part of these events were the people I went with and the people I met there, I met some amazingly lovely book bloggers and authors but I’ll need to do a whole post on a day-to-day rundown because lots of awesome people need a huge shout out so this post is purely for my haul (most of it, anyway… I picked up some pins etc too and basically ended up feeling [and looking] like a mule).

Books!

Of course, my biggest expenditure of the weekend was on books. I did get a few for free including some ARCs which I’m so excited about but yeah, down the rabbit hole we go…

Books I took/bought there and got signed:

So I took a fair few books with me (though not as many as I came back with…) including:

• My three copies of Everless by Sara Holland (out of four, but one is already signed and personalised)
• The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert (OwlCrate edition)
• The Belles by Dhonielle Clayton
• The Exact Opposite of Okay by Laura Steven – currently reading this and completely understand why people love it so much!
• Sweet Black Waves by Kristina Perez
• The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon
• Eve of Man by Giovanna and Tom Fletcher
• Show Stopper by Hayley Barker
• The Surface Breaks by Louise O’Neill
• A Skinful of Shadows by Frances Hardinge

Copies which I bought at the convention and got signed there were:

• The Dark Queen by Josephine Boyce
• Jinxed by Amy McCulloch
• The Loneliest Girl in the Universe by Lauren James
• Slay by Kim Curran
• Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi
• Show Stealer by Hayley Barker

As I’ve said, I’ll write another post on meeting the authors because if I put it in this post it would be far too long, but everyone was so lovely! Owing to queues sadly I didn’t get to personally meet Dhonielle Clayton, Louise O’Neill, Melissa Albert or Tom and Giovanna Fletcher, but my friends were kind to take them with theirs!

Books I bought there already signed:

I managed to get one of the limited edition signed Leigh Bardugo Shadow and Bone trilogy signed sets! It’s so pretty too. I haven’t read this series yet (I know, I know) but I’m so glad I managed to pick up this set!

The final book was The Extinction Trials: Exile by S. M. Wilson, it has dinosaurs in and really that’s all the explanation it needs.

ARCs won/given:

I adore this part of my haul because a few I’ve been really excited for!

• The Forest Queen by Patricia Cornwell is one of my most anticipated releases because I love Robin Hood, I’d been declined for it on NetGalley so I’m even more excited that I got a copy!
• Sawkill Girls by Claire LeGrand
• Damsel by Elana K. Arnold
• Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan
• Witchsign by Den Patrick
• Pulp by Robin Talley
• Summoner: The Outcast by Taran Matharu, a limited edition signed proof from Bkmrk and it’s beautiful and I love this book so much so yeah… pysched to have it!

I also picked up a sampler book from Penguin with an excerpt from Sarah J Maas Catwoman in!

Books I bought because I’m impulsive:

• Night of Cake and Puppets by Laini Taylor
• Sea Witch by Sarah Henning
• The City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty
• Mask of Shadows by Linsey Miller
• The Beast’s Heart by Leife Shallcross
• ACOTAR Coloring Book
• They Both Die at the End by Adam Silvera
• History is All You Left Me by Adam Silvera
• Lifel1k3 by Jay Kristoff
• Splintered by A.G. Howard
• RoseBlood by A.G. Howard
• Empress of a Thousand Skies by Rhoda Belleza
• Beyond a Darkened Shore by Jessica Leake

And… MyKindaBook were giving out copies of Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake for free, and I’m so glad I managed to get one it’s actually a series I’ve been interested in for a while, plus one of the main characters is an elemental and I’m clearly a sucker for stories with that magic in!

Art Prints

There were two artists with stalls which I jumped for joy at! Jo Painter was in the YALC area and I’ve been lusting over her art for so long that I jumped at the chance to get some! I went for this print and bookmark of Feyre and print of Zelie. Jo also designed the character cards for Reign of the Fallen so check those out here if you haven’t already (it’s also an awesomeeee book).

I didn’t get the next print from the YALC section, it was from the LFCC part… Joshua Dunlop had a stall and as a Pokémon fan and follower of his work I jumped at the chance to meet him and get this Pikachu print (I wanted them all though, you’ve no idea how difficult the decision was to make).

Samplers

I picked up a fair few awesome looking samplers, including one for Stain by A.G. Howard which looks really good, it’s inspired by The Princess and the Pea.

SUMMONER TRADING CARDS!

I picked up the final six trading cards from the Summoner series and this complete set just makes me so happy. Bkmk had a really fun competition for these where you went around finding hidden demons around YALC.

YALC Teddy

If there’s an official teddy anywhere, you can bet I’ll be buying it. This was too cute not to pick up and so so soft too! Perfect cute little reminder of the weekend.

Did you go to YALC?
What do you think of my haul?

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