5/16/2009
It's almost quiet around here this morning. Cinderella's off getting her Book Tour Hair done. I dreamed last night I dyed my hair black--Adam Lambert Fever? Oh, maybe the book tour jitters. I've put myself through book tour boot-camp with America's Top Personal Trainer, Nicki Anderson (TM, Patent Pending). My quads and my lats and my blatz and my shats are all stronger now.
And we've been preparing some merch and swag for fans--yes, there are copies of "The Magnificent Seven" for raffle. Yes, we are making a big stack of "Nayeli and Tacho's Drive-Time Playlist" of all the favorite songs of Tres Camarones and the main characters in the book. Yes, we have hand-fans made (if you've been in a tropical Mexican moviehouse, you'll recall these cardboard fans) with the logo of Tacho's "La Mano Caida" restaurant and internet cafe. We're having 500 post-cards made to give away and/or mail to fans. Thinkin' about t-shirts.
We're arranging for the tour to be a Twitter-fest: I'm hoping Cinderella and whatever Twitteroos present will keep up a running record of each gig--and we hope to use the twits to run some of the raffles. (It's the First Inaugural Tweet-Up Tour, for those of you who follow: never tried before. My small addition to the Twit alternative history being brought into the world 140 characters at a time.) Twitta Hatas don't "get it," but I always tell long-time fans of the blogs here that Twitter is a continuation of "The Wastelander's Notebooks," one of the most popular features of this website. I can't think of a better, more immediate way to peek into a writer's mind/soul/lunchbox. So, I guess, it's a way for us to whisper secrets, enjoy pillow-talk, laugh, share notebooks and journals. It's the phone call at midnight I might have made to you when we were 16--before we were respectable and married and too sleepy to play Leonard Cohen and Shawn Phillips songs over the phone.
A Tweet-Up is when Twitter folks meet face-to-face. I'm hoping to have at least one meet us at each gig. I also hope readers of this blog will come--a Blog-Up? Ugh... That sounds like stomach flu. "Mom! Chayo just blogged-up!" Anyway, if you want to follow the scribbles and the jottings, you can always see it all: Twitter.com/Urrealism. Join us!
I will "Wasteland" the trip as best I can on here, too. We'll have a teeny tiny notebook computer w/ us.
So. I'm not ready, but I never am. The clock runs out and we'll have to leave, ready or not. As the saying goes, "No choice, no problem."
So far, Into the Beautiful North has gotten generous, sometimes ecstatic, reviews. Except for Kirkus reviews--which often ahs the same guy review my books. Anonymously. It's easy to drygulch a cowboy when you have a mask over your face! I would take the review to heart and mend my bad-writer ways, except the review is full of crap. I do listen--though paying too much attention to reviews good or bad will drive you crazy.
One of my Twitter pals calls the book Into the Tweetiful North. Ha ha ha! Or, as my Mexican readers say it: Ja, ja, ja!
First stop: Kankakee, Illinois. May 19/20. Why? Because the book ends in Kankakee, and we have a long sweet history with that fine town. (I wrote a NY Times piece about them once.)
May 21: Anderson's Books in Naperville, IL. Home town, locals coming. We'll adjourn to a pub afterwards so I can say hey.
The next day, we leave for Denver. The Holy Rocky Mountains! Home of my Eternal Soul! The Bella Luna gang is having a wedding! And afterwards, The Tattered Cover. May 26, 7:30. B there or B square.
Tempe, AZ the next day...and on and on. Updates here.
I'll be looking for you.
Hope you win the raffle.
XXX, OOO, XXX
Ludwig Aethelbert Urias
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And we've been preparing some merch and swag for fans--yes, there are copies of "The Magnificent Seven" for raffle. Yes, we are making a big stack of "Nayeli and Tacho's Drive-Time Playlist" of all the favorite songs of Tres Camarones and the main characters in the book. Yes, we have hand-fans made (if you've been in a tropical Mexican moviehouse, you'll recall these cardboard fans) with the logo of Tacho's "La Mano Caida" restaurant and internet cafe. We're having 500 post-cards made to give away and/or mail to fans. Thinkin' about t-shirts.
We're arranging for the tour to be a Twitter-fest: I'm hoping Cinderella and whatever Twitteroos present will keep up a running record of each gig--and we hope to use the twits to run some of the raffles. (It's the First Inaugural Tweet-Up Tour, for those of you who follow: never tried before. My small addition to the Twit alternative history being brought into the world 140 characters at a time.) Twitta Hatas don't "get it," but I always tell long-time fans of the blogs here that Twitter is a continuation of "The Wastelander's Notebooks," one of the most popular features of this website. I can't think of a better, more immediate way to peek into a writer's mind/soul/lunchbox. So, I guess, it's a way for us to whisper secrets, enjoy pillow-talk, laugh, share notebooks and journals. It's the phone call at midnight I might have made to you when we were 16--before we were respectable and married and too sleepy to play Leonard Cohen and Shawn Phillips songs over the phone.
A Tweet-Up is when Twitter folks meet face-to-face. I'm hoping to have at least one meet us at each gig. I also hope readers of this blog will come--a Blog-Up? Ugh... That sounds like stomach flu. "Mom! Chayo just blogged-up!" Anyway, if you want to follow the scribbles and the jottings, you can always see it all: Twitter.com/Urrealism. Join us!
I will "Wasteland" the trip as best I can on here, too. We'll have a teeny tiny notebook computer w/ us.
So. I'm not ready, but I never am. The clock runs out and we'll have to leave, ready or not. As the saying goes, "No choice, no problem."
So far, Into the Beautiful North has gotten generous, sometimes ecstatic, reviews. Except for Kirkus reviews--which often ahs the same guy review my books. Anonymously. It's easy to drygulch a cowboy when you have a mask over your face! I would take the review to heart and mend my bad-writer ways, except the review is full of crap. I do listen--though paying too much attention to reviews good or bad will drive you crazy.
One of my Twitter pals calls the book Into the Tweetiful North. Ha ha ha! Or, as my Mexican readers say it: Ja, ja, ja!
First stop: Kankakee, Illinois. May 19/20. Why? Because the book ends in Kankakee, and we have a long sweet history with that fine town. (I wrote a NY Times piece about them once.)
May 21: Anderson's Books in Naperville, IL. Home town, locals coming. We'll adjourn to a pub afterwards so I can say hey.
The next day, we leave for Denver. The Holy Rocky Mountains! Home of my Eternal Soul! The Bella Luna gang is having a wedding! And afterwards, The Tattered Cover. May 26, 7:30. B there or B square.
Tempe, AZ the next day...and on and on. Updates here.
I'll be looking for you.
Hope you win the raffle.
XXX, OOO, XXX
Ludwig Aethelbert Urias
# posted by Luis @ 11:34 AM 
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