My Today Show Appearance on Nancy Drew Hardy Boys

Penguin publishers was able to arrange for Al Roker's Book Club for Kids on the Today Show to select the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books for the kids in the club to read. The first books in each series were read and everyone met up on Jan. 29th at the Today Show Studios in NYC for the taping. View the segment here.

I was asked to be the expert guest on the show back in December and was very excited to be invited. Of course they normally have the author of the books on but in this case that was not possible. They normally have a different studio set up but that set was being used for a different segment so we were set up in another area.

I flew to NYC on the 27th to spend some time before and after the show at the New York Public Library to research in the Stratemeyer Syndicate archives for my Nancy Drew book I'm working on about her mysterious history. I was a bit nervous about the Today Show appearance and could barely sleep the night before. I arrived a little early and was ushered into hair and make up for touch ups. My hair was not cooperating :) It was so cold/windy and full of static. Uggh!

I got to meet the kids and their parents: Ian, Spencer, Delroy, Danielle, Treasure, and Tatiana. They had a make-shift green room area on the first floor set up. I brought gifts for the kids--Her Interactive computer games, Nancy Drew pins and magnifying glasses, and some neat Nancy Drew shirts from Jen's Ideas.

Meredith Jaffe lent her Nancy Drew books/collectibles for the segment--you can see them on a table in between the kids and I. Unfortunately they didn't focus on them during the segment which was a shame. The kids were interested in them though and seeing them before the segment went live.

We began the segment with Al Roker asking a few questions about the books and then we quickly went to the kids for their questions.

The kids were great and had some fun questions. I wasn't expecting Delroy's question about Chet's car :) While we were waiting for the segment to go live, they did several live shots of the kids with their books.

Once we went live, it was a whirlwind! It felt like the segment lasted about 30 seconds but I'm told it ran nearly 5 minutes. We mostly discussed the books and the characters.

We took some photos before the segment downstairs with the kids and their books. Treasure, standing next to me is going to be a tall girl! She's only 11 and look how short I feel :) ha!

Danielle had some questions for me and was very interested in the books. It's nice to see the kids have interest in these great classic books--and hopefully this segment inspires more to pick up our childhood favs and enjoy the same exciting mysteries.

Jenn:)