Sandworms of Dune
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Thursday, August 9, 2007

From Tacoma to Portland

Yesterday Brian and I had most of the day to ourselves, and we both holed up in our rooms (or Starbucks down the street, which was the only place I could get reliable internet) to get work done. Brian wrote another chapter in PAUL OF DUNE and I edited five of them; my typist e-mailed two more transcribed chapters.

By 4:30 PM, the driver escort picked us up at the hotel to drive us from Seattle down to Tacoma, where we were signing at a Borders. My brother-in-law Scott called to let us know he would be bringing his family to the signing, and Brian's three daughters also came down. We had dinner at the Outback Steakhouse (and I'll bet you thought bestselling authors on tour always had lobster or filets), then went over to the store. Though we had a nice crowd, it seemed as if our own extended families comprised most of the audience.

In the spirit of cooperative promotion, HarperCollins had shipped stacks of LAST DAYS OF KRYPTON booklets as well as ten t-shirts for us to give away at the signing, and everyone got packets of SANDWORMS post-it notes. We got back to the hotel late, and I just relaxed in the warm bathtub for a while before crashing.

This morning I had a few hours to work, editing two more PAUL chapters, then running to Starbucks to check my e-mail one last time, before the driver arrived in the lobby with several more boxes of SANDWORMS for University Books, which we signed (to make up for the fact that the store had sold out of the book on the night of our signing). Then we went to a luncheon with about ten booksellers, managers of local stores, buyers for Borders, etc. (as well as a banquet waiter who had switched his shift because he was a DUNE fan and wanted to meet us and get his battered old paperbacks signed). We had time to stop in at Elliot Bay books to autograph their stock of books before we went to the train station to pick up our tickets for Portland. As soon as we sat down in the expansive waiting area, Brian and I each pulled out our laptops and started editing again (that's what we consider *relaxing*). Right now we're on the train, jouncing our way south.

Thanks again to all of you who have already written us fan letters about SANDWORMS. I can't figure out how you read it so quickly (though we do work very hard to make the books fast-paced and engaging). We hope to see you at one of the Portland-area signings.

-- KJA