New Booktour Travel Blog

I’m happy to announce a new travel blog that I will be updating daily during my September 2011 booktour for The Gutenberg Rubric. I’ll be traveling 7,000 miles in my little Prius, presenting at independent bookstores and for private parties. Simultaneously, I’ll be participating in a virtual booktour as guest blogger on several bookblogs.

 

This is going to be a great month, and while I’ll occasionally be posting on this site as well, the posts here will start reflecting the next project I’ll be working on, tentatively titled “To Be or Be Lost,” a new Dag Hamar mystery. So please check out the new tour blog, The Rubricant, (http://www.gutenbergrubric.com/blog) for daily updates in a “Jack Kerouac On the Road style”.

 

I hope you will join me for my booktour, either virtually or in person. September is going to be a very good month!

Trip update, new blog, nervesssss

I just ordered 100 more copies of The Gutenberg Rubric to be drop-shipped to Minneapolis where I’ll have my first book sales on September 5 after a 4-day drive from Seattle. Every time I write a check and think, these are my books, made out of paper, that I will sell, I get a bit of a queezy stomach. It’s pretty ballsy, don’t you think? I’m carrying a computer with order info and addresses where I can drop ship to different places around the country—just in case I run out!

 

I keep trying to not make my expectations too high, but also not to drop them so low that there is really no reason to go. It’s quite the balancing act. This, as they say, is it.

I’ve begun my new trip blog where I’ll be focused on the travel, people I meet, pictures of the events, and news about where I will be next. I’d love it if you tune in at http://www.gutenbergrubric.com/blog. I’ll be posting continuously now until after the trip is finished at the end of September (technically, October 2) and then regularly as I continue to work on a book about the experience of being your own publisher/promoter/presenter/salesman. I think it’s going to be a lot of fun, so please stop by and comment on what you read!

 

Speaking of updates, I now have six blogs on my simultaneous blog-tour. I have a lot of open dates, so if you are interested in a guest-post on your blog, I’d love to contribute. And I’ll continue to post here on LJ and FB as the trip progresses as well. I figure that with the blog, guest posts, and this space, I’ll be writing the equivalent of another NaNoWriMo novel (50,000 words) during September! I’ve got to see how that works with driving 8 hours a day to get 7,000 miles in.

 

Here are the locations and dates for my coming blog-tour. If you have a date in September that you’d like me to guest-post on your blog, let me know.

• 9/1 A Few More Pages.
• 9/8 A Word's Worth
• 9/14 My Reading Table
• 9/19 Blatant Biblioholic
• 9/24 A Book Vacation
• 9/27 Cici's Theories

Check out these great bookblogs in advance. I’m sure you’ll want to follow them.

Are you on or near The Gutenberg Rubric Tour Route?

The September book tour for The Gutenberg Rubric is finally shaping up pretty well for the first half, but I’m having some trouble filling the second half of the trip with bookstore or house-party or book club stops. Please take a look at the map below (click on it for an enlarged view) and see if you are near my route or one of my estimated stops. If you’d like to host an author signing party in your home or a local coffee shop and can get 20 people to come, I’ll probably make a stop for you unless its already booked. I can’t guarantee an evening stop, depending on where it is on the route.

Here is the tour schedule as it currently stands:

Sept1-4: Drive Seattle to Minneapolis. Could stop in Missoula, Forsyth, Jamestown.

Sept 5: 7:00 p.m. Reading at Becketwood Senior condos. Could do a noon or afternoon meet-up, but it is Labor Day.

Sept 6: 7:30 p.m. Reading at Magers & Quinn Booksellers in Calhoun Square, Minneapolis. Could do a breakfast, noon, or afternoon meet-up. I will be leaving town as soon as this event is over to get part way across Wisconsin by midnight.

Sept 7: 5:30-7:00 p.m. Reading at City Center News & Books in Plymouth, IN.

Sept 7: 7:00-10:00 p.m. Meet & Greet with local friends and classmates at the Brass Rail in Plymouth

Sept 8: 3:00 p.m. Student/author discussion on the writing life and publishing at UIndy, hosted by Prof Kevin McKelvey. Location to be announced.

Sept 8: 5:00-6:00 p.m. Book signing at UIndy Bookstore across from the cafeteria

Sept 8: 7:00-8:30 p.m. Reading and signing at Bookmamas in Irvington (Indianapolis) IN.

Sept 9: Travel to sister’s house in Columbus OH. Could do an evening event on this Friday.

Sept 10: 1:00-3:00 p.m. Reading and signing at The Book Suite in Columbus OH. Could do an evening event on Saturday.

Sept 11-12: Driving from Columbus OH to Washington DC. I’m attempting to set up an event Sunday afternoon in Pittsburgh. Anyone with contacts or would like to host a house party, please let me know!

Sept 12: 5:30-7:30 p.m. House party in Washington DC.

Sept 13-14: Attempting to set up readings in Washington DC and/or Philadelphia, but having trouble finding a bookstore to host. They are all full up! Would love to do a house party anywhere in the greater DC/Baltimore area for 20 or more guests. Anyone want to host at a favorite coffee shop after work or mid-day? Book clubs?

Sept 15-17: Will be in Broadway VA at sister’s home. Looking for an event or two in Northern VA anytime on the 15th or 16th. Will even come as far as Richmond!

Sept 17: 11:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. Reading and signing at The Bookworks in Staunton VA. That’s my last stop in Virginia before heading west. Could do an event that night in Huntington, WV.

Sept 18-21: Driving across promising territory where I could do events in Lexington, Louisville, Evansville, St. Louis, Springfield, Joplin, Tulsa, Oklahoma City and Amarillo. Need hosts, leads, or suggestions. I’d love to meet you and could add a day here if needed.

Sept 22-23: With sister near Lubbock, TX. Would consider any event if anyone knows anyone who lives within a hundred miles of there!

Sept 23: Driving through to Denver CO. Looking for an event in Denver that evening. Alternatively I could stop short in Pueblo or Colorado Springs for an evening event as I’m sure I’ll be tired of driving. Anyone there?

Sept 24-25: Steamboat Springs CO. Will be with my college buddy David and tentatively reading at Off the Beaten Path bookstore. Possible party and library reading.

Sept 26: Salt Lake City, UT. I’ve always wanted to visit the Family History Library there and plan to get in early enough to do so, especially since it is mentioned in the book. I’d like to do a reading so am looking for a bookstore/host.

Sept 27: My birthday! Who are the lucky people in Boise ID who want to help me celebrate? I’d love to do a reading as my contribution to the festivities!

Sept 28: Just in time for my friend’s birthday, I’d love to do a reading in Walla Walla, WA. I’m open to one of the great bookstores, a coffee shop, winery, or whatever. This is the last stop before my slide home.

Sept 29: Back to Bellevue WA for a day of recovery before:

October 1-2: Northwest Bookfest in Kirkland WA where I will have a tent and will be selling books and doing printing demos with the Seattle Center for Book Arts.

As you can see there are some holes in my schedule, and I have a day’s slippage if I need an extra day someplace. I’m working on the southern leg westward on scheduling now, so if you have suggestions, let me know. If there is a compelling reason, I could change my route to the south to include Nashville, Memphis, Little Rock, and Dallas.

And, by the way, I’ll be doing a simultaneous virtual tour, so if you are not on the route in blue, let me know and I’ll be happy to add you to the blot-tour for the month of September. I’ll begin on Sept 1 with a post on http://fewmorepages.blogspot.com/.