Jay Swanson's Blog

Adventures in Marketing Emails: The Ad Network

I’m not a big fish – in fact, I barely qualify in the crustacean category – but I do get approached by random marketers on a regular basis. For additional context: I used to run a team that reached out to influencers in hopes of working with them (actual influencers, well above the crustacean category) and I genuinely hope they never sent emails like the ones I receive. Still, if there’s a great service or a team out there that wants to work with me, I want to hear about it. I don’t think marketing in itself is bad, I just despise it when it’s done poorly (you are the one, after all, who is filling up my inbox – I didn’t ask for this).

Yesterday I got an email from someone claiming to love my YouTube videos and asking if they could send me information on their promotional network. I decided to bite, because we’d all love an effective promo network and a team behind it that cares. Still, it’s a marketing email and I’m not going to dive straight in without a little vetting. If you’re going to tell me you ‘love’ something I do without offering any proof, I have a sh*t test for you: I agreed on condition that she describe why she loved my videos so much.

Unfortunately, she didn’t do very well. Thus, I’ve decided to treat this as a teaching moment that I hope someone, somewhere, in some distant corner of a cubicle farm in New Jersey will take to heart.

Email 1: The Approach



Hi, I’m [Name] from [Company].

I studied your YouTube channel today and loved your videos. That was some trippy travelling you got right there!

[Company] is a San Francisco-based company. We’ve helped many YouTubers get noticed. Sony, Ted Talk, Universal and over 30,000 marketers use our video advertising technology.

Is it cool if I send more info?







Response 1: The Sh*t Test

Sure, if you can tell me why it was you loved my videos.

Email 2: Proof She Loves My Videos

Hi Jay, nice to hear from you. I like your channel because its interesting. From seeing Portugal, Wales, your interesting introductions, and your adventures around Paris

Ten Things I Learned from Casey Neistat

For the Three of You Living Under a Rock

Casey Neistat is one of the single most transformative YouTubers to grace our Chromecasts since the internet was a twinkle in Al Gore’s eye. It actually feels awkward for me to try and explain who Casey is because that knowledge feels like it should be ubiquitous – but I realize it isn’t. So here’s the crash course:

Casey is a filmmaker who first gained notoriety for calling Apple out on their irreplaceable iPod batteries – he had an HBO show with his brother produced in his now trademark homemade movie style – and would have another explosive internet hit with a video he produced for Nike (below) that makes me want to jump on a plane every time I think of it.

There are many others, but these are the standard highlights.

 

Critical Mass

What transformed Casey from a dot on the map into one of those little squares that gets its very own bold outline was his daily vlog. Casey uploaded a video almost every day for 18 months – and not just of him sitting around talking to the camera. He made 10min movies about his life every day and, in doing so, changed the world.

Maybe not the entire world, but mine and millions of others. Out of all that life-changing-explosive YouTube gold, here are ten things that I learned from Casey while he strove to provide us with the most epic ride any vlogger has ever taken us on.

Lessons I Learned from Casey Neistat:



ONE - VLOGGING CAN BE MORE

If there was one thing I learned from Casey it was that a vlog does not have to be limited by format. I vlogged when I lived in France and again from the Congo, but I never dreamed of applying any filmmaking skills to the endeavor. The most I ever did was change backdrops, whether I filmed myself in front of the Eiffel Tower or on the top deck of my ship.

When Theo (of Theodopholis Thursdays) sent me a link to Casey’s vlog, my mind was immediately blown. I have since strived to imitate and steal every last bit of Casey’s hard work that I can.

TWO – IT’S ABOUT THE WORK

Perhaps this is as much a function of growing up as anything, but Casey helped me appreciate the long road to success. From the outside, if you’re just jumping on board in the middle of the vlog, Casey can appear like an overnight success. He’s not. He’s been making films for decades and had his fair share of struggle along the way.

Focus on the work for its own sake and let come what may.

