I know of someone else whose first signing wasn't well attended at all, apparently it's a rite of passage for authors (well, that's what the successful published authors who commented on her blog poast said, anyway).
Yeah, not everything's going to go well. Saturday's event sounds perfect though! To sell 50 books at one event is pretty damn impressive!
I'd suggest physically giving places like libraries posters to put up, if you can afford to print nice, striking, perfect English (trust me, I've seen it happen) posters, with a space for them to write in date and time. That might help. It might not. What we do at our library when we've got an event on is to have little freshers' fair-style slips at the issuing counter, so people can take one, and the counter staff can slip one into each person's set of books. Again, just ask if they'd be willing to do that, and give them a stack of slips.
(I'm posting from work, so commenting on a vageuly relevant unlocked post - hope you have comment notifcation turned on!)
I remember you saying at your launch that you found your book in plenty of Waterstones, but not Borders. I wonder if it might have something to do with this? I knew Borders was in trouble in teh US, but I didn't realise it was struggling so badly over here too. Bookguild might be one of the publisher's that's pulled distribution (or rather, work with a distributor that has - I can't imagine that many publishers have actually chosen to apart from the really big names), since if it's anything like the US then Border probably haven't been paying up on time or demanding unreasonable terms.
It's a shame, because I much prefer Borders to Waterstones. Though part of me's hoping B&N will buy them out, because B&N have the Nook, which is possibly the shiniest looking gadget I've feasted me eyes on in a long time.
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I know of someone else whose first signing wasn't well attended at all, apparently it's a rite of passage for authors (well, that's what the successful published authors who commented on her blog poast said, anyway).
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But yeah, very, very, very few writers make a fraction of what I imagine you earn, working for Microsoft. That's a nice day job you have there :D
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I'd suggest physically giving places like libraries posters to put up, if you can afford to print nice, striking, perfect English (trust me, I've seen it happen) posters, with a space for them to write in date and time. That might help. It might not. What we do at our library when we've got an event on is to have little freshers' fair-style slips at the issuing counter, so people can take one, and the counter staff can slip one into each person's set of books. Again, just ask if they'd be willing to do that, and give them a stack of slips.
Reply
I remember you saying at your launch that you found your book in plenty of Waterstones, but not Borders. I wonder if it might have something to do with this? I knew Borders was in trouble in teh US, but I didn't realise it was struggling so badly over here too. Bookguild might be one of the publisher's that's pulled distribution (or rather, work with a distributor that has - I can't imagine that many publishers have actually chosen to apart from the really big names), since if it's anything like the US then Border probably haven't been paying up on time or demanding unreasonable terms.
It's a shame, because I much prefer Borders to Waterstones. Though part of me's hoping B&N will buy them out, because B&N have the Nook, which is possibly the shiniest looking gadget I've feasted me eyes on in a long time.
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