For the LA Times Festival of Books the price of parking was $8 on Saturday and $9 on Sunday. I can’t figure that one out. One thing missing this year from the Festival was the various colored banners that helped direct people to the signing booths. I personally didn’t need those banners, but I wonder if they were useful for those who were new to the event and wanted to get their books signed.
I saw a couple walking along. A coin slipping out from one of their pockets. They looked down at the coin and continued to walk on. A young kid ran over and picked up the coin. He then returned it to the couple. That kid is one honest kid. I hope he remains that way.
There was a booktv.org tape that played before a number of the panels. I think it was the same tape from last year. It got so irritating after awhile.
Back to Saturday. I was walking pass one of the signing booths and saw a long line of folks waiting to get their books signed. I checked out what book people were carrying with them. It was “Kiss My Math: Showing Pre-Algebra Who’s Boss” by Danica McKellar. I wanted to see if I could see her so I looked over to the tent. There was a blond posing for the cameras. I was like, “That can’t be Danica.” It was actually Tori Spelling. I guess Alyssa Milano was also signing books in the area, but I didn’t see her. She might not have arrived yet. It was nice to know that so many people had McKellar’s book versus Spelling’s. Just my two cents.
Sunday, Panel 1
The first panel I attended was at 11 a.m. It was titled “Climate in Crisis.” The moderator was Jon Wiener. The panelists were Stephan Faris, Edward Humes, William J. Kelly and Daniel Sperling.
The stolen bios are as follows:
Jon Wiener. Wiener is a contributing editor of the Nation magazine and a history professor at UC Irvine. He’s also written for the Los Angeles Times Book Review, the New Republic and the New York Times Magazine. His most recent book is “Historians in Trouble: Plagiarism, Fraud and Politics in the Ivory Tower.”
Stephan Faris. Faris is a journalist who specializes in writing about the developing world. Since 2000, he has covered Africa, the Middle East and China for a variety of publications. His most recent book is “Forecast: The Consequences of Climate Change.”
Edward Humes. Humes received the Pulitzer Prize for his journalism and is a writer-at-large for Los Angeles Magazine. He is the author of nine critically acclaimed nonfiction books, including “Eco Barons: The Dreamers, Schemers, and Millionaires Who Are Saving Our Planet.”
William J. Kelly. Kelly has written on environmental and energy issues for 25 years. He is the Southern California correspondent for California Energy Circuit, covering the energy industry. Kelly is the coauthor of “Smogtown: The Lung-Burning History of Pollution in Los Angeles.”
Daniel Sperling. Sperling, a professor of engineering and environmental science and policy at UC Davis, is the author of 10 books and more than 200 technical papers and reports on transportation. His current title is “Two Billion Cars: Driving Toward Sustainability.”
Sperling sees the two biggest environmental challenges being oil and climate change. He argued that green house gases must be reduced by 80% by 2050 to avert global warming. He mentioned that mass transit is used less than 3% of the time for all US transportation needs. Vehicles have not innovated much, which is unlike other technologies – I believe he mentioned telecommunications an another example.
Kelly mentioned that LA had huge smog issues in the late 1940s. Research was done and the conclusion was that it was caused by autos. Initially, nothing could be done, because states didn’t have the power to make state environmental laws. In the 1960s, this changed via Congress. Jerry Brown had some ideas, but these didn’t go anywhere. He said that the problem in California is that we delayed so long in making necessary changes that we now have sprawl and that people must have cars in order to get to work. This he sees as the main reason the electrical car initially died when first introduced. People live such far distances from where they work that the first generation of electric cars wasn’t useful. Current hybrid models should gain acceptance. A current problem is still that people view technology as a solution for our global warming. We really need a change of values – such as getting rid of those McMansions in the sprawled out areas of SoCal.
Humes made some interesting comments about people who are attempting to change the environment in increments. He mentioned certain wealthy individuals who buy land and then they set the land aside as a preservation area. He also mentioned the Center of Biological Diversity. There is a group that wants to develop a city and resort in the Cajon Pass. This pass is just south of Bakersfield, CA. If this development is allowed, it is just a leap frog sprawl, where you’re creating a new city far away from the major metropolis of Los Angeles. The Center of Biological Diversity is attempting to stop this development.
Faris discussed how his interest in the environment started with Darfur. He argued that the war in this area is based on environmental change. He mentioned that smaller changes will also occur due to global warming. He said that fine wine could be impacted. Grapes grown in Italy may need to get shifted to Germany. He mentioned that global warming might allow certain diseases to jump to different spots. He mentioned how a disease that is primarily in India jumped to Italy. A man who vacationed in India came back home carrying the disease. There was unusually mild weather that year and so mosquitoes survived longer into the year. The disease got spread to the community. He mentioned that if we don’t do anything, the weather could go to an extreme. He mentioned that the weather could get as hot as the ice age got cold.
