We drive from Cleveland to our next stop, Columbus, heading south through the state of Ohio. Our driver, Denis, is Irish, and wears a claddagh ring and a matching pin on his lapel. The claddagh, he explains, is a symbol of love and friendship. Kevin reads us an e-mail from Jason Mayer, a good friend, who congratulates us on another bestseller.

Through the dunenovels.com website we also received an e-mail from our "biggest fan in South New Jersey," who gave us permission to quote him: "I was very sorry that I did not get to Barnes and Noble in time to meet you. I was going to come to the signing in West Chester PA, but that was the day after the big storm, and they told me they had no lights so they were having it the next day, but I had to work. The next day I would be able to get to a book signing was 9-24. I got up early 7:00 am and left South New Jersey and started out, got stuck in New York (I'm sure you know what I mean). Well, to make a long story short, I missed you by 5 minutes in Warwick RI -- the manager said you had just left. I was really disappointed because I was looking forward to meeting you both. It is because of you that I have started to write again. However, I did manage to get a signed copy of your book, so I guess the trip was not a total loss, and I was at least in the same state as both of you."

On the two-hour drive to Columbus, Kevin and Brian both work on their laptops, writing the day's weblog by passing the computer back and forth over the seat back, then Kevin answers questions for two lengthy interviews (one about GRUMPY OLD MONSTERS, one from Finland about STAR WARS), and Brian writes a chapter in his mainstream novel. At a gas station outside of Columbus, we stop to switch drivers, like an illicit deal! Denis hands us off to Cathy, and we jam our luggage into the trunk with a shoehorn. We're getting good at this. After a few moments of angst, wondering if we will all fit in the car, we're off again.

We arrive in Columbus in time for lunch and a brief stop at a Target store where Kevin can pick up a new toothbrush, razor blades, and some deodorant, and Jan gets allergy medicine; this afternoon in the hotel room we have time to rinse our socks and underwear in the sink -- ah, the glamorous life of best-selling authors on the road!

Our signing at Barnes & Noble is huge, with twice as many audience members as chairs. The store's community relations coordinator Missie is full of energy and enthusiastic; she's done banners and posters, and the people of Columbus turn out in droves. Brian and Kevin have been taking Advil and other forms of ibuprofen for sore signing arms. At the signing, the authors try to shake hands with everyone, but Brian gets a throb in his elbow after shaking hands with a strong young fan. Unfortunately, Brian will need to shake with his left hand for awhile now.

Afterward, we meet with Sally from Larry Smith Bookseller, a book dealer Kevin has often seen around science fiction conventions. She has arrived with her van full of our books, and Brian and Kevin do their first "tailgate signing" out in the parking lot.

After checking into the hotel, which is right on the capitol square, by now Kevin is getting "peopled-out" and wants a little time alone to decompress. In the hotel room, he finishes all the revisions to the STAR-JAMMERS script and e-mails it to the Marvel editor, then he goes outside. Back home in Colorado, he would have gone out on a long hike, but in Columbus he walks around the capitol and for several miles through the downtown, very quiet late on a Sunday night. Several years ago, he was in Columbus with Rebecca for Mid-Ohio Comic Con, and he remembers dictating several chapters of the YOUNG JEDI KNIGHTS novel, TROUBLE ON CLOUD CITY here -- including one of the most dramatic scenes in the entire 14-book series. After an hour of wandering, lo and behold, he stumbles upon a microbrewery, where he sits for a while and maps out 25 pages of a new graphic novel, THE ORC'S TREASURE, which will be published next spring -- a great way to end the evening!

While Kevin is immersed in a smorgasbord of remembered and current science fiction projects, Brian and Jan go the nearby German Village and enjoy the finest meal of the entire tour at Lindey's, a European-style restaurant. The waiting staff, including Becca and Jesse, are enthusiastic and very attentive, even before they learn that Brian and Jan are on a book tour. When they both say that they are Dune fans, Brian gives them signed memorabilia on DUNE: THE MACHINE CRUSADE and DREAMER OF DUNE, and suggests that they watch the continuing saga of the book tour on our website.

As we write this the following morning, we feel the euphoria of our Advil overdoses kicking in.

Monday, September 29, 2003

In the morning, Brian is interviewed by telephone by Daniel Robert Epstein of the UGO.com website in New York city. This interview is expected to be posted in the next few days, and will be linked to our own dunenovels.com website.

Brian and Kevin spend much of the day apart, and then rejoin for dinner at the Watson Brothers Brewery in Cincinnati. They are joined by their “road nanny,” along with Jan, the Sandlins, and noted science fiction author Mike Resnick. Over beer samplers and porterhouse steaks, Jerry and Brian discuss old times, and enjoy hearing Mike’s stories of his adventures in Africa. Mike has written a book about his travels, which will be published soon, and he promises to send signed copies to Brian and Kevin.

