User Tag List

+ Reply to Thread
Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 10 of 19

Thread: Signed Books and Book Signings

  1. #1
    Points: 74,611, Level: 66
    Level completed: 64%, Points required for next Level: 839
    Overall activity: 39.0%
    Achievements:
    50000 Experience PointsSocialVeteran
    Standing Wolf's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    314971
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Posts
    25,616
    Points
    74,611
    Level
    66
    Thanks Given
    5,717
    Thanked 21,088x in 12,283 Posts
    Mentioned
    415 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)

    Signed Books and Book Signings

    One of the advantages of living in or near a larger city is that authors come through regularly on book-signing tours. There are several independent bookstores in the Phoenix area that host such appearances on a regular basis, and meeting authors, getting to know some of the ones who come through frequently, and of course reading and collecting the books has become a major source of enjoyment for me these days.

    Our mystery-centric bookstore in Scottsdale, The Poisoned Pen, is one of the best places to hang out and meet authors. The owner is a former archivist for the Library of Congress, a publisher, and a personal friend of many of the authors, so they rarely skip Scottsdale on their tours.

    Among the writers whom I’ve met there are the late Robert B. Parker (‘Spenser’, ‘Jesse Stone’), Andrew Vachss (the ‘Burke’ series), Lee Child (‘Jack Reacher’), Kathy Reichs (‘Bones’), Craig Johnson (‘Longmire’), the late James Crumley, Earl Emerson, Ed Kovacs, Clive Cussler, Laurie King, Joe R. Lansdale and Jeffrey Deaver. I tend to gravitate more toward the “hardboiled” detective stories, but one author of the lighter variety - the “cozies”, as they’re called – named Betty Webb has written a series of books called the Gunn Zoo Mysteries (beginning with ‘The Anteater of Death’) and I feel obligated to buy and read them (and get them signed, of course) because Betty named the heroine of her books after my wife.

    A general interest bookstore, with a couple of locations here in the Valley of the Sun, is called Changing Hands, and they also frequently host author signings. Last week I met Ila Borders, she of Independent Baseball pitching fame, there and got her to sign her just-released autobiography and a baseball. A few years ago, I met Matt McCarthy, the Yale pitcher who wrote the controversial minor league expose ‘Odd Man Out’ at the same store.

    Others I’ve met at Changing Hands are former U.S. Attorney David Iglesias, Anne Rice, Linda Ronstadt and Ozzie Osborne. (That last autographed book was a gift for my sister, who was a big fan of his reality show. The Ozzie signing brought out a very…interesting crowd; that was the longest I’ve ever stood in line to get anyone’s autograph.)

    One of the first author signings I attended after moving here in 1993 was at the now-defunct Brentano’s, where I met Leslie Nielson. Some years later I was privileged to see Charlton Heston at that same store, which is a story in itself. I think it was at a Barnes & Noble store that I met and spoke with U.F.O abductee Travis Walton; he signed his book for me of course, and my VHS copy of Fire in the Sky. Travis was the second U.F.O. abductee I’ve met, having seen Whitley Strieber at a signing some years ago in California. (I also have a rare signed copy of a book by ‘50s U.F.O. abductee and famous oddball George Adamski, which I discovered in a second-hand bookshop many years after his death.)

    That is far from being the only signed book that has come into my possession second-hand, as it were. One of my favorite poets is the late William Stafford, and one of my favorite poems is his ‘Traveling Through the Dark’. For my birthday one year, my sister sent me a signed copy of his poetry collection of the same name…and apologized because it wasn’t a first edition. In a second-hand bookshop in San Jose in the ‘80s, I found a copy of The New Testament: An American Translation by Edgar J. Goodspeed, which was popular in the ‘20s, signed by Professor Goodspeed. (It’s not every day you come across an autographed Bible.) It was also about that time that I attended an author’s symposium at the San Jose Public Library and met fellow Indiana-expat Jessamyn West and Harlan Ellison. (Louis L’Amour was there, too, but the signing line for him was out the door and around the block.)
    Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” - Robert E. Howard

    "Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas and not eat a chicken fried steak." - Larry McMurtry

  2. The Following User Says Thank You to Standing Wolf For This Useful Post:

    MisterVeritis (03-17-2017)

  3. #2

    tPF Moderator
    Points: 473,135, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 69.0%
    Achievements:
    Social50000 Experience PointsTagger First ClassYour first GroupVeteranRecommendation First ClassOverdrive
    Awards:
    Master Tagger
    DGUtley's Avatar tPF Moderator
    Karma
    200769
    Join Date
    Jul 2016
    Location
    Northeast Ohio
    Posts
    52,922
    Points
    473,135
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    17,060
    Thanked 46,039x in 24,874 Posts
    Mentioned
    886 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Thanks for sharing. I have no signed books. I have plenty of unsigned books, generally history books. I do have John Wayne's autograph and will have it framed and hang it in my office one day over the fire place once I get the appropriate picture I like to frame it with.