THREE – HAVE FUN SHARE FUN

On a more personal note, I’ve had a rough few years running and 2016 topped them off with a bang. I don’t just look up to Casey for his skill or work ethic; one of the biggest gifts Casey Neistat gave me was that somehow, every day, he always found a way to encourage me in the midst of my misery. I wasn’t just inspired, I was often lifted out of the holes into which I’d fallen or allowed myself to slide. He had fun in the midst of his successes and that zeal for life was contagious.

It revitalized dreams I was allowing to die.

FOUR – POSITIVITY ISN’T BLANK

Casey collided with someone on his boosted board once and, unfortunately, managed not to film the incident. He recreated it in all of its adrenaline-pumping and frustration-inducing glory with paper and a giant marker. He was honest with how infuriating the situation was (like the time Australian security lifted his boosted board off him in the airport). And he was still, somehow, his positive self. I have a hard time taking anyone suffering from perpetual positivity as sincere, but Casey was instructive in how to be both honest and uplifting at the same time.

FIVE – IT’S NOT A SELFIE STICK

I bought a gorillapod pretty much as soon as I realized what Casey was doing with his DSLR. I had little ones for my phone, but the concept of using a big one to get in front of a real camera had never even struck me as a possibility. When you see two dozen people doing the exact same thing over the next week, you have Casey to thank. I’m not sure if he had the idea first, but to the one who popularizes goes the spoils!

There are innovative ways to abuse your gear and make it work for you in ways you never thought possible. Casey sticks bits of wood to his camera to protect his audio jack and has no fear of jerry-rigging just about anything to get a shot. Those risks pay off (and sometimes backfire for our entertainment).

SIX – WOO THEM TO THE BEAT

If you make videos, you know just how tricky finding good music can be without violating copyright laws. Casey burned a path through the treacherous landscape of the discovery process and left signposts along the way. If it wasn’t for Casey, I never would have thought to dig through SoundCloud and Band Camp to find great music and reach out to the artists directly for permission to use them. Simple, but I guess I’m lazier than I’d like to admit.

There’s a lot of great music out there if you’re willing to look, and the right song makes all the difference.

SEVEN – YOU CAN DO IT

Like I said, I’m no stranger to vlogging, but the idea of making a video every day was daunting to say the least, especially while traveling. It was something I’d wanted to do for a long time, but after my foray into Vlog Every Day in April while living in Paris, I knew what a nightmare it could be. Back then I didn’t have enough to say – but something in Casey’s approach helped me realize that I did, in fact, have plenty. Again, this could just be a function of growing up.

Then I was a groomsman in three wedding ceremonies over two days three time zones apart and managed to keep uploading; I now know for a fact that I can get it done. Just don’t expect me to keep track of my pants in the process.

EIGHT – SUPPORT YOUR COMMUNITY

Casey takes time to support the people that support him. While I don’t expect that he should ever read this, I would not be surprised in the least to find out he had, simply because he seeks this stuff out and props it up. I have been shocked and impressed by how far out of his way Casey will go to pump the people following him and push them towards success of their own. So often creatives are jealous with the attention they’ve earned to the exclusion of others – Casey has no qualms sharing his success with others.

I hope I can behave similarly should I ever be granted a fraction of the attention.

NINE – TO ERR IS GOLDEN

It’s really easy to be embarrassed about our mistakes and to try and gloss over them. The magic of editing provides any filmmaker with ample opportunity to cover up any and all mistakes. Casey highlights his own and laughs along with us. Something I’ve finally come to appreciate about art is that it’s the mistakes and imperfections that truly draw us in.

They say to err is human, so don’t remove too much humanity from your work.