In the evening, the “Dunamic Duo” appear at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Cincinnati. The speaking area is cozy, with a fireplace and deep cushion chairs. There are not enough chairs for the large audience, so the authors carry their own out into the crowd. Brian quips that both of them have been waiters in the past, and that they will also be serving food. At this signing, and others, there is much good conversation and laughter, which is usually the case when the authors get anywhere near eight hours of sleep.

One interesting man named Ernie waits in line for his book to be signed. He has a great short version of a Reggae haircut, and as he hands us a copy of DUNE: THE MACHINE CRUSADE, he explains that this is for his grandson or granddaughter -- a child who has not been born yet, and has not even been conceived. His daughter is only sixteen, and not married yet, but Ernie is planning for the future. This is the first time that we have ever personalized a book for a person who has not yet been born, and we are delighted.

A number of people thank us for continuing the Dune series, and we thank them for their continuing, enthusiastic support.

After the signing, Jerry drives all of us (not including the fans) south to Louisville, Kentucky. It is a rainy night, and we arrive at shortly after 11:00 PM. After feeling ebullient, the authors are suddenly very tired, so we make bee-lines for our rooms. It is one of those situations where we arrive relatively late, and have to get up early for a television appearance the following morning. Our heads are no sooner on the pillows, it seems, when the wake-up alarms go off.

Wednesday, October 1, 2003

The handoff from Louisville to Lexington. Kevin gets up early enough to edit one HORIZON STORMS chapter before meeting Brian and Jan in the lobby of the Old Seelbach Hotel for checkout. (The Seelbach has one of the "top 50" bars in the country, a dim and cozy place with leather chairs and jazz players; we enjoyed a bit of relaxation there the night before.) Our driver Marilyn takes us to a halfway point between the two cities, driving through the rolling Kentucky Hills, where we are intercepted in an Applebees parking lot by Barb Ellis, today's "road nanny."

Barb is a whirlwind, who has checked and double-checked every aspect of our hotel, our route, our book signing. We want to adopt her. We do a noontime TV interview at a station housed in a beautiful plantation building across from a famous Kentucky horse farm; Brian and Kevin both make good-natured flubs (on live TV, naturally), but at least it doesn't sound like a canned speech.

After a nice lunch of fresh sandwiches and soup at the Atlanta Bread Company, we go to the Lexington Airport where Kevin goes to fill out the forms for their rental car while Brian says goodbye to Jan. The airport is not very large, which leads Kevin to tell Jan that she is going to have to help screw the propellers onto the plane. On this roadshow, Kevin is turning into our funny man (or trying, at least).

Soon Kevin is behind the wheel again for the first time in weeks, while Brian remains alert in the passenger seat, wondering when we will reach warp speed. At a civilized pace we follow Barb's "pilot car" through incredibly beautiful, pastoral country roads around Lexington. On the way, we brainstorm Dune 7, with Brian typing notes into his laptop computer. The plot ideas are still embryonic, but will hatch soon. Since this story will have 12 Dune novels preceding it, with a huge universe, and Frank Herbert's outline for the story, we intend to break it into two novels. Tentatively, our working titles (based upon Frank Herbert's notes) are HUNTERS OF DUNE for volume one, and SANDWORMS OF DUNE for volume two.

Next we drive up to a small independent bookstore in Georgetown, called Bohannons'. The exuberance of Kay Vincent, the store's co-owner, is outmatched only by a young man, Charlie, who has skipped school (with his mom's permission) to wait for us to show up at the drive-by signing, since he's such a DUNE fan. While we are talking to Charlie and answering his questions, two college students, Chris and Jordan, race into the store, hoping they haven't missed us. They also ply us with questions for about half an hour, until we convince them to come to our formal talk and signing in the evening.

We get to the hotel with a whopping hour and a half to spare before the evening event. No time for dinner. Brian heads off to the gym, while Kevin manages to edit one more chapter. He tries to call Rebecca on her cell phone, but catches her in the middle of an appointment. Later he tries back and helps to iron out an unexpected problem: the editor of the GRUMPY OLD MONSTERS comic series never received the revisions to script #4, sent off before the start of this book-signing tour; Kevin walks Rebecca through the labyrinth of finding the file on his computer, and she takes care of the emergency from there.

Then it's time to change clothes and walk to the Joseph-Beth bookstore, a huge new store with fine wood furnishings. At the evening signing, one woman tells us she has just bought a house and needs to restrict her budget to paperbacks, so we give her an additional signed bookplate for when CRUSADE comes out in paperback.

