Life is really a series of connected and disconnected rituals, and we have a new one in our lives. Every evening, around dusk, we go to Battenkill Books to sign and personalize copies of “Second Chance Dog: A Love Story.” We usually arrive around five, it is getting dark now. Connie usually goes home to be with her family for dinner, and Kate Reid or Connie’s mother, Marilyn, is waiting for us.
Most days, there is a small card table set up in front of the cash register, we look around to see how many boxes full of the book there are from Random House, tonight there were five or six, about 60 or 70 books. Connie orders books in batches of about 60, with Christmas coming on, she doesn’t have all that much room to store more boxes than that.
The orders come in online, and via Paypal. Maria comes with me, as almost everyone asks her to sign the books too. Red is always with us, he greets Kate or Marilyn – Connie if she is there – and then greets the customers in the store. Maria and I help gather the boxes, pile them on and around the table, then we sit down. Connie has a box of pens specially for us. I stack the books and Maria goes over the papers inserted – they have signing and personalizing instructions.
Customers come in and out of the store, they are curious about what we are doing, some of the buy books. Red lies down and goes to sleep when we start signing in earnest. Invariably, someone calls to order the book while we are there. Tonight, Jackie Campbell called to order two novels from Battenkill – a friend and reader of the blog and member of the Open Group At Bedlam Farm, Jackie gets all of her books from Battenkill. She did not know we would be there, but we ask to speak with her and both of us talk with her, we are great admirers of her and her work. I met her as a book recommender and I recommend a couple of books to her on the phone, she bites for one of them.
Maria and I go through the boxes quickly, she reads out the instructions for signing, she double-checks to make sure I haven’t screwed them up. We laugh and joke during the process, we plow through the books, but carefully, Connie and Marilyn and Kate are scrupulous about the books being signed exactly as people requested, they don’t send any through if there are any mistakes. It takes us about an hour to sign these books, another 60 are coming tomorrow. Maria and I notice that most of the books are simple signatures, not personalized requests. This is significant, we both know what this means, the book is being ordered as Christmas gifts, people aren’t yet sure who they are going to give them too.
This is good news for my new book tour, if the book catches on as a Christmas gift, the tour will have really worked. We don’t know yet, we all sense that after Thanksgiving, people start getting serious about buying gifts for Christmas, I’m banging that this will keep sales of “Second Chance Dog” moving. Connie’s store is a good indicator, we will be there tomorrow evening too, you can order the book through the store website or by calling them at 518 677-2515. This is the exciting part of the book tour.