TEN – IT’S OK TO QUIT

I often say that Casey’s work gave me permission to do _________ (fill in the blank). Seeing him take particular risks or experiment with certain techniques has often led me to think “Oh, awesome. He got away with it, I wonder if I can too?” I’ve been pushed and challenged by Casey as much as I’ve been inspired by him. I’m also pretty stubborn and (if you can judge by the 2,000+ photos I’ve posted in my photo/day effort) it’s easy to see that I have a hard time quitting once I’ve started.

Casey gave me so much through his vlog. He inspired me to try and take on his style, to play with storytelling daily, and to struggle through the hard bits because there was satisfaction to be had should I make it through. He encouraged me daily, brought a smile to my lips when all I had was that flat-faced emoji, and put life back into dreams I was tempted to let slide into the bin.

When I say that vlogging saved my life, I often mean that Casey saved my life.

PERMISSION TO LAND

In the end, Casey gave me permission to quit when the time is right. I don’t expect my vlog to go anywhere in the sense that I might become a YouTube sensation. I do expect it to bring me a greater sense of discipline, a better understanding of story structure, and a honed set of tools I can turn towards greater projects in the future. When the time comes to move on (assuming I decide to quit after daily vlogging for a year), I know I can quit in style.

Unless I get hit by a bus. Then you’ll have to deal with whatever I uploaded that morning as my final contribution.

Thanks Casey. I learned a lot from you and can’t wait to see what new lessons you have in store.

Thank You Too!

And thanks to those of you who follow my vlog, too. Your support and encouragement are more help to me than you may ever know.

If you’d like to follow along with my daily adventures (or nonventures if I’m sitting in Spokane) then click here to subscribe on YouTube. I’ll be heading to San Francisco this month in hopes of landing a visa to move back to Paris, and then things will get interesting. Also baguettes. Lots of baguettes.

Did you watch Casey’s vlog? What did you take away from it?

Click on my handsome, smoky face to check out my YouTube channel, or click here to see the highlight reel of my vlog so far.

Into the Nanten Hand-Bound Leather Journal – Kickstarter Reward

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

Last year the highest reward to get snagged during my Kickstarter for Journal 2 of Into the Nanten was the hand-bound leather journal I made as a reproduction of the one Marceles is currently lugging around the jungle. It was a lot of work to format the innards, from mud splatters to skewing and moving individual lines of text (you want it to feel hand-written after all). It was also totally worth it.

I took my copy of the journal with me to conventions around the country, and each time it got plenty of “oohs” and “aahs.” It’s the only intrinsically expensive reward we’ll be offering again, purely because it is that awesome and I want you to have a chance to get your hands on some serious awesome yourselves.

I never took photos of the journal before now for some reason – I guess I was too busy sitting on airplanes, and the lighting in a passenger jet is notoriously bad for product photography.

We highlighted it in the Kickstarter video (which I just finished) and I wanted some good stills to share in the Kickstarter campaign as well. It only seems right to give you a preview of what you’re getting for a whopping $750 down. Trust me, it’s worth every penny. At least the four of us who have copies of Journal 1 think so.

There will be ten on offer during the Kickstarter, which launches on March 4th. You can check out the artwork on display at Coeur Coffeehouse here, which is where we’ll hold the official launch party on the 4th. If you can make it, we would love to have you. We’ll have sweet prizes on offer along with live music.

Whether or not you can make it down for the party, mark your calendars for the campaign itself so you don’t miss the early-bird specials! You can join the Facebook event here if you need the reminder – and that way you can invite all of your friends as well!

What perks are you most excited for?

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Artwork from Into the Nanten on Display: Coeur Coffeehouse

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

I made this weird transition where I lost my job five months before my contract was set to be up and found myself writing in a coffee shop nearly every day. This was a pretty glorious change. I even managed to finish a post-apocalyptic book last month and, if we’re being honest, there’s a part of me that relishes few things more than the freedom to sit and write all day.

We won’t go into the inherent stressors inversely correlated to one’s income stream.

I would argue that the most comfortable spot to sit and write in Spokane is at Coeur Coffeehouse – their coffee is delicious and the baristas are both talented and friendly. It’s pretty darn close to perfect.