    Attachment 17518
    Any time you give a man something he doesn't earn, you cheapen him. Our kids earn what they get, and that includes respect. -- Woody Hayes​

  4. #3
    Points: 74,611, Level: 66
    Level completed: 64%, Points required for next Level: 839
    Overall activity: 39.0%
    Achievements:
    50000 Experience PointsSocialVeteran
    Standing Wolf's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    314971
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Posts
    25,616
    Points
    74,611
    Level
    66
    Thanks Given
    5,717
    Thanked 21,088x in 12,283 Posts
    Mentioned
    415 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    Wayne's heirs put a huge collection of the Duke's personal things up for auction a year or two ago. The catalog was mind-blowing - memorabilia from all of his films and one-of-a-kind personal items. Hard to pick, but if I had to do it, I'd probably go with one of his cowboy hats, or maybe the beret he wore in The Green Berets.
    Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” - Robert E. Howard

    "Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas and not eat a chicken fried steak." - Larry McMurtry

  5. The Following User Says Thank You to Standing Wolf For This Useful Post:

    DGUtley (03-17-2017)

  6. #4
    Points: 74,611, Level: 66
    Level completed: 64%, Points required for next Level: 839
    Overall activity: 39.0%
    Achievements:
    50000 Experience PointsSocialVeteran
    Standing Wolf's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    314971
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Posts
    25,616
    Points
    74,611
    Level
    66
    Thanks Given
    5,717
    Thanked 21,088x in 12,283 Posts
    Mentioned
    415 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    By the way, was that photo taken before you'd actually moved into your house, or are you just one of those minimalist décor kind of guys?
    Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” - Robert E. Howard

    "Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas and not eat a chicken fried steak." - Larry McMurtry

  7. #5

    tPF Moderator
    Points: 473,135, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 69.0%
    Achievements:
    Social50000 Experience PointsTagger First ClassYour first GroupVeteranRecommendation First ClassOverdrive
    Awards:
    Master Tagger
    DGUtley's Avatar tPF Moderator
    Karma
    200769
    Join Date
    Jul 2016
    Location
    Northeast Ohio
    Posts
    52,922
    Points
    473,135
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    17,060
    Thanked 46,039x in 24,874 Posts
    Mentioned
    886 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Standing Wolf View Post
    Wayne's heirs put a huge collection of the Duke's personal things up for auction a year or two ago. The catalog was mind-blowing - memorabilia from all of his films and one-of-a-kind personal items. Hard to pick, but if I had to do it, I'd probably go with one of his cowboy hats, or maybe the beret he wore in The Green Berets.
    I'd like to find a picture of a courtroom scene or something like that. Maybe something from Liberty Valance or something.
    Any time you give a man something he doesn't earn, you cheapen him. Our kids earn what they get, and that includes respect. -- Woody Hayes​

  8. #6
    Original Ranter
    Points: 859,042, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 90.0%
    Achievements:
    SocialCreated Album picturesOverdrive50000 Experience PointsVeteran
    Awards:
    Posting Award
    Peter1469's Avatar Advisor
    Karma
    496570
    Join Date
    Jun 2011
    Location
    NOVA
    Posts
    241,693
    Points
    859,042
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    153,218
    Thanked 147,580x in 94,412 Posts
    Mentioned
    2552 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    I got a book by Michio Kaku autographed. At the Air and Space Museum here in DC.
    ΜOΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ


  9. #7
    Points: 74,611, Level: 66
    Level completed: 64%, Points required for next Level: 839
    Overall activity: 39.0%
    Achievements:
    50000 Experience PointsSocialVeteran
    Standing Wolf's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    314971
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Posts
    25,616
    Points
    74,611
    Level
    66
    Thanks Given
    5,717
    Thanked 21,088x in 12,283 Posts
    Mentioned
    415 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Peter1469 View Post
    I got a book by Michio Kaku autographed. At the Air and Space Museum here in DC.
    Oh, yeah...the guy from the TurboTax commercial!

