Pearl Abraham @ Festival of the Book, Conclusion

(Pearl's account of the Virginia Festival of the Book winds down with a wrap-up of her final day in Charlottesville...)

Sunday morning, Alix Strauss, Steve Stern, and I breakfasted at The Nook. I ordered the southern special, complete with grits and plenty of coffee. Back at the hotel, it was check out time and as it turned out, about ten of us were taking the same plane to La Guardia. I said goodbye to Steve, who was headed back home via Philadelphia, and wasn’t due at the airport until twelve. And just before I left, I met Barbara Feinberg (Welcome to Lizard Motel), a Sarah Lawrence graduate, who was reading that afternoon at the Old Dominion Bookshop on the mall. And wonderful Razel Solow came by to say goodbye to all of us.

Saskia drove Alix, Jonathan Safran Foer, and I to the Charlottesville airport, and once we checked in, had our laptops and backpacks x-rayed, removed our shoes, belts, and jackets, and put them all on again, we re-congregrated at gate 5. Boarding the plane were: Alix, Jonathan, M.J. Rose (Lip Service), Kate Walbert (Our Kind), and I, plus A.J. Jacobs, his wife Julie, and one-year-old son Jasper (who gives babies a good name), and a writer named Mike, whose last name I didn’t catch and haven't been able to find, though he informed me that he definitely isn't Mike McFadden, another excellent UVA Festival organizer, and more. Once aboard, we authors settled into our seats, to sleep or read, and return to our private, often desperate, writing lives.

In conclusion, an anecdote from Bella Stander (Book Promotion 101), one of the UVA Festival’s excellent moderators who read our books, invited us, advised, and communicated with us, and hoped that we remembered to do what was best for ourselves, our audiences, and our books:

"For the 2001 fest, I'd informed all the authors on my Saturday 10:00 a.m. panel weeks before that they were to give a 5-minute reading. Met a couple of them for breakfast. After we paid the check--at this point it was 9:40 & we were supposed to be at the city council chambers in 10 minutes--"Jane" started leafing through her book, looking for a passage to read. She made it to the program just before 10, read poorly, and a dull passage to boot. While another panelist was reading, her cell phone rang. She said, "Oh, it must be my kids," and walked offstage, crouched in the wings, and talked on the phone to said kids, a conversation we all heard (it didn't sound like her house was on fire or that anyone was bleeding; and anyway, her husband was home with them). I don't think she sold many books afterwards. Needless to say, she was not invited back. Come to think of it, I don't think she's come out with another book, either."

So it seems we indeed need those rules and regulations to keep us in order. Bella offers book promotion workshops for those who want/need extra preparation.

Finally, it’s been fun to do this, and I hope it amuses more than it embarrasses, and that, even after this, the Festival will want to have me back. I apologize for the errors (grammar and otherwise) that remained uncorrected. These dispatches were written away from my desk, after late nights, or too early in the morning, after too many glasses of wine, or not enough coffee.

Disclosure: I (Ron) have taken Bella's Book Promotion 101 seminar; I highly recommend it for any about-to-be or recently published author as a wake-up call to just how much more work you've got ahead of you.