Marissa Meyer at the bookstore

Marissa Meyer, author of the bestselling Lunar Chronicles that started with Cinder, announced at her blogsite that she would be signing books at Third Place Books. Considering her in-depth knowledge of fairy stories, I definitely decided to go.

After she and three other young adult authors did a Q&A session, people rushed to line up for autographs. I ended up towards the end of the line, but it was worth it. They were autographing coloring books featuring themselves and other authors on the book tour. Coloring books!

You can read the autograph, which is what's important

  

(You’ll see how lifelike when you scroll down.) Marissa was glad to see me. Want to know why? Google my name and the word Cress and you’ll see. It’s important to have something intelligent to say, not just, “I really like your books.”

So after the picture, since she does a wealth of research on folklore, I asked her opinion on which country had the original Cinderella story. (It was not originally a European tale.) She said that the earliest written account was in China, but she thought the earliest account of all would have been an oral tradition in Egypt.

I asked, “You mean with the fur slipper?” and she said yes.

(There is an ongoing controversy as to whether the first European writer of the story actually meant to write verre, which means glass, or vair, which means a fur used for clothing.)

That was an enjoyable conversation. If you hear that Marissa Meyer is doing a signing in your area, you really should go see her.