Saturday morning I was dashing through the snow in a one horse open sleigh, when^H^H^H
Saturday morning I was dashing through the breakfast line when I saw, all unexpectedly, Winifred Halsey, who was the judging editor at the 2002 RMFW conference–the conference that lit a fire under my ass to get this whole writing thing going. I went to that conference to talk to Winifred, because I wanted to talk to an editor about my work, and having placed in the contest (which I knew I would), there was my opportunity. (And she told me that my writing was too good to sell to her small press and that I wanted to send MANIFEST DESTINY to Tor. Anyway.)
So at the earliest opportunity (after breakfast with Jim and Shannon) I flagged her down and found out what her morning schedule was, and arranged to talk to her a little later that morning.
A *great deal* of the morning was spent seizing or being seized by people who had had successful editor or agent appointments (Anna, Scott, Cal, Winifred, Liz…!) I did get to catch up with Winifred, who is still running Speculation Press, but who’s really focusing on her own writing career now (she was there pitching 3 different manuscripts!) and she was just about beside herself with excitement over URBAN SHAMAN and the upcoming Dermody books (she really liked the Strongbox Chronicles concept!), so that was just *really* fun.
I broke with Winifred to go have lunch with my Dad’s cousin Denny, which was possibly more fun than two people are supposed to have together, period. We had a *ridiculously* good time. We had no idea where we were going, to start with, and eventually ended up downtown at the Cheesecake Factory, where neither of had been before, and while we found the parking garage, we could not then find the restaurant. After walking up and down the block, we asked three guys on the corner if they could answer a question for us, and they said, “We don’t know!” Denny said, “Can you tell us where the Cheesecake Factory is?”
And it was literally right behind us, so they pointed with both hands, fingers spread wide, and said, “There!” We complimented them on a job well done, and went in. (The Cheesecake Factory’s sign is on the 2nd story, and set back behind an overhang, so in fact even when we knew it was there above us, we could still barely see it, so I didn’t feel too silly for not being able to find it!)
Lunch was surprisingly good, and Denny told me stories from his life and I told him stories from mine, and we discovered we were enormously copacetic, and agreed that the way to live life was through competition with oneself and a great deal of joy, and man, we just had a riot. :) He told the waitress I was a famous writer and she nearly dropped her teeth, and said, “Really?” So I whipped out one of my business cards (which say “C.E. Murphy, famous writer” on them!) and she was pretty excited over that, and then someone came by to do a Cheesecake Factory survey (they’re trying to decide where they should build more CF’s) and Denny treated her to a history of Port Tobacco, where he doesn’t really live anymore, and the poor girl handled it all pretty well. *laugh* It was just a really excellent time. *beam*
I got back to the hotel just in time for the book signing–Karen said, “There you are! You have fans waiting for you!”, which was true (Anna, at least, was waiting for me!), and Jim and I sat down at the end of one of the tables and hung out and chattered and had a great time for a couple of hours.
Duane, the guy from the University Bookstore who was doing the WW book sale, told me that he hadn’t gotten the 5 or 8 books in that he’d ordered to bring to the signing, and he’d sold 5 of the 8 copies he had *at* the store, and he thought it would be embarrassing to bring just 3 books to the signing, so he’d gotten a box of twenty books from the distributor.
AND THEY SOLD OUT!!!!!!
*Lots* of people got copies, and one woman from Canada already had a copy at home but didn’t know I was going to be there, so she hadn’t brought it, so she bought a *second* copy for me to sign, and Ann and Josh from Forward Motion came up from wherever it is that they live in Washington to see me, and we hung out, and Winifred bought a copy of the book and just about popped with glee over it, and people kept coming over to tell me that the pile of books was diminishing at a wonderfully rapid rate, and Cal was very funny when she handed me her copy to sign; she was deliberately all shaky-voiced and shaky-handed and quavered, “M-m-ms. Mu-ur-urphy, c-c-could you sign m-m-my b-b-book p-please?” (Which was what I’d done to Jim last year, in fact.) So I got a very good laugh out of that. *laugh* It was fantastic. :) I forced my card on a woman named Alisha, saying, “You’ll want to read my action-adventure romance series that’s starting in December, because my main character’s name is Alisha!” *laugh*
Jim got to see ACADEM’S FURY, which Duane had gotten advance copies of (on pain of death if he sold them anywhere but at the booksigning before its release date) *and* the paperback version of FURIES OF CALDERON, neither of which he’d seen before, so he kept snatching them out of people’s hands and eeking over them *laugh* Oh, and Jaime whom I’d had lunch with came to the signing, and she was wearing her Bookstore Commando t-shirt (and had with her her two *adorable* daughters), and asked Jim to sign the t-shirt, so Jim was thrilled and kept saying, “My first t-shirt! My first shirt!”
The whole thing was absolutely brilliant. Duane was *so smug* over selling out, and wanted me to let him know the *minute* I knew when I’d be back through Seattle, so we could arrange a booksigning. Now I just have to figure out when I’ll be back through Seattle. :)
The rest of the evening was spent–I went out to dinner on my own, then retoined for hanging out with more or less anybody I could track down for the next few hours, and then to bed again.
Sunday morning was more wonderful socializing, and then I climbed onto an aeroplane and flew HOME.
miles to Rauros Falls: 275
You so totally rock. :)