Monday, May 07, 2007

THE AUTHOR AT WORK OR NINE THINGS YOU HATE ABOUT ME...

The soon-to-be-debut (the "T" is silent contrary to what DH says) author.
Toiling on her next novel?
Doing an interview?
Answering emails?
Maybe yes...maybe no...
What is she REALLY doing?
Googling herself of course.
Snapshot by Dr. Ian. World famous combination radiologist/photographer.

9:30 pm and 77 degrees.
Google result number one.
YIPPEE Lottery is in
BORDERS
and
BARNES & NOBLE
Cool. What was I doing? Oh yeah.
I have been tagged. By like six or seven people. I have lost count. You see. I get distracted. I don't do chain letters. You know those emails that give dire warnings if you don't send five animated flapping angels to sixteen of your closest friends? I break the chain.
Bummer.
DH says I am tempting fate. OK well. Here goes.
Time to re-google.
KEEN!
Lottery's in
WALMART
1. Three tags for thinking blogger. Since I can't remember who all tagged me I conjecture that I am incapable of thought. I am unworthy and must decline this award.
2. Two tags of writerly questions. Twenty in all.
It starts with "DO YOU OUTLINE"
My answer?
"I DON'T NEED NO STINKING OUTLINE!" Oh bad attitude. Very bad attitude. Go to corner. Hang head. Until you can contribute something positive Patricia you cannot join the group.
Google time!
A review by
JOHN COYNE
(jumps up and down and hits head on ceiling)
3. List nine random things about yourself. I am flippant. I don't follow instructions. Um. I am forgetfull.
OK, I think I'll google myself again.
Galley giveaways at BEA
Well this is totally cool.
So you see. I am entirely too busy to participate in tagging.
OOPS! Look at the time!!!
I gotta visit MISS SNARKS BLOG
Catch ya later.

23 comments:

Roberta said...

Google has put some magic into our lives, hasn't it? Especially those of us who live in the middle of nowhere (I live on a remote Greek island).

Did you know you can set up google alerts so you're notified whenever your name pops up somewhere? It's at google.com/alerts, is easy to sign up.

Patricia, I'm enjoying the accounts of your writing journey. Lottery time is almost here!

You're right in promoting Miss Snark. How can we help but adore her? She's Gilda Radner, come back to life as an agent.

John Robison said...

How did Google find you in Borders and B&N? I had been checking their sites, after appearing in Amazon, but nothing happened. Now both books are there but I still did not see it in Google. Was is way down the list?

Looking at those online displays, you can sure see why Amazon's on top.

And the galley giveaways was neat, too. I'm going to go around and collect as many as I can carry. It's a shame you can't fly back.

John Robison said...

Hey, they're in Books-a-Million and eCampus and Amazon France and Japan now, too!

Anonymous said...

John and Paaat, On Amazon you see! R-E-A-D-I-N-G! First comes the contract, then come the sales. How big you ask? I'll tell you! As BIG AS WHALES! (The sales, people, not John and Pat.)

Therese said...

And I thought MY distractability was getting bad!

Um...reminder: was there something you were just about to put in the mail to me?

David L. McAfee said...

Wow, Pat. You're all over the map, ain'cha? S'okay. I would be, too.

Actually, I already am. :)

BTW- What is "tagging?"

ORION said...

roberta- google alerts and I go waaaaay back!

john e.r. - you have to go through ALL 79 pages! Keep in mind one of my key words is lottery -- do you have any idea how many times that comes up!!

kim's a poet and knows it!

therese distractibility is GOOD!

david- tagging is when a blogger lists a certain number of other bloggers to answer questions or post a similar item (read the comments on the previous posts - I think someone tagged me there).

My abject apologies to ALL who have tagged me--

Kanani said...

This made me laugh. Last night we were sitting in class and someone asked about a different teacher.

I remembered a friend had taken her class. The teacher had everyone get a poster board and draw a flo-chart of their novel. So my girlfriend had to drag this big piece of board to class for ten weeks. She looked (and felt like) a kid with a science project!

And over the years, I've found there really are two types of people --those who outline and those who just write, letting the story and process come out organically.

I didn't outline my first draft. I wrote it all out of order. Somewhere along the line I dashed out the sequence of events. It was with a child's marker. On a piece of paper. I refer to it still.

Anonymous said...

Google me, darling.

And I'm not even a real person.

Kimber Li said...

Googling herself, of course! Ha! You're killing me here. Hey, if Lottery is in Wal-mart then you really are famous. I'm totally with you on #2. Although, I usually phrase it this way - "Huh? What's that?" Okay, enough distraction. I have children to raise, yanno!

Holly Kennedy said...

Pat, you're hilarious.

As I just said on the phone, I think you should allow yourself one day a week to float around that little cabin in your boat, googling yourself, having your hubby feed you grapes and your fellow boaters lay out that red carpet along the dockway...

However, I know you well enough to know that the other 6 days you'll be hard at work writing the next book and not sucking back all that helium that tends to come with such exciting milestones :)

P.S. I'm so glad your hubby agrees
with me on this, btw

P.P.S. CONGRATS on the faboulous reviews! So cool all this pre-buzz

The Anti-Wife said...

Hey, you're not the only one who can be Googled you know! I can too. Of course, I only show up as a reference for the company that built my deck, but I'm there!

MaNiC MoMMy™ said...

Oh, and here I was thinking it was LITERALLY in B&N and Borders, and Walmart and I was about to grab my keys, hop in the Manic Minivan and drive my butt over to get my copy!

Drat.

Guess I still have to wait. (unless of course you've got an ARC itching to make its way to Chicago?--HEY, I'll airmail you a deep dish pizza in exchange?!)

Dawn said...

I'll let you in to a shameful secret, Pat. I've recently started to goggle myself too. But only in private. With the curtains drawn.

Lisa McMann said...

You totally crack me up.

Hey guess what? I'm about to break the "300 days remaining" barrier! I may even stay up late to watch it change over to 299 tonight. Cause, like, I don't have fifty-nine other things I should be doing...

Congrats on your book being everywhere!

Aprilynne Pike said...

*Snort* You are so weird.;)vuhl

Anonymous said...

Hi pat,
It's laura!
Congratulations

LadyBronco said...

Pat,
How fun to see you all giggly! I would be too, tho.

And you can be Googled now...

Too cool.

Anonymous said...

You can go blind if you google yourself, yanno.

>.o

Signed,
The Reader of the Last ARC

John Robison said...

Hey, did you also see that the fall catalogs from the publishers went online last week? Here's yours:

http://booksellers.dk.com/static/pdf/putnam-fall07.pdf

I'll go the the Putnam booth at BEA as a customer and see what they are saying about Lottery and I'll let you know. Just a few more weeks.

Kim Rossi Stagliano said...

Was that a Snark visit?????

Lisa R said...

I think I'd be embarrassed to Google myself. There wouldn't be anything there and how humiliating would that be? I love the reviews! How totally incredible!

Gay said...

You can be forgiven for not tagging others (we're running out of others to tag) as long as you keep working through the answers of random facts about yourself. I think you've done 4 today. So, if you even give us 2 a blog post, you'll have whipped through THAT tag in no time...

We merely want know that you're unique, so we can say, "Well of course, PAT can write a book like Lottery. She does XY and Z," and nod knowingly. Just think how many young budding authors you can warp by having them try to grow up to be just like you!

Seriously, it's fun getting to know more about you.