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On the road #2

I'm off on a signing tour next week. Here's where I'll be, and when:

Saturday 26th: I've got a panel and signing at Comic Con, San Diego.

(Description: 10:00-11:00am, Looking at Our World: Eye on the Future — Speculative fiction authors discuss shaping the future through their fiction and shaping their fiction to the future. Panelists include Robert J. Sawyer (Rollback), Ann Aguirre (Grimspace), Tobias S. Buckell (Ragamuffin), William C. Dietz (When All Seems Lost), Alan Dean Foster (author of more than 100 books), Charles Stross (Saturn's Children), and John Zakour (Dangerous Dames). Moderated by Maryelizabeth Hart of Mysterious Galaxy. Room 8. Signing to follow at 11am in the autograph area.)

Sunday 27th: Signing at Penguin booth, #1117, 11am.

(Note: I arrive at ComicCon on the 23rd, and I'll be mooching around until the 27th. I may post updates to this entry at short notice as/when I have extra fixtures to announce.)

Monday 28th: I'll be in Los Angeles.

Reading and signing from 7:30pm at Mystery & Imagination, 238 N. Brand Blvd, Glendale. (For more information, call (818) 545-0206.)

Tuesday 29th: I'll be in Santa Cruz and San Francisco.

I'll be doing a live interview at 10am on KUSP's Geek Speak program, presented by Rick Kleffel.

And in the evening I'll be doing a reading and signing in SF at 7pm at Borders, 400 Post Street.

Wednesday 30th: I'll be in Phoenix.

In the evening I'll be doing a reading and signing at Poisoned Pen, 4014 North Goldwater Blvd.

Thursday August 7th: I'll be in Denver.

I'm doing a reading and signing at Tattered Cover (Colfax Store), 2526 E. Colfax. It's a joint signing! With Kat Richardson and Joe Haldeman!

I'm also (predictably) going to be in Denver for the Denvention 3 world science fiction convention. I've got a bunch of items scheduled at Denvention; here's my preliminary (subject to change) list:

Friday August 8th:

Panel: Twisting Time: Alternate Histories (10am)

Panel: Timeless Stars: H. P. Lovecraft (1pm)

Kaffeeklatch (4pm)

Saturday August 9th:

Reading: 1pm

Panel: The Evil Empire: Microsoft or Amazon? (2:30pm)

Sunday August 10th:

Panel: The Coming Thing - what's next and newest in SF (1pm)

And I am flying home on Monday 11th, arriving late on the 12th.

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19 Comments

1:

Have you any plans for a UK signing tour Charlie? It'd be great if you could come and visit us in the North-East. It's grim up here but I did get a second copy of Saturn's Children £2 off in Waterstones at Middlesbrough. Now I have both covers :)

To be honest I'm not sure which copy I like best. The US cover stands out better than the UK one but I do like the form factor of the UK edition.

2:

Stephen: I don't plan signing tours. My publishers' marketing folks plan signing tours then invite me along. In general, signing tours are expensive; you (the publisher) get to pay to ship an author around, send a local PR person to nursemaid them, and put them up in a hotel. It doesn't make sense to run signing tours unless you've got a career that's rapidly building and good sales to justify it.

As it happens, I'll probably be in Walsall in early November (for Novacon) and in Bradford for eastercon next year. But that's not exactly a tour; that's normal movement. Middlesbrough is ... well, to be charitable, it's unlikely to repay the cost of a publisher-organized tour.

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3:

Actually, I tend to think of Seattle as the world capital of evil empires: They have Microsoft, Starbuck's (my cohabitant, a coffee fan, says rude things whenever she passes a new one), and Wizards of the Coast. . . .

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4:

Argh,

I was hoping you would swing by the east cost, or more precisely Boson. Oh well, maybe next time.

5:

Robert: I tend to show up in Boston fairly regularly, in February, for Boskone. (It's a good excuse to come over and visit my editors and agent, who're all based in NYC.)

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6:

What are you doing between the radio interview and the signing? And, more importantly to me, how are you going from one to the other? (Depending on route, I'm in-between, and you could stop by Apple for a visit to Teh Shiny Store. :))


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7:

See you at Worldcon!

8:

What are you doing between the radio interview and the signing?

Sleeping, I hope!

(I have to get up at 4am to make my flight to San Jose, and I won't get back to my hotel from that reading in SF until about 10pm. I also have to be up at 6am the next morning for a flight to Phoenix, and I really don't handle sleep deprivation well. So a chunk of the plan is to go directly from the studio to the hotel and then get 2-3 hours sleep before the evening engagement.)

Although visiting the motherlode has a certain appeal ...

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9:

Well, let me know. Assuming your hotel is by the airport or in SF, you'd want to do this before your nap, and you may be too dead-tired for it.

10:

Have fun :D

'Slowly reality and the nightmare of the signing were becoming one, like a twisting razor thread, united in pain.
'Where am I? said Charlie, although to whom he didn't know anymore.
A different city, a different place, they piled up on the horizon of his thoughts, each dangerously vivid and full of blinding halogen lights.
'I love your novel' said a voice out of the twilight, and Charlie wondered if it was a real person or his imagination once again taunting him.
'Argh!' Charlie screamed.
'I can't take this shit anymore. I want to go home.'
But the faces, so young and so beautiful, like shards of pink glass, just laughed mockingly.
Outside the lights were going out as the planes took off on the runway.
They looked for hours but no one could find him. There was only the rumour of a figure, alone and confused, receeding into the distance. It shimmered in the heat as if waving a last goodbye to the dirty cities, begging them not to follow. Then it was gone, leaving only the silence and the night.'

Sorry, couldn't help myself.

11:

I am very irritated that Comic-Con is already sold out. I used to always register at the door.

12:

Charlie, that's an interesting panel description for Comic Con. By saying ADF sold more than 100 books and only listing one book for each of the rest of you, they imply that you each have only sold that one book. They should have put up ADF's latest novel.

13:

The Poisoned Pen is actually in Scottsdale, not Phoenix proper. They call it "part of Greater Phoenix" but, it's a long, long way from the city. Pity, that.

14:

Charlie, when are you heading out, or are you out of town already?

15:

I'm heading out Tuesday evening, arriving Wednesday evening (there's an overnight hotel stop in Dublin on my itinerary).

Just to add to the fun I've come down with a stinking head cold today. Hope I'm better before the long haul flights on Wednesdy ...

16:

Charlie, Hopefully I will see you at the SF Borders event. Have a great trip.

17:

Charlie, do you get upset when people bring older books of yours to be signed instead of the newest one?

Good luck with the cold, flying while your sinuses are discombobulated is no fun.

18:

Frank @17: not at all! I'm happy to sign anything I wrote. (But remember the signing venue is a Borders -- think about the poor folks who're hosting it and try to buy something there, okay?)

19:

Given the amount of custom I give B&N and Borders and the like I never feel too bad if I don't buy anything while there for a signing. It's the small bookstores I feel guilty about.