Beijing Book Fair and Sightseeing
by Rob - August 31st, 2007.Filed under: Uncategorized.
A provocative banner outside the Beijing Book Fair
We began today by making an appearance at the Beijing International Book Fair. No sooner had we arrived than we ran into Neil Gaiman, who accompanied us to the Canadian Publishing booth, where Fitzhenry & Whiteside, and my Robert J. Sawyer Books imprint, were very well represented.
Robert J. Sawyer Books titles at the Beijing Book Fair
After that Carolyn and I joined Neil and his handler from HarperCollins, a very nice economics student named Cygnus, for a wonderful lunch at a restaurant where the sinks had to be seen to be believed.
After, we all went to Tiananmen Square and The Forbidden City, where a local guide gave us a terrific tour.
Neil Gaiman, Carolyn Clink, Robert J. Sawyer, Mao Zedong
The Forbidden City
Neil Gaiman, Robert J. Sawyer
Then Carolyn and I headed out for a great rooftop reception for foreign authors at the Book Worm, a wonderful English-language bookstore.
That was followed by one of the highlights of our trip: a fine fellow named Wenfeng, who is one of my friends on MySpace, treated us to the world famous Beijing acrobats and then took us for a fabulous dinner of authentic Peking Duck at a restaurant frequented by the locals.
The amazing Beijing acrobats — incredible!
Rob’s MySpace friend Wenfeng at dinner
All in all, it was an absolutely wonderful day.
The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site