I left something pretty special out of yesterday's Nantucket Stroll post because I wanted to give it its own post. I met Nathaniel Philbrick! He was doing an author signing at Mitchell's Book Corner in the afternoon. We didn't know that was happening until that day, otherwise I would have brought one of my books for him to sign. Instead, I bought a second copy of Away Off Shore in order to get his autograph. I wasn't the only one in my friend group who wanted to avail themself of this opportunity--there were other Philbrick fans too, because he's a pretty cool guy with an amazing talent for writing about American history.
I've read three of his books: Mayflower, Away Off Shore, and Valiant Ambition. I'll definitely read more if not all of his books in the future. My favorite was Mayflower because it directly involves my ancestry and I've always been so inspired by the story of the Mayflower and the successful settling of Plymouth Colony. When it was my turn to meet him, I said something unintentionally funny about this, which I'll just copy and paste from my Facebook post:
Here I am meeting a famous author—Nathaniel Philbrick; I’ve read three of his books so far, including “Mayflower”—dazzling him with brilliant comments like “William Bradford is my direct descendant.” 
I quickly corrected it to “I’m a direct descendant of William Bradford” and he told me something neat about his research about him. Despite my silliness I loved meeting this amazing author!
