A Launch, a Load of Self-Promotion, and a Hedgehog

Yes, it's been a week and a half, and I completely forgot to update my blog concerning the outcome of my book launch, which is doubly bad because I have this URL listed in the front of the book as my website and I hate the thought of people thinking, "oooh, blog" and then finding it stagnant.  Not that they would, necessarily, be thinking, "oooh, blog" but they might, and I would hate for them to be disappointed.  


In any case, the launch went very well.  There was a steady stream of people, and by the end my face hurt from smiling, so I think that would generally indicate success.  Afterwards I went home to collapse on the couch with Kezia while we consumed pizza and Strongbow and watched An Education (great film by the way, based on a memoir) and had a lovely evening.  Since then I've been wrestling with the beast known as Self-Promotion, which does not come naturally at all.  I've known people who were simply genius at it, but I am not one of them.  In a way, the online promotion part is easier.  Those people don't know you.  And Very Old Friends, who've watched you slave over the novels for years and even perhaps read manuscripts...those aren't bad either.  It's the hometown promotion that's the hardest, I find.  Suddenly you're approaching people who, though they don't really know you, per se, have seen you about town and known of you since you were a midget.  I can assure you, I was thoroughly unimpressive as a midget.  Yes, I had fabulous adventures in my head, but who was to know?  I certainly didn't tell them.  Cancer threw me a little more into the public eye, but who wants to be known for being disease-ridden?  Anyway, approaching people who know you in the aforementioned vague way, and saying, essentially, "Hi, I've written a book.  Please buy it," can feel rather odd.  However, I have been gritting my teeth and getting it done, though generally in a less blunt fashion.  The online promotion has slowly been coming along as well, though it's a lot to learn.  There is, in the end, so much that could be done for promotion, with all the resources available, that I find I have to make myself stop, to set it aside and go back to the writing.  After all, the writing is what really counts.  Without it, there would be nothing to promote, not to mention that without it I would turn into a sodden mass.  We write for the same reason we breathe: because without it we would not survive.  Numbers and sales seem petty things then.


I have acquired a new friend recently.  His name is Ferdinand, or Ferdy for short, and he is an African Pygmy Hedgehog, an anniversary gift from my husband.