After taking up space for over a month, I asked if they would like to host the launch party for my upcoming Kickstarter for Journal Three of Into the Nanten [MARCH 4th!!]. They said yes and when I mentioned that I’d love to hang some art, they asked me how quickly I could get it up.

I was two days away from flying to Taiwan.

Of course I couldn’t waste two precious weeks of wall-space, so I told them I’d get it all up Friday night. It was already almost noon on Wednesday. I grabbed a tape measure and got to designing a display, drawing everything out in my little red notebook before prepping the files to be printed and mounted. I got everything from the printer at 5:30PM on Friday.

Thankfully I had help from some great friends and my dashing brother-in-law. Then my dad showed up at 10:30PM like a champ and helped take the final brunt of the process. It was a good workout, as benign as hanging art sounded going in.

It took us six hours to put everything up (I forgot price tags), and I got about two hours of sleep before heading to the airport. Command strips do not make for quick hanging, something of which I was totally unaware before this experience. Combine that with standing at the tops of ladders and crumbly walls, and you have a recipe for a long night.

It’s both surreal and amazing to see the art from my world mounted on the walls of a coffee shop that I’ve frequented for years. Above all, I’m really glad it turned out well and that people seem to enjoy it.

It’s fun to hear the reactions both in person and through the grapevine. I’ve even had a couple of people tell me they either know the guy who did it all, or are friends with his sister. I always ask them what they think before I say anything else. So far it’s all been positive.

If you’re in Spokane, nearby, or passing through, be sure to grab some coffee and check out my display at Coeur. Pick up a book and some artwork on your way out. If you time it just right, I’ll be there to sign it for you.

I’ve put some of the pieces up online, and will be working on a pricing structure that makes reprinting easy. Basically I’m willing to print (and mount) any of the pieces from Journal One at whatever size you like. Illustrations from Journal Two will have to wait until after the Kickstarter – which launches on March 4th, so mark your calendars!

If you’d like to order one and you don’t see it online yet, just shoot me an email and we can work something out in the meantime. Prices range from $20 for the small 8×10″ pieces to $950 for the frickin’ huge stretched-canvas print of Naline (I’ll post a picture so you can revel in the glory):

So to recap: You can find Coeur Coffeehouse here.

The Kickstarter for Journal Three launches on March 4th.

You can order any prints you want from Journal One in any of the sizes seen here (20% off for unmounted items – I won’t be shipping mounted items, either, so this will be your main option if you aren’t in town).

Drop me a line if you have any questions, and I hope you enjoy the display!

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On Conventions and the People that Make them Great

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

I’ve been to four conventions now. I had booths at two of them and then just schmoozed my way through the rest.

Entering the convention scene as an unknown is intimidating, it will probably terrify me to some degree for the duration of my career, but there were groups and individuals who made the experience much more enjoyable. I just read Kameron Hurley’s call to be kind on the convention scene and it reminded me that even though -unlike her- I’m practically a nobody, I can always do more to open doors to those who feel as awkward or intimidated as I do. It also reminded me that while it’s so easy to focus on the negative moments and insecure feelings, it does more good to encourage the positive.

Kameron was one of those people who wound up making me feel welcomed, both at the Angry Robot party and during BarCon (the post-convention social scene centered around the bar – terminology of which you need to be aware should you find yourself at a convention). She wasn’t alone.

The beer run for the AR party was possibly the most dangerous part of the whole experience – is there something in my teeth?!

While there were some people who made me feel even more like an outsider, and others who simply disappointed (and let’s not forget the series of faux pas that I committed as I stumbled along), I’d rather spend a moment to highlight the people who made me feel welcome. Who legitimized me as both an author and a human being. They deserve some spotlight.

