My YALC Tips

YALC is a young adult book convention at London Film & Comic Con. It's being held at Olympia, London between the 26th and 28th July.

Details can be found here. 


This will be my fifth year attending so I thought I'd write a post with some tips!

1. Take Food and Drink With You

 While food and drinks are sold at Olympia, it is cheaper to take food with you. There are supermarkets nearby if you do want to take food in with you.

2. Panels

The panels can get busy so be sure to get a seat as soon as you can.

I've attended a few panels that I wasn't sure I would enjoy and I found them interesting, so if you're not sure what to do then check out what panels are on. I've discovered several books thanks to panels.

3. Signings

The queues for the book signings can be VERY long. 

In the past I queued to see Victoria Schwab for about an hour (it was worth it) but, if you can, then queue for a signing as soon as possible. 

I've skipped panels so that I can get a spot in a signing line as soon as an author's name was put up on the wall. So if you don't mind missing a panel it's definitely worth it!

But if you don't want to skip a panel then get a seat at the side and make a run for the signing line as soon as it ends :)

  If you can't get to a signing then authors are usually happy to sign books and talk to you while they're wandering around the floor. But be sure to check what days the authors are going to YALC for just in case you end up missing them.

Some authors may only be signing a certain number of books, so keep an eye out on the YALC Twitter page! (It's been announced that V.E./Victoria Schwab will only be signing three books and won't be personalising them).

 

 

 

 4. Book Stalls

The books on the Waterstones stall are full price but they have some signed books and books that aren't sold at any of the other stalls. 

The publisher stalls all do sales on the Sunday and sometimes give away things that they were selling the previous days (I got a t-shirt for free from Electric Monkey a few years ago).  If there is a book that you really want to buy then I wouldn't leave it until Sunday for the sales to buy it just in case there aren't any copies left.

Also follow the publishers on Twitter throughout YALC as they give out secret passwords and limited ARCs. 

@JennieLy on Twitter is making a list of the ARC drops so keep an eye out for that.
And make sure to take CASH! There are cash machines nearby but they've always got big queues. Plus the stalls usually only accept cash.

 

Do you have any YALC tips?