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Lurking Musings

~ Musings of a newly published writer

Lurking Musings

Tag Archives: #MAEG2016

#MAEG2016 – the Manchester author signing event and gig.

14 Sunday Aug 2016

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings, Publicity

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

#MAEG2016, Elizabeth Morgan, Manchester, Ninfa Hayes, R.A Smith, Samantha Harrington, Scarlett Flame, Signing events, The Tea Society


So, yesterday was an event I had been planning and preparing for since quite early in the year – the Manchester Author signing event and gig, officially shortened to #MAEG2016 for the benefit of Twitter users.IMG_4759

It was an early start. I was up at 6 so that I could be at the train station to meet Elizabeth Morgan in time for us both to travel to the site of the event – which was a mining museum near Astley on the outskirts of the city. Things were not helped by the fact I had been persuaded by Samantha Harrington the night before to go to a hotel near the site to meet some of the attendees and have a drink… *. Regardless of that, the meet up at the station went without a hitch and we quickly made our way to the venue, learning on the way exactly how much more expensive train station taxis are compared to pre booked ones.

The event organiser, who writes under the name Scarlett Flame, had spent a lot of the week building up to the event setting up a marquee, a beer tent and Portaloo toilets in the grounds of the museum. By the time Elizabeth and I arrived the place was bustling with people setting up their stalls. We claimed a table and started getting everything ready for the day ahead.

IMG_4776

The Mining Museum

We had lots of conversations with people who came by the stall. Many were interested in what the ‘Tea Society’ was and what it meant. Many of the attendees there were acting as an individual – all the books on their stall had been written by them – however we were there representing not only our own work but those of the other members of the group too which did seem to cause some confusion. I do sometimes wonder if they believe the ‘other authors’ are actually our pseudonyms.** There was a lot of interest in various of the books on the table and many of the bookmarks and cards were taken. We gave out almost all of the swag packs that Elizabeth had prepared and made a couple of sales between us. All in all, about as successful as many similar events I have attended with the promise that future ones will be even better. There was a solid group of people involved in this, both the organisers and the attendees, and a lot of good camaraderie and mutual support going on throughout the day.

 

We were asked to sign a variety of weird and wonderful things. Many of the authors there

IMG_4768

One of the other authors gets video interviewed

seemed to have an autograph book that got passed around by various of the assistants for us to sign and some asked us to sign things like blank canvases,  T-shirts and canvas tote bags. One or two of these items ended up as prizes in one of the many raffles that were going on but many seemed to have them mainly as a memento of the day. We also ended up on video twice over the course of the afternoon. Once by a blogger who was looking to collect footage of authors promoting their books (my contribution was horribly garbled, I hate being on video) and later by Samantha Harrington who was doing a live feed from Facebook of her walking around the site. We get about 5 seconds of fame in that – a brief hello and a wave after she got distracted by corsetry. I will check permissions and share both of these when they are available.

 

IMG_4836.jpgThe signing bit of the day ended at 5 and once we had packed up all our stock and cleared the marquee of tables, we went and got some food from the BBQ while the stage was set up for the gig. Unfortunately, due to the vagaries of public transport meaning we had to leave before 9 we only managed to catch one of the acts that were lined up to perform but did enjoy that a lot – she had a good singing voice and played well.

By the time I got home it was late and I was exhausted from pulling the suitcase full of books but I had a sense of having had a good and productive day.

 

*Which led to a great night out and the chance to meet some of the readers who were there to get books signed. Fun was had discussing everything from Wales to the current economic situation, but did mean I did not get to bed until near 1am.

**Something which will be easily disproved at the upcoming Sandbach Author event in November as that is looking like an event pretty much all the Tea Society is going to so we can all be seen in the same room at the same time with no need to slip off to the toilets to put wigs and false moustaches on – the Ninfa wig really itches too. Only one who cannot make it is R.A Smith. Having trouble finding an actor skilled enough to play him :).

Gods of the Deep

20 Wednesday Jul 2016

Posted by D.A Lascelles in Musings, Productivity, Publicity

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Tags

#MAEG2016, EasterCon, Friday 13th, Gods of the Deep, gods of the sea, GRR Martin, JF Holland, Kindle, Lauren C Waterworth, Paperback book, Pirates, Steampunk fair, swashbucklers, writing


Well, it has been a long time coming. It seems like I have been talking about a sequel to Gods of the Sea ever since the Pirates and Swashbucklers anthology first came out all those years ago. In fact, it was quite ominously Friday 13th April 2012 when I reported to you all that I had got an email from the publisher of Pirates and Swashbucklers asking me to do a sequel.

And now, four years and approximately three months later… you can buy the completed book in both Kindle and paperback formats. gods of the deep postcard

Ok, I admit I was slow in getting this done but this project has gone further than I imagined it would. Plus I think I can still claim a faster turnaround than GRR Martin at the moment. What started as an idea for a  relatively  small novella turned into a much longer work and now includes two bonus short stories that explore the wider world in addition to a newly edited and tidied up version of Gods of the Sea which now serves as what I describe in the foreword as being similar to that scene in a Bond film just before the theme music plays.

And that is not the only thing that is special about this release. In addition to the wonderful cover produced by fellow Steampunk market trader and artist supreme, Lauren C Waterworth, you also have internal illustrations derived from the sketches that she made when creating the cover to coo over. If you like the cover, by the way, you should totally check out her facebook page and see if you can buy prints of her artwork. .

The official launch will be taking place at the Manchester Author event on the 13th August 2016. You can buy tickets for this event here. There I will be signing copies of both Gods of the Deep and Lurking Miscellany. I am also attending another signing event in Sandbach in November and Chester in April 2017. Finally I am also an attendee at Inominate, the Birmingham run Eastercon in April next year where I am hoping to be on some panels again. If you see me at any of these events feel free to pop over and say hi. Also, if you want to pre-order a signed copy of any of my books you can order them using this handy form and they can be delivered to you at the event of your choice.

You can also expect to see me sneaking into some other peoples’ blogs and messing around in there, getting mud on all the furnishings. I’ll post links to these as they go up. In fact there is one here for the Addicted to Reviews blog which went up earlier today. Go check it out and give the owner some love.

Finally, I am staging a stealth raid on the Manchester Author event Facebook page this Thursday (21st June). I will be taking control of the mic around 1030 GMT and holding onto it like grim death until it is wrested from my cold dead hands at 11pm by JF Holland. Come to the page to check out what nonsense I will spout. If it is anything like my last page takeover, expect some musical links to my books and some extracts… If you are lucky there may even be dog photos.

Don’t forget… buy your copies of Gods of the Deep as soon as you can!

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