Mike Underwood and Megan O’Keefe were pretty much the main reasons I even attended ConFusion. Megan invited me not only to the convention on multiple occasions, but to the archery-with-authors event that opened the whole schindig. Then Mike offered to share his room with me and suddenly the whole thing became possible on a financial level. Mike, if you don’t know him, is simply one of the kindest people around. Joey (carrying beer above) really helped me enjoy the start of the convention, too.

Mur Lafferty and I were able to save the village corn from ravaging coyotes dire wolves during that archery-with-authors event. Not only is Mur an affable human being, but she’s a terror with a bow. I’ll try to avoid ending every sentence with “THIS PERSON MADE ME FEEL WELCOME,” but Mur definitely did. She still owes me a beer, which is important for me to remember because it’s like a free ticket to hang out with her again.

Dave Robison isn’t just a voice, but a force of nature. He dragged me into a live discussion on Periscope over the importance of maps in fantasy books and through that experience I met Patrick Tomlinson, who took his welcome to different extremes involving some very cuddly moments with my head. Dave’s inclusiveness is legendary – he just loves people, and he’s so perpetually positive that you might think his mustache is held in that smiling position by sheer joy.

This is quickly turning into a name-drop session, so forgive me for that, but Andrea Phillips and Diana Rowland sat and talked with me for a really long time about the struggles of writing and comparison with others. It came at the right moment (the peak of my jet-lagged exhaustion and end of my convention energy) and it meant a lot to me. Adventures in Rav4’s with Adam Rakunas and long discussions about the merits of Belgian chocolate with Greg van Ekhout made for equally high levels of warm-fuzzies.

Steve Drew and Tim Sharpe were rock stars. Long conversations at the bar or off to the side of the restaurant left me encouraged and with plenty through which to think. It makes sense that the driving force behind r/Fantasy would be warm, inclusive, and thought-provoking.

Howard Taylor gave me even more to think on with regards to Into the Nanten, Patreon, and Kickstarter, in a surprisingly in-depth discussion on the monetization of creative work (over which Andrea also kicked my butt). And M Todd Gallowglass gave me some great stretches of time and kind words to match, as did Stina Leicht, who is as kind as she is hilarious. Not to mention nerding out over Final Fantasy Tactics with Susan Dennard and a long self-pub discussion in the airport with Elise Kova.

There were plenty of other moments – like being included in the signing and selling a few books – which made for good memories. While there were some awkward patches or relatively invalidating moments (which were probably more in my head than real), the good times and these good people leveled the field for me. I’m sure I’ve forgotten to mention plenty but that doesn’t mean they weren’t great to me too.

TL;DR

What I took from the entire experience was that on a moment-by-moment basis, it costs so little to be kind and the results of those small investments can be powerful. Overall ConFusion was filled with good people and great moments. I watched a few corners turn exclusive but many others maintained a warm inclusiveness. I want to build on that and, wherever I end up in conventions in the future, I want to open circles to include more people in conversation.

Unless we’re saving the village corn, then it’s probably just up to Mur and I to get the job done.

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I Highly Recommend Taiwan – Go Visit

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

My trip to Taiwan marks my first entry into Asia, making it my fourth out of seven continents (according to my education in the USA). It’s highly westernized, with plenty of English both spoken and on signs of all kinds. This removes a level of adventure, but it makes it a really easy entry point into a completely different culture.

The food: Amazing

The people: Friendly and helpful

The weather: Meh

Stuff to do: Enough for a couple of weeks

Uber: Great everywhere except getting picked up at the airport (as you can see here):

Stinky Tofu: As stinky as advertised

Weirdness factors: Plenty in the harmless department to keep your silly foreign sense of humor entertained the entire time.

One of the best parts about entering another culture is seeing how differently things are done. Some of them cause you to laugh, others make you wonder why your own culture is so stupid. In the end it’s enlightening and fun.

I definitely want to go back and ,more importantly, want to go see more countries nearby. Thanks for the fun trip and stinky tofu, Taiwan!

