Chicago, Chicago, A Helluva Town....

Day Four of the whirlwind book tour and the saga continues. Yesterday was a fun day. Stock signings don't make me nearly as nervous as sit-down book signings and I was in two of the Milwaukee Waldenbooks, signing stock. PLUS, I got to have breakfast with the always-marvelous Isabel Sharpe, who I count as a friend. I ended up driving into Chicago last evening, where I spent part of last evening fixing my plot issue and part of it reading "Can you Keep A Secret?" by Sophie Kinsella. Funny, enjoyable book. Thumbs up.

Today's agenda is a tour of Fermilab. Fermilab is the National Accelerator Laboratory, the premier physics laboratory in the US, and is the subject of Book 2, in the Bachelorette Pact, It Should Happen To You. I'm actually pretty excited about this one. Tonight it's back hitting the computer (not literally) and hopefully I'll be able to finish up the next to the last chapter in Diva's Guide to Thin Thighs in 30 Seconds. We'll see....

Signing off,
Your Roving Romance Reporter, on the scene in Chi-town.

LaCrosse, WI -- The Travels Continue

Today I'm in LaCrosse. Yesterday was a good day, not a great day, but a good one. I did drive-by signings (i.e. you go in, sign and sticker copies of your books, meet and greet the booksellers, and then wave bye) in Blaine and Maplewood. Both stores had a good number of copies (YAY, this is a good thing, not a bad thing) and in Maplewood, they had put them on the display at the front of the store. The signing at Roseland Center was good, but hard. Signings are very hard for me. I'm not an agressive person and unless you have done a lot of advance PR, you're dependent on the people who stop.
Sample conversation:
"Do you read romance?" (which is my opening statement)
"No, I don't have time" (says harried woman shopper carrying sixteen Marshell Fields bags)
"Do you read romance?" (I say to the man walking by, who is surreptiously trying to scan the covers and not look obvious)
He gets the deer in the headlights look and bolts
I did have one college age male who said he used to read Harlequins. "Good stories." I later saw him flying out a job application in the bookstore. Secretly I think he was sucking up. Ha, I should have made him buy a book.
"Do you read romance?"
"No, just thrillers."
See, if I was a better salesman, like Nick on the Apprentice, I could have sold these people who like thrillers a book. But I can't. I think, "These people don't read romance. They're not my market." Instead, I launch into a conversation about the Kellermans or James Patterson and send them on their merry way, usually with a new thriller in their bookbag.

Today should be good, though. The bookseller is a friend, and a very cool person who understands the industry. We'll see.

I've been trying to write in the evenings, but got myself stuck in a scene, that I knew was wrong, but I didn't have the backbone to go and change it. This morning, I'm about halfway through with the changes, and then I laid down and thought about the next scene, and I think I have that one figured out as well. Sometimes it actually does help to lay down and close my eyes and half-sleep and think about the book. I know, you're thinking, Kathleen, you fraud, you're taking a nap. Well, that may be. But when I wake up, I usually know what I need to do. I prefer to think of it as "deep, meditative analysis." Who knows, but it works for me.

Signing out,
Kathleen

p.s. Neverlost seems to have issues with road construction and detours. "Get back on the route," "You have strayed from the route," "turn back in .3 miles to get back on the route."

Your Roving Romance Report, on the scene in Roseville, Minnesoh-tah!

Checking in from the booming metropolis of Roseville, Minnesota. (Actually, I'm right here outside Minneapolis, home of Mary Richards). Got the car, completely with "never-lost." HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. I can program in where I want to go and it tells me exactly (in a very nice voice) when to turn, complete with a melodic "ding-ding", which eventually gets Pavlovian. I can tell it that I want to find the nearest Starbucks, and it maps the route. Oh, the JOY! I never knew that a life without maps could exist. You too, can kick the map habit. My next car, I'm getting one.

The hotel has free wireless Internet. (BAD, KATHLEEN, BAD, you should be writing). Alas, for an hour (or so, who'se counting), I'm a slacker. Also, I have to put together some Martha Stewartesque trinkets for my signings tomorrow. Shouldn't take long, I think, in a hopeful, optimistic, yet slightly jet-lagged thought-voice.

Life is good. I have powdered sugar donuts and Diet coke and manuscript and bathtub. I'm reading to rock and roll.

Signing out,
Kathleen

Road TRIP!

OK, early tomorrow AM, I'm heading to the heartland of America to have some booksignings, meet some booksellers, and then will be visiting Fermilab up in Chicago! I'm taking my computer with me, so techno-gods willing, I'll try and post from the road -- the RomanceCam Report. OK, maybe not. Anyway, I will be making updates. So....

Reporting live from Rockland County, NY, this is Kathleen O'Reilly, saying "Goodnight and have a pleasant tomorrow."

