The New Book Tour and the Calendar

It has reached that time when details of book tours and public appearances are beginning to come together, and as they do, I’ll be feeding them into the Calendar section of the site from now on.

In the meantime, however, in order to bring the Calendar Section to your attention (it has remained pretty much unused since this time last year, I’m afraid,) I think it might be a good idea for me to outline the schedule in general terms, just as it’s beginning to come together, because this year’s schedule looks to be shaping up quite differently from former years. There was a time, back about ten years ago, when I would simply hop on a plane and fly off to some major center, where I would visit book stores and sign books, do public readings, and generally take pot luck on whatever media coverage might happen to be available at that time in each place.

The growth of the ‘Net has changed all that, and most particularly so within the past couple of years. Now the entire Media Section of the publicity and promotional book tour is a different creature, with new eZines, websites, electronic newsletters and blogs appearing every day. The emphasis of the so-called "tour" has shifted accordingly, too, almost to the point where more media interviews are done on line and over the phone than ever before, and that has both good points and not-so-good ones. On-line interviews, for instance, can be lengthy because they are not restricted by the limitations of print space, but all too often they leave the interviewer (and the reader) with no feeling for the nuances of what’s being said, because the subtleties of body language and facial expression simply aren’t there in an on-line situation. The same goes for TV and Radio interviews: the benefits of a face-to-face conversation with a live interviewer are hard to beat. This fall, however, I’ll be running the whole gamut: live interviews, phone-ins, on-line interviews and Q&A sessions, plus personal appearances in selected towns and cities across Canada, for both readings and signings, and a variety of appearances at Literary Festivals and Conferences. I will publish as much information on each of these engagements as I can, as soon as I receive it from the various publicists in the US and Canada. It will all be within the Calendar section, and it will include places, times and venues.

Here’s a thumbnail view of what will be forthcoming (and bear in mind, please, that the details are only starting to come together.)

The book will be released in Canada by Viking Press on August 1^st, and in the USA by Putnam on August 3^rd, but I won’t officially begin touring until some time in September, when all my activities will be more or less local to British Columbia, and the cross-country tour will be in October. There are no plans at this time to send me on tour in the USA.
 

From August 4^th through August 6^th, I’ll be at the Sunshine Coast Writers Festival in Sechelt, BC, reading and doing the normal Festival things.

September, I’ll be staying home much of the time and doing whatever they ask me to do in the way of media interviews, Internet features and on-line interviews from all over North America and perhaps even farther afield. But I’ll also be touring locally within British Columbia and I’ll be visiting Vancouver and its environs in the Lower Mainland, as well as Vancouver Island.

From October 13^th through 15^th, I’ll be in Calgary, Alberta, at the Literary Festival there, and I’ll also be in Edmonton, Alberta around the same time. Details to follow.

On October 20th through 22nd, I’ll be appearing, as usual, at my annual favorite, the Surrey writers Conference in Surrey, BC, and at the end of the following week, on October 28^th I’ll be appearing at the Stratford Writers’ Festival in Stratford, Ontario. From then on, through November 5^th or 6^th, I’ll be in Toronto and touring in Southern Ontario, after which I’ll be appearing somewhere in Ottawa . . . the details of that mini-tour will soon start falling into place.

Some of these details should already be in the Calendar by the time you check there; the rest will follow shortly, as the events, times and locations are finalized.

More to follow.