ZOELLA’S DUBLIN BOOK SIGNING.

Today I attended my first ever book signing. I went to see Zoe Sugg who most of you may know as YouTuber Zoella. She was holding a book signing in Easons on O’Connell Street for her second book ‘Girl Online on Tour’.

This particular signing was suppose to happen back in November however Zoe fell ill the day before and cancelled it so it got rescheduled to today – January 31st.

It was a ticketed event and without tickets you were not allowed to enter Easons as they had closed it off specifically for Zoe’s signing. The signing began at 10:00 AM.

We arrived to Easons at around 11:30 AM an hour after it had began and to my surprise there was not many people there at all. There was a few girls standing outside who did not have tickets and were hoping to catch a glimpse of either Zoe or Alfie but that was it.

I had previously seen vlogs of Alfie Deyes and Joe Suggs signing’s in Dublin which has hundreds of people queuing for hours on end so I was pretty shocked to see no line whatsoever, we thought we had missed it, well actually we nearly did. They finished the signing at 11:45 AM which is not something I would have expected to happen so we were actually very lucky, we would have missed it if we were 15 minutes later.

We got into Easons and it was very quiet as I said they had closed down the whole shop for this signing and at this stage there was literally about 5 people there excluding her management and Easons employees. We were given the book before hand before we met her and told to go on upstairs. The most we waited was literally one minute. It was all very rushed and I did not really have much time to take it all in because you were in and out within the space of two minutes.

Penguin publishers who published Girl Online were there alongside her Gleam management and they were very specific about where you had to stand and what way to hold the book which I thought was absolutely ridiculous. I understand completely how they have a job to get done and they have a schedule to attain to. I study event management I know how things are when it comes to running events but I am 21 years of age. I know how to hold a book.

There was a table between her and everybody who came to see her and you were not allowed to take any photos with her and you had literally a minute max or even less with her. If you wanted a photo to be taken it had to be taken from the side by somebody else which is rather impossible if you don’t have anyone with you to take a photo. (me) (hence no actual photographic evidence of my encounter with her)

I was a bit taken back by how fast they were moving just because nobody really had the chance to say anything to her.

I got the chance then to meet Zoe, we said hello and our how are you’s and she complimented me on my makeup and lipstick and literally that was it really, she thanked me for coming, signed the book and that was that.

Zoe herself was lovely even though we only got the chance to talk for a minute. Her accent is SO English, so much more than you hear when you listen to her on YouTube. She is so small and cute which is weird as she is 4 or 5 years older than me but she is just as fab in person as she is on screen.

It all happened so quickly. It felt like it was the blink of an eye. I didn’t get the chance to congratulate her on 10 million subscribers or chat about the book which I have previously read.

Luckily for my friend who was behind me in the que (hence why she couldnt take my picture) I got to get some quick snaps of her meeting Zoe so that was a positive at least. After the signing the both of us were kind of like ‘did that even happen?’ just because we were literally out the door before we knew it.

Overall the whole book signing was a bit of a let down as I just felt it was all very rushed, not very personal and the whole set up was not really fair on those who had travelled for hours, spent a lot of money on and were excited to see somebody that they think a lot of. I know for me it certainly was not worth having to get up and walk in the rain to get a bus for an hour and a half.

Personally for me it was an experience at the end of the day and I can say I met her but for younger fans who would have been so excited it would have been a little disappointing for them.

I know it is more than likely is out of Zoe’s control what happens with these sort of things as her management would deal with most of the logistics but it still puts a bit of a damper on the whole situation and I think maybe her management need to reconsider how they are running their events because after today I don’t think I will ever be attending one again.

Other than being let down by the book signing I still had a great day in Dublin and got an Eddie Rockets which can never be a bad thing so it turned out good in the end. 🙂

Honesty and all that,

Till next time,

xo