Launch party, ta-daa!

[desperance]

Okay, this is official, this is confirmed: the launch party for 'Bridge of Dreams' will be at the Lit & Phil in Newcastle on Wednesday 24th May at 7pm. British Summer Time.

And why am I announcing this, you ask, what is the point, in an environment so global that I even feel moved to record the time-zone?

Partly for the fun of it, because I can; I haven't had a launch for a while, so I'm talking about it everywhere, all the time. And I'm new to LJ and I want to play. And there is always the chance that somebody out there is within striking distance of Newcastle and will want to come (if this is you: you are officially invited, and it will be lovely to see you, but do please phone the library to reserve a place: 0191 232 0192). And I'm neurotic, because this is the first launch party I've ever actually organised for myself, I've imported books and everything, I'll be buying wine and Turkish sweets, and wouldn't it be awful if nobody came?

But I do think that's significant even beyond the neurosis, because it represents in miniature the changes that have overswept the whole books business during the time that I've been publishing books. Twenty years ago, bookstores used to host launch parties, as a matter of course; it kept them in good odour with publishers and their local literary community, and these things mattered. Ten years ago, power had shifted; the party was still in the bookstore, but the publisher was probably paying for it. These days, my local bookstores (big city Waterstone's) aren't allowed to host a launch without central office approval, which for a local writer they simply don't get. Add the cost of a venue to the cost of the wine etc, and publishers don't think it's worth it going solo.

Uniquely in this country, we have an Arts Council-funded agency that exists to support new writing in this region; for some star writers, they will take over the organisation of a launch, liaise with publishers and run the event. And they do it very well. When I approached them, though, they fretted about the logistics and expense of dealing with an American publisher, to the point where I didn't pursue it.

Instead, I'm doing it myself. I have the venue - not exactly in my pocket, tho' I do like to pretend so: the Lit & Phil is a beautiful 18th-century private library, where I'm actively involved in the literary programming - and I have the books. All I need now is the people. Yikes...

Comments

[samarcand.livejournal.com]

Well, you know that I'll be there.

After all, I'm going to be selling the books for you... (ah, back to the heady days of bookselling. It will be SUCH fun. I'm going to have to practice my book display skills, aren't I?)

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Coo, golly, yeah. You are my window-dresser. So many pretty things...

xx

[bookzombie.livejournal.com]

I'll be with you in spirit. If I'd been around I would have been tempted to take a day off and trek up but alas pennski and I will be in Chicago by about that time!

Good luck with the launch (and with the book, of course).

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Thank you kindly. In Chicago - as penance for not being at my party - seek out a large central Barnes & Noble, ask for a nice guy called Richard who's the chief SF/F buyer, say that Chaz sends best wishes, and then buy the book from him, hunh? G'wan, you know you want to...

[quietspaces.livejournal.com]

Best wishes for your book launching (and sales). Sounds like a nice setting for it. If I were anywhere near Newcastle, I would certainly show up.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Linux users always welcome... (Well, obviously, everyone's welcome - but a special Tux hi to you.) And thank you for your wishes, and I'm sorry you're the wrong side of the world; 'quiet spaces' would be a fine description for one aspect of the Lit & Phil. Indeed, they even have a Silence Room, where I work often, and where I and friends of mine have all set stories (oh, lawks - I haver on the very edge of more shameless self-promotion! And say no more, and set the advertisement down and back very slowly away from it, my hands conspicuously empty...).

[quietspaces.livejournal.com]

Thanks, and you're welcome! Looks like I have another set of books to explore. (May I admit, here, that I don't think I've read any of your books, yet?) Lit&Phil sounds quite fitting, those being my two major subjects in college. The "quiet spaces" are the surroundings I seek out by preference.

Self-promotion, to some extent, is a good thing. The selections in the bookstores are not varied, and I am finding most of my new reads, these days, through my LJ and Blogspot connections. (I'm addicted to reading.)

I noted up an entry that the launching went well. I'm so glad!

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Looks like I have another set of books to explore. (May I admit, here, that I don't think I've read any of your books, yet?)

You may, of course; you're hardly alone. If I only talked to people who read me, I'd have damn few friends. Besides, I like that 'yet'.

Self-promotion, to some extent, is a good thing. The selections in the bookstores are not varied, and I am finding most of my new reads, these days, through my LJ and Blogspot connections.

Yup - the changes in the industry don't only affect those professionally engaged in it. We readers have to find - or make - new pathways to what we want. Is it a happy coincidence, I wonder, that the internet came along just in time?

