Having done a lot of traveling and speaking, I've come to know very well that there are better and worse days in terms of how well a talk comes off, how many of the things-that-inevitably-go-wrong actually go really wrong, and so forth.
By these lights, yesterday was a near perfect day and a really great start to the book tour.
The speech at the Association of Reproductive Health Professionals conference, where I received the annual "Preserving Core Values in Science" award (the last awardee was FDA whistleblower Susan Wood), was attended by hundreds and extremely well received. It was the kind of event where even weird unexpected things that happen work out for the best. At one point, for example, my talk was interrupted by an extremely loud bang/crash coming from behind me. It sounded like someone had literally slammed into a door while pushing or driving something very large and heavy.
Who knows what the hotel employees were up to, but the noise startled me and knocked me entirely out of my rhythm. But then I recovered and said, "those are my critics," and the audience roared.
Pictures from the event will be posted on this site as soon as I've got them.
Then I went on to Warwick's, where I was thrilled to also find a big crowd. The store estimated that it was about 100 people. It looked like more than half of them were standing. They spilled out of the front door, so that unfortunately some people in the back couldn't hear me very well.
Those that could heard an entirely new and largely improvised speech in which I narrated how my thinking had evolved since the publication of The Republican War on Science in hardback about a year ago. This audience was to be my guinea pig for the speech--which has a strong focus on activism and "what we can do." It went over well once again, and I get the feeling that I really motivated people. Afterwards I found myself thinking: Maybe there's a really hunger out there for a "scientist activism" message.
Once again, I hope to post pictures from the event--in this case, if I find any. I don't know if they exist.
Afterwards, I went out with Drinking Liberally San Diego, and got to know some of the event attendees better over beers. Highlights included me spouting off about football (after all, I played in high school with Peyton Manning), only to have a dude at the bar turn around and enter the conversation who'd played college ball at a very high level and had a Bowl ring on his hand. Boy did I feel silly. But it was all good fun.
Now I'm hanging out in La Jolla, getting work done, and on Monday, I hit San Francisco for these talks:
Monday, September 11
7:30 PM-9:00 PM
Books Inc.
301 Castro Street
Mountain View, CATuesday, September 12
7:00 PM-8:30 PM
BookSmith
1644 Haight Street
San Francisco, CA
More soon, including a list of San Francisco radio appearances...
P.S.: Here's a blog post from someone who was at the Warwick's talk....
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I hope to hear good things about book sales. How many books do you sell in a typical appearance?
Have you forgotten what anniversary September 8 is? I haven't.
Thanks for the visit, Chris; it was a treat to talk with you at the bar afterwards. Best wishes for the tour.
Typical sales at a bookstore vary greatly, and I am not really privy to the information. My sense is that something like a third or a fourth of people who come to a talk on average buy a book...
Carl, was great to hang out and nice to meet you. Thanks for your support.