Hellooooo my friends! I’m writing this from a Pittsburgh airport hotel. I’m supposed to be in Chicago as of yesterday, but my flight was cancelled due to weather. Here’s hoping I make it back to IL today, so I can fly back to Shreveport tomorrow.
My stay in Greensburg has been awesome. The residency was fantastic, and I really, really like my new colleagues as well as the students in the MFA. I think this program will be really challenging and beneficial for me, both as an author and as a teacher. It’s going to be a sharp learning curve that first semester, but then I think it’ll be a great job.
As for finding an apartment, in the end and despite all my protestations about wanting to live in Pittsburgh, I went with an apartment near the school. I drove the commute a few times, and it’s one of those routes that could take 30 minutes OR it could take two and a half hours. Plus I couldn’t find an apartment I really liked that wasn’t ridiculously expensive. But I found something in Greensburg that is absolutely gorgeous and HUGE (I’m going to have to buy some more furniture). It’s an old building, right down town, with tons of character and gorgeous original features. I’ll be living in the Penthouse, which is French for “pray the ancient elevator doesn’t break down.”
But now I’m going home and my thoughts are firmly on launching Tracking the Tempest. Sightings have been thick and fast: Borders definitely has it on shelves, and I think that Amazon has shipped. So those of you who pre-ordered should be getting it right on time.
My big launch party is over at Bitten by Books, where I’m doing a contest to win a Kindle. RSVP here for the event to earn extra chances to win, and stay tuned to BbB for more info on the actual event. They’ve also posted their review, here.
I’ve also got an interview mit contest up at Tynga’s Reviews.
Melissa, from My World in Books and Pages, reviews Tracking, here, and I’ll have an interview and contest up at her site on July 1st, so stay tuned!
Finally, here’s a review of Tracking that absolutely made my day. It’s spoiler free, and she really gets what I’m doing. Thanks, lady! 🙂
Don’t forget about the upcoming signings talked about on my appearances page, and I’ll have some very fun contests to announce on my site and over at the League when I get home. So see ya round, and go forth to buy Tracking over the weekend! YAY!
Glad you found a wonderful place to lay your head. 🙂
Sounds like you are getting full swing into book launching. 🙂 Hope you have a blast with it. And best of luck to you and Jane.
Thank you for the mention, review and contest both. 🙂
Enjoy and have a blast!
[New Post] Contests and Reviews and Launches, Oh My! – via #twitoaster http://www.nicolepeeler.com/2010/06/cont...
Contests and Reviews and Launches, Oh My! http://www.nicolepeeler.com/2010/06/cont...
RT @NicolePeeler: Contests and Reviews and Launches, Oh My! http://www.nicolepeeler.com/2010/06/cont...
RT @NicolePeeler: Contests and Reviews and Launches, Oh My! http://www.nicolepeeler.com/2010/06/cont...
Squee! My review made the blog. That's awesome. I feel like I should link to this post now, though I do wonder at the ridiculously circular logic of doing that. 😀 And drat, I wish I would have known you were in Pittsburgh, I was just there 3 weeks ago. I feel like we could have gotten together for coffee. Boo.
Oh well, happy release week!
I picked up the first book a few months ago at Barns here in town, (anchorage) the cover caught my eye, though I wasn't sure what to make of it. (worried it was a spinoff supernatural teen romance thing. BUUuut I'll try anything once)
Found myself caught up in it, and at one point couldn't stop. (near the end where Jane goes to Court)
At which point I started searching around for the other books in the series, and was getting annoyed and disappointed I couldn't find anything. (did manage to see a couple copies of the book at Title Wave, the local reseller)
So unfortunately I had to give up.
(didn't even occur to me to check the web)
So fastforward to where my mother and myself are going through the airport at Minneapolis, and heading down to A concorse to catch a Delta hopper flight after having come up from F.
At one point, there's this book store right at a corner, just opposite one of the carabou coffie places, and right before an armed services zone, where the horizontal walking things start up. At this bookstore/candy/magazine joint, in the corner of where the books are at, sits a cover style I have only seen ONCE before.
It's Jane, clothed, but in some sort of battle stance.
I stopped… did a double take, and took a look at it.
Sure enough, it's a NEW book in the series!
I check the back… and choke. 799. GAWD… books are getting hella expensive nowadays. I thought 5 bucks for a book was expensive a few years back.
So I go, okay, it's out, I'll just get it when I get to iowa. There's a barns and noble everywhere, right?
Well family reunion took up a lot of time, and we were never really able to get to Des Moines proper.
An attempt at trying to find one one day resulted in us driving around in that 85+ heat and me being alaskan… well… I was never happy.
Eventually I had to give it up looking for it, though I did ask to try and hit up a bookstore before we left. Unfortunately, the people who were supposed to pick us up and take us to the airport on tuesday didn't arrive until after 10:30, and the flight was leaving a little after 12pm.
So no quick bookstore jaunt before leaving.
Blegh. I checked the various dinky bookstores at Des Moines airport, just the usual. several dozen copies of twilight and whatever happened to be in the top 20 at the time. (cow tipping merchandise anyone?)
So we get a nice flight out of there (I got a seat change to an exit row, and no one else showed up for the other seat on my row, so I had both seats to myself. WHEEEE! To bad the flight was only 30 min.)
So we get back to Minneapolis, and arrive at A-14. The ass end of the terminal.
I thought about it, and wondered… 'no way is that book gonna be there after 5 days.' BUT… We decide to walk instead of taking the tram, and use the walkways. (the broken walkway is fixed finally so we can go straight through)
We head past all of A and B Concourse, and I get to the little shop… and lo and behold, guess who's waiting there for me. Jane in battle pose in the corner. Same book, same spot. Only one copy.
I'm not one to tempt fate again, and grab her, pay for that book along with one my mom wants and a 3 Musketeers truffle crisp.
Now I'm set.
This almost makes up waiting 5 and a half hours for our plane over in the F concourse. So now I'm wondering where I'll be when the next one comes out in January.
Maybe if she ever goes to the UK, you could have the title "Tempest in a Teapot"
Sorry if this ran a bit long.
Great story, Kren! Glad you found a copy, eventually, and I'm very happy to hear it's in airports. Thanks, lady! 😉