Next appearances:

*Quail Ridge Books, Raleigh, NC, Friday, June 13th, 7:00 p.m.

*Park Road Books, Charlotte, NC, Sunday, June 15th, 4:00 p.m.

I'm trying to write these entries at least once a week, but it's sometimes hard to do when I'm on the road (as I seem to be almost constantly these days...) Luckily, my charming hostess, Mary Jane Price, has let me use her computer, so I can gather at least a couple of thoughts on this Bad Luck Day. (As Churchy La Femme would say, "Friday the thirteen come on FRIDAY this month!")

It's hard to feel as though my luck's been bad so far, however, as I'm near the top of a pretty crazy ride through the Amazon.com rankings, thanks to yesterday's appearance on Martha Stewart Living. I checked my rank at 10:30 a.m., just before the show aired here in the Research Triangle; I stood at #37,313.

At 5:00 p.m., my rank had moved up to #281.

Yeah, I'd lost two whole digits.

This morning at 10:30, only twenty-four hours from my first check-in, The Verb 'To Bird' was #123.

It was also Amazon's #1 Outdoors & Nature book.

Now that it's dropped to #126 overall, I'm a bit calmer, but I'm still checking the ranking waaaaaay too often. I'm well aware that Amazon rankings don't tell you much about actual sales; the rank can be inflated very suddenly if you sell a few books in a very short time, and since it reflects only those sales made on Amazon, your book can be doing really well in stores and the ranking won't change one bit. Still, it's sort of hypnotic, kind of like watching traffic patterns in time-lapse photography--a Koyanisqaatsi for your publishing life.

My readings here have allowed me to see many familiar faces. Some are people I saw only weeks ago. Some are old friends I haven't seen in decades. Some are the parents of my schoolmates, or friends of my own parents. I've had a number of moments where I knew I knew the person, but the name just wouldn't come to mind--deeply embarrassing. I've also had the chance to drive around my hometown and marvel at the changes time has wrought upon it. Trees have grown huge and begun to overhang the roadways, playing fields that stretched to the horizon have become compressed, and the zombified remains of restaurants stand silently, undead in new funeral garb, daring me to call them by the original names: Pyewacket, Bullwinkle's, the House of Chu.

But some things haven't changed in Chapel Hill, where the trees are green and so are the people, where Hector's is still "Famous Since 1969," where the sound of dribbling basketballs fills the winter months, and where the color of the sky is Carolina Blue, to match the uniforms of the only team that matters. All this was made clear last night, when after my appearance at Barnes & Noble a few friends and I went for drinks & pub food. I was tired and drained, having tensely watched myself with Martha, having ridden the Amazon roller-coaster, and having read and signed for nearly an hour in front of people whose judgment meant something important. I felt like the day had thrown me into a whole new place, and when I sat down at Bailey's to drink my stout, I was still blinking hard from all the unfamiliar glare and motion.

But then I got brought back to Chapel Hill, right when my friend David looked at me across the table to ask me about the day's celebrity encounters and asked me, "So--was that really Coach Guthridge at your reading?"

Home sweet home.


10:38 AM

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