I noted up an entry that the launching went well. I'm so glad!

Sorry, that was me being confusing. What I meant was, arranging to have a launch party was a good thing, an achievement. The launch itself isn't for another three weeks. It'll take me that long to whip up an audience (or at least it feels that way; send out a bunch of invites, and all you hear back is 'no, sorry, can't make it').

[quietspaces.livejournal.com]

Ah! Got it about the launch date. I hear so often that not a lot of folks show up to those events. One must get friends, relatives, and acquaintances to rally round. (Send people out to the by-ways to lure in passing strangers with promises of refreshments?)

I am totally frustrated with the bookstores; only chain stores in our town, and the managements are not accommodating. I wonder if it is the Internet bookstores that make it easier for the brick-and-mortar stores to concentrate on regional and best seller items and skimp on everything else.

Looking through the list of your books at Barnes & Noble, I see one that I would like to read first: BRIDGE OF DREAMS. Currently I have outrun my book allowance and my chemical exposures (chemical sensitivities include problems with paper and ink), but my next installment on the book allowance (aren't budgets wonderful?) is next Monday. :-)

I'll be hanging around, here. Best wishes for your preparations and the writing on your current project.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Ah! Got it about the launch date. I hear so often that not a lot of folks show up to those events. One must get friends, relatives, and acquaintances to rally round. (Send people out to the by-ways to lure in passing strangers with promises of refreshments?)

Yup. Rawhide whips are also useful. Nothing worse than giving a launch party (where 'party' is the material word) and having nobody come.

I am totally frustrated with the bookstores; only chain stores in our town, and the managements are not accommodating. I wonder if it is the Internet bookstores that make it easier for the brick-and-mortar stores to concentrate on regional and best seller items and skimp on everything else.

In this country bricks-and-mortar stores are getting doubly squeezed, with the internet on the one hand offering range they can't rival, and supermarkets on the other creaming off the bestseller sales with discounts they can't match. I do understand their difficulties - but I don't accept their solution, which is all marketing and no depth, pile-'em-high and sell 'em three-for-two. Bleah. This hurts me both as a reader and a writer - and I don't mean 'hurts' in some hi-falutin soulful way, it does me actual damage.

Looking through the list of your books at Barnes & Noble, I see one that I would like to read first: BRIDGE OF DREAMS. Currently I have outrun my book allowance and my chemical exposures (chemical sensitivities include problems with paper and ink), but my next installment on the book allowance (aren't budgets wonderful?) is next Monday. :-)

Eww, a reader allergic to books? That's not kind... But I do have warm and friendly feelings towards your book allowance.

[durham-rambler.livejournal.com]

Certainly is a nice setting. Visit the Lit and Phil website and particularly the photo gallery for more information. But beware, some of those pictures linked from the photo gallery page are immense, that of the Sir James Knott room from the balcony is 362k and the Lit & Phil's server is not very fast.

For those who cannot be there (and even those who can), we hope to take photographs and to post them to the Selling Water by the River website.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

That'd be the royal "we", would it?

[cornishmoth.livejournal.com]

Nice to be able to respond to your weblog at last. It was always so frustrating before... "Bung it in the oven? FOR HOW LONG?? WHAT GAS MARK??" ;-)
Best of luck with the new book... I've started saving... keep me a signed one!
Tim

[desperance.livejournal.com]

"Bung it in the oven? FOR HOW LONG?? WHAT GAS MARK??"

Until it's done, obviously. Silly boy. You know my rule on this: all ovens have three temperatures (warm, medium and hot); every oven is different from every other oven. Approximation and instinct bring us home; when it looks right, smells right, feels & tastes right, it is right.

But all right, I will try to be good. I'll time things at this end, at any rate. We can synchronise watches, for all the good that'll do.

[(Anonymous)]

Both me and the missus will be there. Any chance of post-launch dinner? We don't get out much...

[(Anonymous)]

Cobblers - I didn't say who we were! Simon and Sarah (as if anyone else could be more incompetant).

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Cobblers - I didn't say who we were! Simon and Sarah (as if anyone else could be more incompetant).

Or such lousy spellers... I should think we might go somewhere after that does food (tho' that's always a little tricky, because some people don't want to do eating but do fancy hanging out and drinking; so you either find a pub-that-feeds or someone's disappointed). The alternative is that my especial friends (viz anyone I'm likely to go drinking with) come back here to do excess partying. I could do food for that, if party-type food would satisfy...

PS - I couldn't resist the gag, but it is clearly grossly unfair to blame Sarah for your spelling, so I withdraw the implication unreservedly.