It's great to see and hear people talking about Sand in My Bra.
Susan called yesterday to let me know that the Chronicle ran a review of it and A Woman’s World in the Datebook section.
Two women discover Zen of globe-trotting
While I don’t agree with the author’s premise about the way men and women travel differently, it is still great to get the exposure. Really great. Larry said that more than 20 people (that they didn’t know) came up to the booth at the North Beach Festival and told them about the review. After five mentions TT went and bought their own copy and had it out on the table. Guess what? Lookyloos picked it up, read it, and ended up buying the book.
TT sold 32 copies at the festival yesterday. It was the leading seller of the 240 books they sold total. Second place was Italy with 22 copies. Larry expects to sell out of Sand completely today because they only have 22 left.
Sand was also reviewed by David Armstrong in the Travel section of the Chronicle last week.
It just goes to show you how taste differs. Armstrong thought that Ellen Degeneres’s story was a clunker, but that’s probably the story that I get the most feedback on from the general public. All I’ve heard is that they love it. Even funnier is that while Armstrong commented on how regurgetated Ellen’s story was, he didn’t mention that his favorite, Anne Lamott’s “The Aunties” was also recycled.
All in all, I’m just thankful that the book is getting attention. Not every TT book does, and bias aside, this one is worthy of it. Any PR is good PR. Now if only it were racey enough to get us on a banned book list, then we’d really have a coup!
It just goes to show how subjective taste is, especially in regards to humour. The only TT book I have (so far) is Not So Funny When It Happened. Some I found hilarious, some didn’t strike me as even remotely humorous. But you remember the funnny ones and forget the unfunny ones.
Oh yeah, and Tim Cahill edited it, but let the TT people choose which one of his stories would go in. He expreseed his surprise at which one they chose, since he didn’t think of it as all that great of a piece.
HB, this is the nature of anthologies and I’ve learned to expect reviews of mixed report. It is also the beauty of reading a collection. If one of the stories doesn’t suit your taste or your mood, it’s easy to just skip it and move on to the next one. I liked your point about remembering the ones you liked and forgetting the ones you didn’t.