A question was asked about the electric car. The various panelists argued that even though there are environmental issues with the electric car, these cars are still superior to combustion engine. The batteries do use toxic material, but these batteries will get recycles and not just tossed randomly into the environment. Also, the electric car might not be for all areas of the globe, but in California where emphasis on shifting from coal generated electricity to wind and solar make it more appealing here. They also argued that coal is still better for the environment versus oil, because electric cars are far more efficient and therefore the damage would be less.
As I was walking out of the panel, I overheard some people discussing how the air conditioner shouldn’t have been used, because the use of air conditioning increases global warming. I don't know if they were serious or sarcastic. I suspect they were serious, because a poll was taken and a significant number of people in the audience owned hybrids (I can only therefore assume that the audience was largely upper middle class, as well.)
Sunday, Panel 2
The second panel I attended was at 1:30 p.m. It was titled “Kevin J. Anderson in conversation with Geoff Boucher.” The moderator was Geoff Bourcher. The panelist was Kevin J. Anderson.
Stolen bios are:
Geoff Boucher. Boucher came to the Los Angeles Times in 1991 and, after years covering crime and local politics, he switched to the Hollywood beat covering film and music. He’s also the paper’s go-to geek, and writes the paper’s “Hero Complex” blog.
Kevin J. Anderson. Anderson is an internationally bestselling author of nearly 100 novels, including the “Dune” series of novels with Brian Herbert. His latest work is “Enemies & Allies: A Novel.”
“Enemies and Allies” is set in the 1950s and is about the first meeting of Batman and Superman. Bruce Wayne is rich and reads James Bond. Clark Kent is out investigating reports of flying saucers. Clark Kent is worried that aliens are always portrayed as the bad guys. Batman is suspicious of Superman. He thinks Superman is working with Lex Luther. Anderson stated that the advantage with a novel over a comic book, is that a novel allows you to get into the characters’ heads. He argued that Bruce Wayne wants to be Batman while Superman wishes to be Clark Kent.
Anderson is a fan boy who has written books about comic book super heroes, X-Files, Star Wars and Dune. He said that he felt comfortable writing about Star Wars. He said he was most intimidated by Dune. Frank Herbert died in 1986, leaving Dune on a cliffhanger. He waited for ten years for a final sequel – written by Frank Herbert’s son Brian Herbert. It never arrived. One day, Anderson decided to contact Herbert about a sequel. They first wrote a prequel. Then luck struck. Initially, Brian had mentioned that his father didn’t keep detailed notes about upcoming books, but Frank’s estate attorney called them up one day about keys to a safe deposit box. Inside were floppy disks with detailed notes for a conclusion to the book. The challenge he faced was trying to create a book that felt like the Dune universe, but not try to copy the writing style of Frank Herbert – since he would probably fail on that point.
He mentioned that when writing for a franchise, he immerses himself into that world. For example, for the Star Wars movies he watched the three movies over and over again and read the few books that had been written at the time. He said he was unlikely to write another Star Wars novel again, because now there are more movies and way too many books to read.
My comments: This was the least attended panel that I attended. I thought it was strange since Anderson is a well-known author – though I personally haven’t read anything by him. Of course, I have to admit I wasn’t going to attend this panel. I decided at the last moment between this one and the one on the Soloist. Of course, the Soloist panel was at 12:30 p.m., but I figured I wouldn’t be able to get from the Soloist to Anderson in time. Of course, if I knew how empty Anderson’s would have been, I would have done both. If you’ve read my other blog entries on the LA Times Festival of Books, you’ll notice that I went to some “heavy” panel discussions. To end my Sunday, I definitely wanted to go to a panel that didn’t deal with the end of the world or some social re-defining event.
Interesting moment for me regarding this panel was that while in line in the morning, I was reading Michael Crichton’s Airframe (note: I’ve had this book for about five years and just now got around to reading it, shows how long books stay on my shelf at times). A lady in front of me asked, “Are you possibly planning on going to the Kevin Anderson panel? My brother was going to go, but something came up and he can’t make it. You can have his ticket.” I replied, “Yes, I am.” She said, “Here’s the ticket . . . I figured you might be interested based on the book you’re reading.” Okay, I enjoy the quick read, but I didn’t realize it led to such quick assumptions. This is a note: I’ve found that generally people at book festivals are very friendly.
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