The whole story

I didn’t know if it would be worth it to go all the way to New York to spend just one night and travel back the next day but it definitely was. Too bad we weren’t able to be there for the whole weekend. We did make it to the huge signing where we got a chance to talk to William Gagliani who was nominated for first novel. He does lots and reviews and just completed one on 100 Jolts so it was cool to meet him and thank him. We also met J.M. Heluk (we published her story in Sick) for the first time along with her fiancee Pablo. They were great to hang out with!

Perhaps our most shining moment was when Tom Monteleone came up to John to thank him for sending his chapbook and to tell us how much he liked 100 Jolts. He said that we are doing things right and his advice was just to keep going and putting out more titles. That was so great to hear from someone who has been in publishing and been getting published for so long. People keep telling us Monteleone is a bit of a curmudgeon and hard to impress but he sure liked Jolts!

We attended the Q&A session moderated by Matt Schwartz from Shocklines where several editors answered questions about publishing. We picked up a few tips and it was definitely interesting to hear people from so many different facets of publishing talk about what they do. Paul Miller from Earthling was the closest to our operation and had a lot of interesting things to say. He was given the award for excellence in small press publishing.

Another person who I always love to see is poet Linda Addison because she truly inspires me. She’s a strong woman in body and spirit with a great sense of style, fun-loving and generous. I’m always looking for characters like that in books and movies but if there were more woman out there like her I know that wouldn’t be necessary. She makes it look so easy but I’m betting that a lot of determination and sheer willpower has gotten her where she is today. It was also cool to spend a little time with her husband Gerard Houarner since we haven’t talked to him as much.

At the post-award party we finally got a chance to meet nihilistic_kid and had a good chat. Picked up a copy of Move Under Ground from him which I started reading on the bus trip back.

As usual it was great to hang out with Mike and his wife Renate.

current mood: rejuvenated