Book Expo America attracts 30,000-plus booksellers, authors, editors and journalists to talk publishing. “The event briefly reconverts a modern business of e-mail, phone calls and faxes to a human one of smiles and handshakes, laughs and shared meals, and lots of giveaways: book bags, galleys, tchotchkes, and the heavy tomes exhibitors don’t want to repack and mail.”