One week! One week since Spells of Blood and Kin officially launched. What’s happened in that week?
First: the launch itself! A power failure at the Yonge & Eglinton Centre meant the Indigo store had to close for the afternoon, but the amazing events team quickly found a solution–the courtyard of the mall. Check out the amazing setup (and the long signing line!):
Curtis Chen and I are tag-teaming a lot of our events as his debut novel, Waypoint Kangaroo, is with the same publisher at the same time–what a great coincidence! Curtis came to Toronto for this event and the next one–a day later, at the Chiaroscuro Reading Series. Here’s a great picture Kelly Robson took of me at the reading series…right before I classily smacked myself in the face with the microphone:
Next up, a double-header of Indigo signings: Chapters Chinook in Calgary, and Indigo Granville in Vancouver. Both stores were lovely! Indigo Granville had an especially great location for a signing table:
I got to chat with not one but two different readers who were celebrating birthdays and decided to treat themselves to a signed copy of my book. I hope they both had great days! (There were a lot of people who bought my book for no particular reason, of course, and I hope they had great days too!)
From Vancouver, author & entourage flew on to LA and landed late enough that we could see the wildfires burning on the dark hills: a harsh and ominous reintroduction to a city I haven’t visited since the year my father died. Yet thanks to dear friends, we were welcomed warmly and put to bed in the guest room of a lovely house with mango trees in the yard.
Barnes & Noble in Torrance generously hosted the next stop, Curtis’s official launch. Both Curtis and I had the pleasure of seeing our high school English teachers at our respective events–how awesome to have been taught by people who remain so invested in their students’ lives and in the literary community!
This super-long post is going to have to leave out a lot of the non-book-related details–pretending to be a runaway horse with our small cousin in Calgary; running on the sea wall to Dundarave; mangoes with chili and lime in Santee Alley. By the time I get back home I’ll have a whole library of new scents and tastes and views and accents to draw from… all ready and waiting for whatever I write next.