More Author Ruminations

Apparently there's a new book out, 'Mortification: Writers' Stories of Their Public Shame' by Robin Robertson. I haven't seen it, but the Times has an article on it today. Selected tidbits include: Ricky Moody, whose mother gave him three out of five stars on Amazon, and Simon Armitage, who found an autographed copy of his book in the garage. The inscription? "To Mum and Dad." Oh, my. I take back EVERY bad thing I ever thought about my family.

I'm almost finished with the first draft of The Diva's Guide to Thin Thighs in Thirty Seconds. I still have a lot of work left to do, but it's not due until the end of next month, so I think I'll be fine. I gotta say, I'm very happy with the way it's turning out.

And in foreign news, I got an Italian copy of Touched By Fire in the mail today from my editor. Somewhere, over in Italia, belle signores, are sighing over Colin and thinking that Sarah has got a really long road ahead of her. (Am I the only writer who makes fun of her characters? I love them, but they are like family to me).

Miscellanea

While reading Emma and Lo's trials and tribulations of their research, I sat back, and thought, "Wow, I have it easy." As they're talking about the "So, how DO you do your research jokes?" I'm nodding, going along, "yeah, yeah." And then they're off in the sex-class anecdote, and I remind myself why I don't write for Harlequin Blaze (not that there's anything wrong with that). All in the name of research…

For those that need one more excuse to procrastinate

OK, a free book for the best explanation to this one….

The Buzz on Starbucks…

The trials of being prolific

Recently, I got in a discussion with various authors about how their families behave when a new book comes out. Some families are really supportive and buy tons of books, some families just want their free copies and then go away. In my own experience, my family was really excited about the first couple of books, but when book six, seven, and eight hit the shelves, well, the bloom was off the rose, so to speak.

Which made me wonder how Nora Robert's family handles a booksigning. I mean, think about this, after a gazillion (OK, I think it's getting close to two hundred now), do they still get excited? For instance, imagine a big booksigning in New York, and her son is there to support her.

Nora: "Honey! It's great to see you."
Son: "Hi, Mom. New book out this month?"
Nora: "Three."
Son: "So which publisher is this? Silhouette."
Nora: "I only write for Berkley now."
Son: "Oh, sorry. So I guess it's one of the MacGregor books, then?"
Nora: "No. I finished up that series in 1999."
Son: "The O'Donovans?"
Nora: "It's Donovans and O'Hurleys."
Son: "Look, Mom. I'm sorry OK, but how can I keep track of all this?"
Nora: "Are you going to buy a book?"
Son: "Well, you're going to send us a freebie, aren't you?"
Nora: "You know, would it be so hard for you to spend $25 to support your mother?"
Son: "Mom, if I bought all your books, it'd bankrupt me."
Nora: "And what do you think put you through college? These books. All four hundred and thirty-seven of them."
Son: "437???"
Nora: "OK, I'm exaggerating. I'm a writer. It's what I do."
Son (picking up book): "Here, sign this one for me."
Nora: "Do I make it out to 'My favorite son'?"
Son: "Nah. Just your name."
Nora: "You're going to put it on ebay, aren't you?"

There are times when I agree with Andy....

Last evening, I watched Sixty Minutes (we usually do), and last night Andy Rooney had some fun things to do from a decidedly authorial point of view. First, he talked about how people come up to him and say, “You know, I’ve always wanted to write a book. I just don’t have the time.�
Like Andy, I’ve heard this one a lot as well. Andy’s response? “What if I were a brain surgeon? Would they say, ‘I’ve always wanted to be a brain surgeon, I just don’t have the time? No.�
And he took a couple of pot shots at Richard Clarke as well. It was like Sunday afternoon football at our house, with me yelling at the TV, “Go, Andy, go!� and my husband telling me I’m just jealous because my books aren’t going to hit the NY Times list at #1. Well, okay, maybe there is a hair of that, but I still have ethical reservations about the whole testifying in front of the commission the same day the book hits the shelves. Apparently Andy does, too.

In the Sunday Times, they mentioned some of the better April Fool’s jokes that were played by the media around the country. Apparently a news release on the Coalition Provisional Authority letterhead announced the formation of an Optimist Club in Baghdad. Journalists were appalled because of the shadow of the atrocities committed in Falluja. Who was responsible for such tasteless humor? It wasn’t a joke. They really did form an Optimist Club in Baghdad.
Most of the time, life truly is stranger than fiction.

I was at the New England Chapter of Romance Writer’s spring conference this weekend and had the pleasure of heading NY Times bestselling author Carly Phillips speak. She’s such a class act (and a great writer, too; if she weren’t so nice, I think I would hate her). Her speech touched on the sacrifices that it takes to write a book and then get it published. A lot of the same things Andy said on Sixty Minutes. Carly’s book, the Heartbreaker, is available now. Kathleen says, “Check it out.�

That’s all for now.

Current Events

• New and fun uses for Barbie (half-way down). Not for the feint of heart.


• An accident? Or perhaps a diabolic attempted murder, Betty Crocker style? I can see a great CSI episode in this one.


• There’s nothing like Leviticus to raise the passion…