Successful author event!

My author event at The Rabbit Hole went quite well!

I spent hours prepping for it, and as always, felt like I was doing everything at the last minute and didn’t do nearly enough. Part of the problem was that my sister was here from Friday through Tuesday. I picked her up at the airport Friday night and drove her to my dad’s, and then spent all day both Saturday and Sunday with her and dad, so I didn’t get any work done at all over the weekend.

I think we had about a dozen people attend tonight’s event, but not all at the same time. Some people had to leave before the end, and some came in late. The time was awkward for employed folks on a weeknight. It was scheduled at the same times as Fitchburg’s “First Thurday,” 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m., and the store closes up by 8:00 p.m. When I do this at the two libraries that have already invited me, I’ll ask for it to be later, and see if attendance is higher that way.

I sold five books. That’s not a large number by itself, but if you look at it as the percentage of attendees who bought books, it’s rather phenomenal. I gave one complimentary Tarot reading. 🙂 People took flyers and business cards, too.

Lynn, the events coordinator for the store, said I was great. The audience really seemed to like it. I talked the legs off every chair in the room with my lecture and slide show, then wrapped up with a short reading from Mortal Touch. My sister gave me a quick tutorial on Power Point this weekend. I’d never used it before. This was my first slide show talk ever! I made 74 slides in three days and I felt like I was just banging them off, no time for any finesse. Just tracking down the photos and illustrations I wanted was time-consuming. I could have used twice as many slides for the talk, easily. I practiced and practiced and the slide transitions went very smoothly. I can say with confidence that I’ve got Power Point down.

I lugged a spare CRT computer monitor with me to display the slides. The biggest one I have (I have six of them–and they all followed me home, honest!) is about 14.5 inches. In the small space, it was okay. I’m still jonesing for a projector. But the room would have been rather light for one even if I’d had it.

Of course, I’m very critical of my performance, but I’m going to do this again so I’ll be able to refine and improve it.

Between me and Lynn, we promoted the hell out of this thing, so I don’t know how we could have gotten more people without standing on the sidewalk abducting passers-by and dragging them inside! The store sent out e-mails repeatedly, Lynn listed the event repeatedly on Craigslist and a bunch of other online sites, some of which I hadn’t even heard of (she’s going to send me a list). It was on Booktour.com. I put it on my blogs and social networking sites, and I spent two days driving around the local area and putting up posters in Ashburnham, Ashby, Fitchburg, Groton, Lunenburg, Ayer, Townsend and Pepperell. Lynn listed it in the local newspapers. The store had a sandwich board out front, with a bunch of red balloons. It’s not that I’m complaining about the turnout, all things considered, but I’d love to know how to improve the results for next time.

So, that’s what I did today! I’m relieved that the hairball some cat barfed in my bed this morning wasn’t an omen of how the rest of the day would go. I didn’t plan to launder the bed linens today, but at least I have nice clean sheets (and I have to make the bed up before I can retire for the night). Tonight was my dad’s first summer band concert of the season, and I was done at The Rabbit Hole in time to catch the second half. Dad was really happy to see me. I didn’t want to make any promises because I didn’t know how late I’d be in Fitchburg, but I try to go to all of dad’s concerts. Townsend just had their Town Meeting and approved the funding for the summer concerts, too.

I can decompress a little now–I’ve been doing nothing but slides and lecture prep for three days running! Whew!