I'm in Orlando for a couple of days for the International Christian Retail Show, which is put on by the Christian Booksellers Association. A few highlights from today: - Gabe Lyons and Dave Kinnaman were the featured speakers at this morning's general session for all attendees. Plus they were on the cover of the daily ICRS Newspaper. I have secured several copies for my friends in Atlanta......
- UnChristian has now sold over 100,000 copies in 11 months. This is pretty incredible. When Gabe and Dave launched the book at Catalyst last year we had no idea that it would be such a big hit. Congrats to Dave and Gabe for the success and impact of the book.
- Ran into Paul Young, the author of the uber popular book The Shack. His book was recently picked up by Faith Words, so he was at their booth signing copies. The line was really long, but I cut in to just say hi. Shout out from Paul to the Catalyst Road Trip Crew on their trip around the northeast US!
- Had lunch with Mark Batterson, who is soon to release a new book entitled Wild Goose Chase. Always great to hang with Mark. We discussed at length his upcoming trip in August to Scotland, and the fact he will be playing at St. Andrews, the birthplace of golf.
- Saw Tony Dungy roaming the halls, but wasn't able to get a picture with him. Bummer!
- Went to Epcot for dinner and watched the fireworks at sunset. Very cool. They use lasers, smoke, an LED ball (not wall) that is set up as the globe, and lots of fire. I think the Magic Kingdom fireworks show is much better, but the Epcot "illuminations" show is a good runner up.
- Ran into Mark Steele and Kevin Anderson from Steelehouse Productions. Those guys are a blast to hang out with. Also ran into Mark Sanborn, the author of the Fred Factor, and soon to release book entitled The Encore Effect.
- Went to a fun get together put on by Yates and Yates. They are celebrating their 20th year of representing authors and serving tons of clients as literary agents. Their client list is a who's who of Christian authors, including John Maxwell, Rob Bell, Charles Swindoll, Erwin McManus, John Eldridge, and many others. There were a ton of friends in the publishing industry at this celebration gathering, which is a testament to the friends Sealy, Susan, Matt, Curtis, Chris, and Jeana have made through the legal and literary agent work they have done over the years.