The first challenge I faced this year was deciding which day to attend (April 24 or 25th). Saturday offered a tempting panel with Ray Bradbury and Ray Harryhausen together. But Ray Harryhausen is currently out on the promo circuit signing his new book and I'd just gone to a Ray Bradbury signing a few months ago. So I opted for the (I hoped) lesser attended Sunday where one of my all time favorite authors, Dean Koontz, was speaking twice during the day. Another nice point - Dean was speaking on two of the stages, which unlike the Festival panels (such as the two Rays), did not require obtaining tickets in advance. Although I later learned that by not attending on Saturday I'd also missed another favorite writer: Eric Garcia, author of the marvelous Anonymous Rex series.

Since Dean was speaking at noon, I arrived by 11 a.m. and made my way over to the stages following directions provided by the various and plentiful information booths. An aside - the Festival has a pretty easy method of directing people around the often-confusing UCLA campus - long lines of different-colored flags strung high above the booths. So if one is looking for a particular area, information booth workers give you directions such as 'follow purple to yellow and the stage is between yellow and red'. It sounds odd, but once you're used to it, it's a lot easier to follow than 'start at Pauley, head for Campbell and if you pass Fowler, you've gone too far'.

At any rate, the flags quickly led me to the first stage where there were still plenty of empty seats this hour prior to Dean's appearance. And I soon realized why - there was already a good-sized line formed around the corner for Dean's anticipated signing for AFTER his speaking engagement which was still an hour away from starting! It was at this point that I began to realize that the Festival had gotten too big. It was once again up to a choice (as often happens at such overlarge venues) of listening to someone speak or getting in line to get something signed. Tmepting as it was to want to go listen to him speak, I decided to wait in line to get books signed instead, as any questions I had for Dean, I could ask once I'd reached the front of the line, and then I could go listen to his second reading/Q&A on the other stage later in the day. The disadvantage I had is that I was alone at the Festival - many others had traveled together and left one friend in line to hold their place while they went and sat and listened to Dean speak. But as I had no one to hold my place, I stayed and waited. As frequently happens, the Festival was held on an especially hot weekend, so I got well and truly sunburned standing there waiting in line while Dean spoke and answered questions (too far away for me to hear) for 45 minutes. Then he headed over to the autograph area and started signing.

Now when I'd first gotten in line, there appeared to be about 75 or so people in line ahead of me. But as soon as Dean finished speaking, those who had been in seats listening, returned to the line which suddenly doubled in size ahead of me. I groaned as the heat intensified and the wait lengthened. This wasn't my first time meeting Dean - I'd been to a few of his signings before. But he's such a nice guy (not to mention a great writer), and I wanted to get the items I'd brought signed, and I had a question for him, so I stayed and waited.

It wound up being two hours total in line before I put my books down in front of Dean. He was as friendly and fun as always, enjoying answering his fans' questions. The lady in front of me inquired after Trixie's health. No, Trixie is not Dean's wife - she's the beautiful 8-year-old Golden Retriever that Dean poses with on the back of his books. Apparently Trixie recently had spinal surgery but is now romping about and feeling much better. (My favorite of Dean's books, "Watchers", coincidentally features a very lovable super-intelligent Golden Retriever.)

When it was my turn, I placed the items I'd brought in front of Dean. Now the Festival website had said there's a maximum of three items that a person can get signed by an author, so I'd painstakingly picked from a myriad of Koontz collectibles what I'd bring to the signing only to arrive in line and find that Dean's maximum was actually FIVE items signed - which made the line that much longer. But the three items I'd chosen I did get personally inscribed: a copy of Dean's current book "Odd Thomas", and two "Hideaway" items - one, an oddity paperback copy that hadn't had any color printed on the cover and two, the press kit for the movie adaptation of Dean's novel. Dean wrinkled his nose a bit and laughed as he wrote on the press kit "Don't see the movie!" I joked with him, saying it could have been worse - I could have brought the press kit and other items from the movie version of "Demon Seed". He grinned and said he wouldn't have minded that at all in comparison. So I laughed and said, okay, next time.