Last week I had two of those unexpected, unexplained, mysterious “out of the blue incidents”.
I received an e-mail from the marketing coordinator for a brand new hotel, The Madison Graduate Hotel, on the edge of the University of Wisconsin Madison Campus (UMAD). She wanted to know if I was interested in helping coordinate author book signings at the hotel. WHAT? I honestly thought it was a hoax or a scam. I googled the hotel and learned that it is a “retro” hotel designed to be like it was when you attended college in the 70’s or 80’s. I wondered how the person found my e-mail but was shy about asking. I responded to the e-mail by asking if we could meet to further explore what they were interested in doing. I received a response the same day and we are meeting later today. I was copied in an e-mail to other hotel staff where I learned that I am the Wisconsin Writer’s Association Social Coordinator. That’s not exactly accurate, I am the facebook manager for WWA but it got me the meeting so I don’t care if it’s not totally accurate. I’m excited that I may be able to help a lot of local authors get a venue to sign and sell their books. I’ll let you know what happens next week. The second “out of the blue” experience was another e-mail from a bookstore in Omaha. Several years ago our son and family lived in Omaha. While visiting them they took us to their favorite bookstore, The Bookworm, where I met the owner. They agreed to take my first book, Murphy’s Troubles, on consignment. It was impressive; they offered a written contract and the hope of selling the five books I left with them. The thrill was taking my granddaughters picture standing in front of where my book sat on the shelf. In their e-mail I learned that in three years they had sold only one book. They offered to return the four remaining books but pointed out that postage would be more than the $14.95 they collected for the single sale. They suggested I might want to donate the four remaining books to their library and they would send me a check for the single sale. Can you imagine that? What a kind and thoughtful suggestion. I wrote back the following day that they didn’t need to send me a check for the single sale; they had been kind to carry my books for three years. I agreed donating the remaining books to their public library was a great idea. You never know what can happen “out of the blue”.
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rex owensI write to tell the story of our human saga. Categories
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