Our friends from earlier in the afternoon, Chris and Jordan, are there sitting in the audience, finally getting the rest of their questions answered en masse. Most fans pick up copies of THE MACHINE CRUSADE; others have piles of our backlist titles, in the Dune series and our solo books. Many fans purchase Frank Herbert titles, sometimes hefting the entire six book Dune series that he wrote. Occasionally, a proud collector brings in a signed first edition of DUNE to show to us.

At this and other signings, we notice that there are fans who also want to write their own stories. Whenever we mention that DREAMER OF DUNE includes writing tips from Frank Herbert, people in the audience rush to get their own copies of the biography, sometimes leaving their seats while we are still talking.

During each of our signings, we always make sure to autograph every book in the store, old books, paperbacks, anything they have. Some store owners are surprised at this, because apparently many authors will only sign their new hardcovers and don't "waste their time" with paperbacks. Brian and Kevin both believe that the fans should be able to get a signed book, even if they can only afford a less-expensive edition. We appreciate the support of readers, whether they have picked up Kevin's old STAR WARS books or Brian's paperbacks or the original Frank Herbert titles.

At the stores where we've appeared, we are leaving thousands of signed books in our wake; if any of you have missed our formal autographings, you should still be able to get a signed book on the shelves of the stores. We also try to shake the hands of the people who come to the events, even though by now our hands are getting a little sore. (How do politicians do it?)

Afterward, Barb recommends (actually, she insists) that we go to a local steak house for dinner, Malone's. She even tells us what to order (the center cut bone-in filet and bottomless salad), in no uncertain terms, and then makes sure we call her after the meal to let her know what we think. Barb has never steered us wrong. In fact, the steaks are excellent, and it's a good conclusion to the day. At the restaurant, we also meet a touring professional golfer, Randy Jewell, and his wife, Brittany. As we part we wish each other well on our respective tours.

We return to our hotel, plan our trip for the next day, when we have to drive six hours from Lexington, Kentucky up to Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Friday, October 3, 2003

Before starting this entry, we had to look up the actual date. After three weeks on the road, with one different city following another, it's easy to lose track of where you are and what day of the week it is.

But this is Saturday, and we have to drive from Detroit to Indianapolis. Since our early-morning interview was cancelled, we have a few hours to ourselves, used for editing HORIZON STORMS (Kevin) and health club (Brian). Before setting out, we eat the Zingerman's deli sandwiches in Kevin's room, splitting a Diet Coke from the minibar, and then we drive off under gloomy skies west from Detroit to Ann Arbor, then south to Fort Wayne, Indiana, on our way to Indianapolis.

This time, after making cell phone calls to check in with Jan and Rebecca, we brainstorm the six DUNE graphic novels we are planning to write for a major comics company, plotting out the course of a story that will take place in the six decades between THE MACHINE CRUSADE and THE BATTLE OF CORRIN. When it's not his turn to drive, Kevin also writes another five pages of the comic script for THE ORC'S TREASURE. When Brian is in the passenger seat, he organizes promotional literature for distribution to our fans at upcoming bookstores and also finds time to write a page of his mainstream novel -- a dramatic story that he's wanted to tell for a long time, and he hopes to complete it by the end of the year. As we continue through the Indiana countryside, the clouds break up and it gets sunny after all.

As we arrive in Indianapolis, heading to our hotel, we pass a large Barnes & Noble. Since it's time to stretch our legs anyway, we both decide to stop for a quick surprise drive-by signing. Inside the store, Kevin goes up to the information desk to introduce himself, while Brian rounds up the first stack of THE MACHINE CRUSADE to autograph. The woman at the information desk is somewhat flustered, which is odd because most of the time bookstores are happy to have authors drop in to autograph books. The answer isn't long in coming, though, as Brian hurries up to the counter and exclaims, "Kevin, this is the store where we're signing tomorrow!" He points out a poster advertising our appearance in the window. No wonder the staff was surprised. Embarrassed, we meet the store manager and some of the employees, then promise to come back at the correct date and time. Not far down the road, we find a Borders (which is NOT expecting us), so we drop in and are happy to sign many stacks of books there. While we are going through the piles of books, several fans come up, and a line forms of people who have decided that they have to take advantage of the situation and purchase birthday gifts, Christmas gifts, and even books for themselves.

Though our map doesn't show any time-zone line, for some reason all the clocks in Indianapolis have shifted by an hour -- which is fine with us, since we now have an extra hour to work on our laptops, after we have dinner in a nice Italian restaurant called Sangiovese. Arriving back to the hotel, the inevitable finally happens. Kevin gets off the elevator, holds the unmarked room key card in his hand, and can't remember the room number. Last night his was 703, and Brian's was 302. The day before in Lexington, we had different rooms. For security purposes, there's no indication on the card. Walking up and down the hall, Kevin finally finds a door that looks familiar (of course, they all look the same!), and the key works.

Yes, we've been on the road for too many days straight.