    I've wanted to visit that museum for a long time. I did see some wonderful things at the Air and Space Museum in San Diego, but many of the historic aircraft they have there are mockups and replicas, and I'm sure the D.C. museum has probably got most of the originals. A traveling Smithsonian exhibition came through Phoenix 10-15 years ago and they had a Mercury capsule - I seem to recall it was Glenn's Friendship 7. (Also one of Lincoln's stovepipe hats, George Washington's cavalry sword and the little table they used at Appomattox Courthouse to sign the terms of surrender on.) When I was stationed in Memphis in the early '80s, my oldest son, then about eight, and I drove up to the Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville. They had a Saturn V rocket, all 365 feet of it, laid out on the ground, and we got to see Miss Baker, the space-going squirrel monkey, sitting calmly in her enclosure eating a banana and watching the tourists.
    Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” - Robert E. Howard

    "Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas and not eat a chicken fried steak." - Larry McMurtry

  10. The Following User Says Thank You to Standing Wolf For This Useful Post:

    Peter1469 (03-17-2017)

  11. #8

    tPF Moderator
    Points: 473,135, Level: 100
    Level completed: 0%, Points required for next Level: 0
    Overall activity: 69.0%
    Achievements:
    Social50000 Experience PointsTagger First ClassYour first GroupVeteranRecommendation First ClassOverdrive
    Awards:
    Master Tagger
    DGUtley's Avatar tPF Moderator
    Karma
    200769
    Join Date
    Jul 2016
    Location
    Northeast Ohio
    Posts
    52,922
    Points
    473,135
    Level
    100
    Thanks Given
    17,060
    Thanked 46,039x in 24,874 Posts
    Mentioned
    886 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by Standing Wolf View Post
    By the way, was that photo taken before you'd actually moved into your house, or are you just one of those minimalist décor kind of guys?
    We are getting ready to move our Akron offices into the former BF Goodrich executive offices. These were the original Pres, VP, General Counsel offices. My office will be the former VP office as my partner and I flipped for the Pres office and I lost. We are currently in an old rubber mansion, but we've outgrown the available space.

    Attachment 17521


    Attachment 17522
    Last edited by DGUtley; 03-17-2017 at 07:02 PM.
    Any time you give a man something he doesn't earn, you cheapen him. Our kids earn what they get, and that includes respect. -- Woody Hayes​

  12. The Following User Says Thank You to DGUtley For This Useful Post:

    Peter1469 (03-17-2017)

  13. #9
    Points: 74,611, Level: 66
    Level completed: 64%, Points required for next Level: 839
    Overall activity: 39.0%
    Achievements:
    50000 Experience PointsSocialVeteran
    Standing Wolf's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    314971
    Join Date
    Oct 2015
    Posts
    25,616
    Points
    74,611
    Level
    66
    Thanks Given
    5,717
    Thanked 21,088x in 12,283 Posts
    Mentioned
    415 Post(s)
    Tagged
    1 Thread(s)
    Quote Originally Posted by DGUtley View Post
    We are getting ready to move our Akron offices into the former BF Goodrich executive offices. These were the original Pres, VP, General Counsel offices. My office will be the former VP office as my partner and I flipped for the Pres office and I lost.
    Ah, I misunderstood - I thought you meant it was your home office.

    Quote Originally Posted by DGUtley View Post
    We are currently in an old rubber mansion, but we've outgrown the available space.
    Well, the nice thing about a rubber mansion is that it will stretch to accommodate your needs.



    WAKA WAKA WAKA!
    Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.” - Robert E. Howard

    "Only a rank degenerate would drive 1,500 miles across Texas and not eat a chicken fried steak." - Larry McMurtry

  14. The Following User Says Thank You to Standing Wolf For This Useful Post:

    DGUtley (03-18-2017)

  15. #10
    Points: 78,723, Level: 68
    Level completed: 43%, Points required for next Level: 1,327
    Overall activity: 0.1%
    Achievements:
    OverdriveSocial50000 Experience PointsVeteran
    resister's Avatar Senior Member
    Karma
    154141
    Join Date
    Oct 2016
    Posts
    29,399
    Points
    78,723
    Level
    68
    Thanks Given
    23,242
    Thanked 10,122x in 7,595 Posts
    Mentioned
    264 Post(s)
    Tagged
    0 Thread(s)
    There is no God but Resister and Refugee is his messenger’.

    Book of Democrat Things, Chapter 1:1






+ Reply to Thread

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts