10:00 a.m.: Bookshop in a Mall, Outinasuburba.
Nice big queue and I eye the early arrivals carefully, espying a fan I’d met before. Explain problem. He nips off. An hour later he’s back, and slips me a disk with the freshly downloaded fix. I sign all his books. No worries.
1:00 p.m.: Small Bookshop, Worralorrasurfa.
Still enough fans around to take the queue to about seventy-five minutes. As a charity wheeze, they can have their picture taken with me. One lady has made me an entire box of origami turtles. No worries.
Day 6
8:10 a.m.: flight to Arthur.
11:00 a.m.: Interview with Big Radio Journo (said to be first-division media). I was prepared to dislike the man but in fact we got on pretty well; he avoided the usual dumb questions and we had a decent twenty minutes. Sometimes it’s a bit embarrassing to be interviewed by a journalist who’s a fan because fan-type questions don’t work well on air (they say things like “So … is Rincewind coming back, then?” and you can hear a hundred thousand people looking at their radios and saying, “What the — is he on about?”).
On to Small Yet Seriously Worthy Bookshop, Innasuburb.
This shop is seriously behind all aspects of Discworld. They sell the Clarecraft models and had even imported the videos. Don’t know how many people there were, because everyone was keen and wanted to chat and a bunch of actors in costume from an upcoming production of Wyrd Sisters also turned up. A fun event; every tour should contain at least one. I was allowed to kiss Granny Weatherwax. Few people can say the same. Not without having a very croaky voice, at any rate.
On to Big Specialist Bookshop.
Big Forbidden Planet type of queue, heavy with carrier bags. One nice lady had brought a banana daiquiri in a thermos. Another one opens the violin case she’s carrying and it turns out to contain a polished scythe blade on a black velvet lining.
Will I sign it so’s she can have the name etched on? What would you do, boys and girls?
Signing overruns, so the tail end of the queue follows me down the road to Big Mainstream Bookshop and tags on to the end of the one already there. Among the people waiting is Ruby, who describes herself as my biggest fan and may well be, and a lady with some books to be signed to her psychiatrist. I sign them, advising her to change her psychiatrist.
Nip back to the Specialist shop to sign orders, and we spot a young lady fan surreptitiously walking out with the empty lager can that I’d been drinking from earlier. We shall never know why and dare not ask.
Check into very posh small hotel. There’s a letter from the manager, assuring me of his attention at all times.
Go out with publishers to a fish and chip supper. Ah, but this is Doyles Fish Restaurant, where they serve barramundi and chips, and a barramundi is what a cod becomes if it’s been a good cod in this life.
Back to the hotel, where there’s a letter in the room from the deputy manager, assuring me of his attention at all times. I wake up at 2:00 a.m. at the sound of an envelope being pushed under the door. It’s from the night manager, assuring me of his attention at all times. I think if you stay in this hotel for more than a fortnight you have to marry one of the staff.
Day 7
On to Large Mainstream Shop, Nothersuburb.
Eighty or ninety people, I guess. One guy turned up as Death and was rewarded with a big poster. At least, I assume it was someone dressed up as Death, but who knows?
On to New Specialist Bookshop, Yettanothasuburb. Big queue. Lady surreptitiously attempts to bribe me to put her son in a future book. Trouble is, he’s called John (or Sam, or Tony … can’t quite remember). Explain that if she changes his name to Sweevil or Chalcedony she might be in with a chance.
Off to airport for flight to Vulcana …
Signing-tour hotels are like a box of chocolates—you never know whether you’re going to get the nasty hard one that someone else has already sucked. Sometimes you get one lit by forty-watt lightbulbs, sometimes you get a suite where you have to phone reception in the end to find out where the bed is. I’m in luck tonight—this one’s got a bath so big you can lie down in it, completely flat.
Day 8
Media in the morning, then on to University for big talk in their lecture theatre, organized by the librarian, who is a fan. Make ape-like gestures behind his back while he’s doing the introduction, then give him a “Librarians Rule Ook” badge. Sign for queue afterwards, and get hit by a drive-by manuscript dumper. That is, when it’s over there’s this unexpected brown envelope on the desk, with a note asking me to read it and send my comments to the author. Sigh.
4:00 p.m.: Small Yet Lovely Specialist Bookshop. The owner knows her stuff, so it’s always a pleasure to sign here. Long friendly queue, and there’s a bowl of black jelly beans on the signing table; it is impossible to eat only one black jelly bean. One lady had travelled more than fourteen hours on a train to get to this signing. Sent her a poster when I got home.
Rush off to airport for flight to Bugarup. Dinner on the plane is Chicken Congealé. No worries. Well, perhaps one or two.
Day 9
Breakfast with a journo, who’s really a fan in disguise who has come up with a good way of not having to wait in a queue, some down-the-line interviews, and on to:
Book signing, Bigmallsomewherea.
They’ve really tried, but somewhere someone came up with the idea that fantasy = horror = coffins, and obtained an actual coffin, on wheels, for use as a signing table. This raises a few problems. One of them, of course, is of good taste, but more practical is the fact that coffins are made for lying in or kneeling by, not sitting at, and since this one is on casters it gently slides away as I sign until it’s at arm’s length. In the end we settle for a dull but practical table and they save the coffin for Anne Rice, who knows how to do this stuff.
On to:
Another Big Specialist Bookshop, Citycenta.
Nice place, this. Been there on every tour. Despite this, loads of people with lots of backlist. And a banana dakry. Oh, and a Goth. Fourecks seems to have a thriving Goth culture, if thriving is the right word. I think Goths are fun. It’s not a proper signing queue unless you get at least one Goth. In Worralorrasurfa they’ve got surf Goths.
Back to the hotel where, hooray, I have a suite with extensive views of the curvature of the earth.
Day 10
So’s I don’t get bored on my day off, there’s a set of proofs been sent here from the U.K. Read them and make three pages of corrections. Plan is that, since hotel has got a Business Centre, I can use one of their printers and then fax the pages back.