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The Mighty Jay Swanson Blog Tour – 2016

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

It’s time to hit the road and see the sights.

I’ll be going on a two-week blog tour starting next week and would love it if you came along, poked your head in, and joined with comments as we go! There will be interviews and guest posts, along with some never-before-revealed secrets and maybe a joke or two.

I’ll post the links once they go live, but you can expect a post almost every day from December 28th – January 8th.

The Blog Tour Stops

12/28/2015 – Where the Story Comes First
12/29/2015 – Blog of author Jacey Holbrand
12/30/2015 – Straight from the Library
12/31/2015 – It’s Raining Books
1/1/2016 – The Snarkology
1/4/2016 – Archaeolibrarian – I dig good books!
1/5/2016 – Rogues Angels
1/5/2016 – Multiuniverses of Liza
1/6/2016 – Kit ‘N Kabookle
1/7/2016 – Queen of All She Reads
1/8/2016 – Romance That’s ‘Out Of This World’

Happy Touring!

(Batmobus found here)

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Into the Nanten – Thicker, Heavier, and Late to the Party

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

Two months ago I ordered a bunch of books for a signing at Auntie’s Bookstore in Spokane. At the time, my main concern was getting Shadows of the Highridge in time as it was brand new and as-yet unprinted. Little did I know that it would be Into the Nanten that would never arrive.

As you may have seen, I’ve had issues with shipping books recently, but this time it wasn’t the Post Office swapping books for expired prison food (oh yeah, thanks to Reddit I discovered that those brands are all only available through the corrections system). Instead, my printer not only never shipped my order of Into the Nanten, they never printed it.

But I hadn’t figured that out yet. I chalked it up to bad timing, lost ink, unicorns in the printers; I had no clue, but I was off traveling again before I could give it a second thought. Then the books just never showed up. A couple of weeks went by and I finally emailed them to ask where those copies of Into the Nanten that I’d been waiting for were. Their response was essentially “Quality control found something and decided it wasn’t printable.”

I responded “I’ve sold dozens of these as they were, what on earth was wrong?” All I got back was an ambiguous, “Whatever it was, while it may not have been a problem yet, they figured it would be in the future.”

Not. Helpful. The ‘requested’ change was that we up the paper weight from 50lb to 70. I did some math with their spine-calculator and gaped. The original version of Into the Nanten was 1.3 inches thick – the new version would be 1.8 inches(!!!).

It took some effort, and I had to redesign the cover to accomodate the sudden weight-gain, but yesterday, two months and one day later, I received my order, which means you can buy it again! For those of you who already have, I put your copies in with FedEx this morning to make up for the delay.

Auntie’s has also restocked with fresh copies, so if you’d like to own this tome of a book you can walk in and grab one today. If you’re not in Spokane, drop by my store and I’ll sign one and ship it to you.

The books do look great, even if they’re a bit thicker. The covers printed with a warmer tone, as did the interior (a slight difference, but the result is that the illustrations appear slightly richer – a nice surprise). The weight of the paper definitely helps the pages feel hardier, and I think that has a direct impact on the appearance as you can’t see hints of the other side of the page so easily.

It will also make up an extra half-inch of difference should you need to level any table legs. It’s thick enough to be a table on its own now. And don’t forget your copy of Shadows of the Highridge or Dark Horse while you’re there – Shadows being mandatory reading as it’s a spinoff of Into the Nanten, featuring our favorite man of mystery: Brin Salisir.

Happy reading!

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The Worst Unboxing Ever – Vlog

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

I never thought I’d have an unboxing that I could describe as the worst unboxing ever.

It was just over a month ago that I found out I was losing my job – that mysterious job that took me all over the country that I never really disclosed in full detail. Anyways. I basically live out of a suitcase, but I’d accrued a few things along the way, including a number of books, prints, etc. for the inventory of my online store.

