a first time for everything

I am happy to say that I sold out today's book signing.

The last signing for NOCTURNE was at the Fairview Heights, Ill. Borders this afternoon. By the end of the signing, I had sold every book, including the display copy in the front window.

Bookstore signings are tricky things. You are sometimes mistaken for a bookstore employee, and they ask you where they can find the geography books or the coffee bar. Quite often people don't realize you are the author, even with an "author" sign in front of you. Most of all, though, customers avoid eye contact or conversation. Saying "hello" can weird them out and they scuttle away.

It's the fault of those kiosk operators in malls, I swear. If you make eye contact, you're lost. They've got you, and you'll be forced - forced, I say! - to buy fifteen bucks' worth of nail care products. If you make eye contact with an author at a book signing, you're stuck. You will have to buy the book. So they act like I'm trying to mug them.

Not today. Today's people were much more relaxed and barely blinked at NOCTURNE's cover price. I sold easily twice as many books today as I sold at any other signing. It's such a relief, too, because I hate the store getting stuck with extra copies. The marvelous staffers said it was the most successful signing they'd yet seen. That works for me.

Overall, I'm so pleased with how NOCTURNE has been received. Critics are mostly ignoring it because both "Nocturnal Urges" and "A More Perfect Union" were heavily reviewed as ebooks. But it's sold out at Dragoncon and Archon, sold well at bookstores and sold out at this signing. Better yet, distributors are having a hard time keeping up with demand, and my publisher's stock is also getting low. That tells me it's performing better than anyone, including I, expected. (Including me? Oh, I hate grammar.)

This officially ends the NOCTURNE tour, and while it's been fun, I'm glad. There's a few actual writing projects I'd like to focus on, and it would be good to finish the laundry for the first time in three months. I hear there's this kid who lives with me, has eyes that kind of look like mine and wants to spend some quality time with me. I think we can arrange that.

Comments

  1. Good news! Good news!

    I looked at your website. Some questions: "Nocturnal Urges" and "A More Perfect Union" and "Nocturne" are all vampire stories, right? Vampire romances? Mysteries? It's all a new genre for me. I tend to read sf, mystery and litfic.

    What is "Tandem"? Sounds like perhaps an erotic romance. That isn't what I usually read, but if it's something more, I'll give it a look.

    Not that I'll be reading much in November. Nor probably in December, either.

    (You know me as Airycat on LJ)

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