Eclipse Prom

May 11, 2007

Eclipse Prom Recap

Wow. That word sort of sums up the Eclipse Proms. After all the madness of selling out two proms, after all the massive amounts of organizational work that Changing Hands Bookstore, my Little Brown publicist, the ASU crew, and many dedicated volunteers went through, after all of the personal stress of sorting through so many photos of male models and actors searching for Edward and Jacob look-a-likes, in the end, the Eclipse Prom was WOW.

Everyone was gorgeous! The creativity and glamour blew me away. I think most of this update is going to have to be in picture form to adequately do the prom justice.

First, the general rundown. I was hiding out “backstage” (backstage was a slightly fragrant men’s locker room) for a lot of the action, so I can only give you the parts I saw. After everyone was inside the main gym, I was whisked through back halls to make my entrance through the appropriate door. (It was a lot of fun “whisking” in my huge skirt.) In the little holding room, I got to see my “Edward” and “Jacob” all costumed up for their appearance—that was exciting! (If you ever get the chance to make people dress up as your fictional creations, I highly recommend the experience.)

The Amazing Cindy from Changing Hands introduced me, and then I took the stage (I was quite proud that I did not trip over my copious skirt layers).

There was lots of excited cheering, and I inferred from all the happy smiles in view that I was the only person in the room at that exact moment in time who was abjectly terrified. After saying “hi” and giving not nearly enough thanks to the people responsible for all the amazing preparations, I read the first chapter of Eclipse. It was long. Very. (Another recommendation: don’t read that chapter out loud in one sitting unless you are a professional voice actor.) I quickly realized that this wasn’t the optimum reading selection for a crowd of people standing in stiletto heels, and I read a shorter “good parts” version of chapter one for the second prom. When that was over, I got to the fun part! I told everyone that I was aware most people had come to the Eclipse Prom stag, and so I’d brought a few of my friends to stand in as dates in their official prom pictures. That’s when my Changing Hands buds escorted “Edward” and “Jacob” into the room. There was much rejoicing.

Then I got to sit down (yay! I much prefer talking to people one at a time than to speaking to five hundred of them at once) and sign some books. I loved getting a chance to see everybody’s prom finery!

I signed books until I had an actual blister on my index finger, which has never happened to me before. (I thought my blister was so cool that I took a picture of it, but the photo didn’t turn out.) Then I had a chance to sneak over after the books were all signed and get my official prom picture.

Sadly, at last the music had to end. (And it was really good music, too, because it was all off my personal mp3 player. I had the entire Eclipse Playlist and the Midnight Sun Playlist mixed in with a bunch of red herrings, and a few sleuths have already tried to reconstruct the right list on-line.) It was a huge relief that everything had gone successfully, but it was also sad to see everyone go. I got to prolong the fun for a few hours at the “I Love Jacob Black” After Party (it’s good to see Jacob getting some love!), which was fantastic. It was nice to (literally) let my hair down and spend a little time with people in a more casual setting. Even “Edward” and “Jacob” popped in for a bit (there was no bloodshed).

One of the coolest things about the Eclipse Prom was that it wasn’t just here in Phoenix—Satellite Proms all over the globe (seriously! It was global!) were going on at the same time. Here are a few of the fun parties people threw in the below gallery.

A very brave and talented fan translated the entire first chapter of Eclipse into Slovak (I can only imagine what a HUGE endeavor that was, given the length) so that the other fans could understand it. Here’s a little description of this prom from that fan, Joey:

“We started at 2:00pm CET. We were at the pizza restaurant in the part of our city which is really close to the forest. Also the weather was cloudy and rainy so we felt really like in Forks 🙂 My friends were sooo beautiful and excited (just like me) about the event. We were talking about your books and characters (of course mostly Edward was the topic) and made theories about third book. Like if the first was about vampires and second about werewolf which monsters will be in third book? We suggested big lizards, giant spiders. 😀 😀 😀 Noooo. Just kidding. We don’t think there will be another monsters in the third book. We ate pizza and drink red wine (instead of blood 😀 ) and of course not too much 🙂 Than the moment of reading a first chapter came. I did read, because my handwriting is not readable by anyone 🙂 Girls were like don’t breathing all the time. It was really amazing chapter. Funny and romantic and sort of frustrated (the Jacobs part). We can’t wait for other chapters 🙂 Than we have discussed it, rephrasing our favourite quotes from Twilight and New Moon. Imagining how your prom is going to be, etc. At 5:00pm CET we were finishing this unique event.”

Is it safe for me to say that the Eclipse Prom, both the local and the international experience, was a tremendous success? I think so! Thanks again to everyone who made it work—Changing Hands, Little Brown, ASU, M Squared Party Planners, the prom committee, the volunteers, the satellite fans, and my long-suffering husband!