Not wanting to abandon said swag, and not wanting to lug it around France with me, I opted to ship most of it back to Washington State, where I would head as soon as I returned from Paris. I put together three boxes of books and shipped them all via USPS Media Mail – the most amazingly cheap way to send books domestically – and didn’t think anything of it after that.

I shipped these on November 17th.

Two of the boxes arrived that week, but I’d shipped a few other things and lost track of the total box count in the midst of my travels. Fast forward to Friday, December 4th, and one more box arrived. It seemed odd that it should come so late, and something seemed… off. I opened it up, took a step back, and asked out loud “Is this a joke?”

Perhaps there are worse out there, but here’s my contender for

The Worst Unboxing Ever:

 

Needless to say, what I found shocked me. I double-checked, then tripple-checked the box. I had never seen anything that was inside – not the items themselves, not even the brands they bore (with the exception of Little Debbie, but let’s be honest, we would expect Little Debbie to be in a box like this). The pies got smushed, spilled out a little, and left everything sticky-sweet. Gross.

What didn’t make it into the video, because I discovered it in the midst of cleaning up, was that the bag of powdered sugar was unsealed. It just got freakier with time. I’m also fairly composed in the video, but this weirded me out pretty significantly at first, and I didn’t go through all of it until I was on camera because IT WAS SO FLIPPING WEIRD.

If anyone recognizes the brands, I’m too creeped out to google them. Seriously, it felt like the kind of stuff you’d find in the last convenience store before the serial killer’s cabin in the woods. Didn’t help it was all old and expired.

What’s Missing (x30)

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Buy Shadows of the Highridge

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So to whomever has my 30ish copies of Shadows of the Highridge out there, I really hope you distribute them to some book lovers and don’t cover them in Little Debbie pie goo. To celebrate your achievement, you sneaky sticky bastard, I’m going to give everyone 10% off in my store for the next two weeks.

Just put in the code BOOKTHIEF at checkout. Expires as soon as Santa lands on your house (and ships as soon as my inventory is restored).

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My First Signing – Shadows of the Highridge

Written by the illustrious Jay Swanson

Vandalizing Books Since 2011

While I’ve signed books before, I’ve never been invited to do so by an establishment that I hadn’t broken into. Until now. My first signing happened at Auntie’s Bookstore this weekend, and we had a blast. The preparation that went into this was similar to the conventions that I’ve done, just with stress of a different variety.

What I don’t go into in the vlog below is how everything that could go wrong effectively did, and still, somehow, it all came together.

The artwork you see hanging behind me (albeit briefly) was, as of last Tuesday, still in Minneapolis. Missing. It took a series of phone calls over two days to find it – the hotel I’d left it with never got it on the FedEx truck as promised. Once they found it, they expected me to arrange pickup remotely (and if you’ve ever arranged pickup remotely, for something you’ve already printed labels for but that they have no record of, you can imagine how much fun this was).

My printer also informed me they were uncertain the books I’d ordered for the signing would make it on time.

And then I found out I’d never actually purchased tickets to fly to Spokane in the first place.

Thankfully it all turned out splendidly:

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Buy Shadows of the Highridge

To top it all off, a fantastic review by Timothy Ward came out the same day on Shadows of the Highridge.

I sold 20 books (sadly I didn’t have copies of Into the Nanten on hand, otherwise that would have been a bigger number), signed up a bunch of people for my newsletter, and had some really good conversations. All in all it was a great first signing – I would love to do it again.

A huge thank you to Auntie’s for inviting me, to my parents for receiving the mountains of books that arrived and transporting them downtown, and to my sister for taking footage the whole time (which will show up in something later). Thank you to everyone who came down, said ‘hi,’ and bought books!

For the rest of you, don’t worry, you can pre-order Shadows of the Highridge off Amazon right now (and will be able to buy it off my site here soon too).

After you read it, if you’d leave reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, it would do a world of good. Stay tuned for more good stuff!

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