Book Musings
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Sunday, April 6th, 2008Went to Chicago for a talk at Northwestern in the Chicago area for the Taiwanese students confeence, so (like a diligent little author) I went around to all these Chicago bookstores to sign stock. There were only two of eight copies left at the Evanston Barnes and Noble. And then I discovered something surprising. Apparently, The Fortune Cookie […]
Lessons from TV
Saturday, April 5th, 2008This is what I have learned over the last few weeks re television/video appearances. You do not dress for television the way you would dress in real life (or at least I don’t). For women, wear bright (but not too bright) solid colored tops: Royal blue, wine, maroon, emerald green. Pastels can be good (but […]
OC Register: confronted by a wall of me-ness
Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008Richard Chang brought me physical copies of the paper where his Q&A with me ran. I have to say, I was kind of overwhelmed with the amount of me that was on that page. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a picture of myself that large before.
The Underground Onepot Dinner in Seattle with Fold-Pak menus!
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008The underground dinner in Seattle via Onepot.org was held in this discrete loft entertainment space in a semi-industrial area in Seattle. Yay Michael Hebberoy for organizing and Jerry Traunfeld + Xuan Che for cooking, and Jerry’s partner, Steven (sp?), for designing the adorable menus with the Fold-Pak motif!
It was snowing in Seattle…in March
Tuesday, April 1st, 2008My plane to Seattle from Los Angeles was delayed because of snow (?!). Talk about climate shock.
The butt-to-seat ratio, the key to readings
Monday, March 31st, 2008I’ve discovered at my events that it’s really not about the absolute number of people who show up (though that’s important), but more, it’s about the butt-to-seat ratio in the room. See above at Skylight Bookstore in Los Angeles. There were probably only 30 seats, but then a lot of people showed up from hearing […]
Libraries versus publishers…how business models change
Monday, March 31st, 2008When I spoke at the San Francisco Public Library, the woman who arranged the event (Joan) mentioned that the book had been very popular in the Bay Area. They had ordered about 40 copies of my book and all of them were out. Plus there were 71 holds (i.e. a waiting list) on those copies, […]
Fortune cookies find their way back to Japan (and Mexico and Iraq)
Monday, March 31st, 2008Tomoko, who played an important role in the Japan section of the book (and the wardrobe advice for the book launch) sent me this email today: yesterday, as i was headed out of office, i noticed one of my colleagues had a bright orange book in her bag. i thought to myself, ‘wow, that […]
Fortune cookies are not a “food’ (according to our federal government
Monday, March 31st, 2008Fortune cookies are not necessarily food, at least, according to the federal government The Nixon Library made these adorable custom-made fortune cookies to promote my talk on Saturday (above). But the library is part of the National Archives which is part of the federal government which is not allowed to give out “food†as presents […]
Fortune Cookies, the Hollywood version…
Monday, March 31st, 2008Since I was in Los Angeles, I met up Hollywood folks who are interested in optioning The Fortune Cookie Chronicles for a television series about Chinese food. Optioning of course, is a looooong way from anything ever happening. I’ve had other things optioned (Man Date), so know that there are many ways for projects to […]
Signing books in book stores…a humbling (and encouraging) experience
Friday, March 28th, 2008So during our downtime in San Francisco, I ran around to local bookstores with Naomi Epel “signing stock” as they say in industry parlance, which means that you sashay into stores and say you are an author and you want to sign your books. Very proactive authors do this (I should really do this in […]
I’m sooooo tired, but I can’t sleep
Friday, March 28th, 2008This is the first day in many days that I did not have to get up at some time for an interview or an event or something. I got up at 5:30 a.m. for a 7:45 flight at SFO. But even though I went to bed at 2:30 a.m. because I was up thinking about […]
Alcohol makes people buy books…the San Francisco launch party
Friday, March 28th, 2008On Wednesday night we had an amazing book event in San Francisco, spearheaded by Dave Lu of Fanpop (and aided with Jimmy, Ben, Lydia and James). It was 150+ people at Swig Bar on Geary Street, and it was a new promising model for a book event.
Escorts, Drivers, and Literary Chaperones
Thursday, March 27th, 2008So when authors go on book tour, they plug with this whole network of people who drive the authors from event to interview to hotel to bookstore to FedEx/Kinkos. Each city has a handful of such people, and in San Francisco I was hosted by the inimitable Naomi Epel, who has been doing it for […]
Kids and Fortune Cookie Chronicles in front of Barnes and Noble
Thursday, March 27th, 2008My friend Kelly sent me this photo of her kids with my book on display at Barnes and Nobles.
Fortune Cookie Chronicles in Hawaii
Wednesday, March 26th, 2008A friend sent me a photo of her 90-year-old dad reading The Fortune Cookie Chronicles galley while on vacation in Hawaii.
Random people actually read the book…which still continues to surprise me
Monday, March 24th, 2008So I was at R&G Lounge in San Francisco Chinatown for a low-key alumni event when these people from another table actually recognized me because they had read my book. They weren’t even Chinese American or my age. It was a father and teenage son pair, genetically Indian, from Brownsville, Texas. (That’s like essentially Mexico). […]
Third printing!
Monday, March 24th, 2008Due to strong re-orders from bookstores and (hopefully) continued media attention, the publishers just ordered a third printing. Yay. Whew.
#26 on 3/30/08
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008Yay. The Fortune Cookie Chronicles hits the New York Times extended bestseller list at #26 on the March 30 issue (which is up today). Because of the way the list operates, that represents the second week of sales, or the week closing on March 15 (my birthday). As my friend pointed out, 2 + 6 […]
General (Tso’s?) Sushi? A reader responds
Saturday, March 22nd, 2008Getting reader emails like these is in part why authors write — to know they have changed how someone looks at the world. The line about whether the General of the sushi is the one of chicken fame or not made me burst out laughing. After reading your book, I have to say; I’ll never […]
Politics and Prose, Kosher Chinese Food and Standing Room Only
Monday, March 17th, 2008This is one half of the audience at my Politics & Prose event at Sixth and I Synagogue which is in Chinatown. (It was like the perfect convergence of my book: literary, Jews, Chinatown). The other half of the audience is at the right, past the laptop. It was about 150+ people, standing room only. […]
Fortune Cookie Chronicles E-card
Monday, March 17th, 2008My publisher designed an e-card!
How to minimize reading at “readings”
Sunday, March 16th, 2008I’m running around trying to pack and get all the logistics together before goig o tour. (The itinerary roughly goes Washington –> Philly –> Boston –> San Francisco/Bay Area –> Los Angeles –>Seattle). I have packed for two weeks at a time while doing research for my book. Packing for two weeks if no one […]
It’s my birthday and all I want to do is sleep
Saturday, March 15th, 2008I have a one day respite between New York City publicity (which happens to be my birthday). Dinner tonight with my closest friends and then book tour starts tomorrow. It goes Washington –> Philly –> Boston –> San Francisco –> Los Angeles –> Seattle –> (Home in NYC for a few days) –> Chicago. Put […]
Now 40% off on Amazon
Wednesday, March 12th, 2008Not sure why, but Amazon just upped the discount on The Fortune Cookie Chronicles from 34% to 40%.
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