What is up with that?

I am doing a "soft" booksigning this weekend, to practice for a "real" one. So far it has been really helpful. Even with no advertising I have been selling a book every twenty minutes. Which means I hang out at my little table with my stack of books for ten minutes like a total geek, chat with a total stranger who has a different set of questions than the person before, sign a book, then start the whole cycle over again.

A dry run has been useful. It has assisted me in formulating decent answers to people's questions. I am confident the first couple didn't want a half hour lecture on "what is the book about?" - the two minute answer I came up with an hour later seems to make people happy, "An Alaskan adventure story with really quirky characters and events - like Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil meets up with Twin Peaks in Alaska and Mr. Whitekeys is editing."

It was nice that Jonathon came down from Anchorage with one of his cool friends and did a short reading. Of course, he chose to read a sex scene since we were sitting in a candy shop filled with sailors and cruise ship tourists from Wisconsin. That turned a few heads.

Locals are always amused to discover that I have used a number of Seward people as characters, only changing names to protect the guilty. The innocent are on their own. Only half the lies are true anyway, so those who read it have a fun time determining who really did what where.

I figured out that I need to add the word "Alaskan" or "Seward" before the word Author on my signage, and make the poster much larger to fit the sign board. And Iris and Sara Nan insist I need a better photo. Funky thing is there is not a lot ofverbiagee on the signage, and since the sign board is in my direct view out the window, I get to watch people as they react to the signage. Most glance and walk by, some ignore it entirely. Without fail, if a woman stops to read it she will come in an purchase a book.

Men, on the other hand, spend an amazing amount of time staring at the sign (they could have read the book by the time they were done) and then step around to look at the other side, talk amongst themselves, and then continue walking down the sidewalk. I don't know what that is all about, but I am curious to find out.