My reading/signing at McIntyre's

One of the crueler lessons of writing is that unless you're quite well known or you have someone heavily shilling for you, you tend not to draw many people to a reading. So, on the one hand, the attendance of 14 at McIntyre's yesterday was quite respectable. You can see many of them in this photograph, courtesy of Gina.


For those wondering, the guy with his back to the camera who is taking his own shot of the space is my friend and fellow author, David Drake.

The true story, however, is that 13 of the 14 people were friends, folks who quite graciously showed up to support me (well, one came primarily for the food, but she sat through the reading as well). I am lucky to have such good and loyal and supportive friends.

That left me, of course, with only one person to whom I might sell a book--the ultimate purpose of these gigs. I don't know if I convinced her to purchase Children No More, but I did try. I read both a couple of chapters from the novel and a few other short pieces, and I talked about the charity program and the plight of child soldiers, as well as my own related background. In the past, with only one person I didn't know in the crowd, I would have considered blowing it off, but I vowed a while ago that if anyone at all showed up, I would give it my best.

The good news for the bookstore is that my friends predictably all love books, so even though we didn't move much of my stock, we made a lot of money for the store.

I'm going to hope--and work--for a much better result at Thursday's event.