View in browser
Website    Facebook    Goodreads

Okay, so what feels like a million years ago but was actually two weekends ago, me and my wife, we packed up everything and we went to a con. Now, just to give you a real quick glimpse into what that involves. I have a stand that holds three books across, five books down, that I usually fill with The Manhunters books. They fit perfectly. The stand was given to me by a writer friend of mine who does cons with me named Sonia Rogers. I have two banners, 7ft banners that each talk about a different series, The Manhunters and The Madness Wars. They were designed by my wife. They're beautiful. Everything else fits into six filing crates. The brand is called Vaultz. They make very sturdy storage cases of all sizes. Mine are the size of a filing drawer, little bit shorter, and I can fit all the books and all my supplies into those cases. 

So, in the car they go. It's beautiful. They fit perfectly, with no room at all for the cooler. So, out they have to come. There's simply no room. Normally this isn't a problem, but this time Willow will be coming with us and they have to have a place to sit. So Guardian repacks the car, everything that's supposed to go in it. Then it all fits perfectly, including the cooler. And there's a little bit extra room. And I look over at Bekah, and she looks over at me, and I don't remember what she said. She's taking dictation, so she'll have to put it in here for you (Bekah's note: I have no idea.). A friend of mine used to comment on my packing ability. He said I had the ability to fit 20 pounds of sh- stuff into a 10-pound bag. We slapped the back table on it, which is a 6ft table that folds in half, and off we went.

I wasn't as nervous this time. This one didn't get me that bad. I just walked in and set up. Now I was on the very end of a row. It was very easy for us to turn the table, which was perfectly within our rights, and then set up our booth. And when we were sitting behind our booth, we were staring directly at the front door. We were at the end of two rows. It was the perfect spot to be. Our booth is extremely professional looking. And when our booth is the first thing you see when you walk in the door, it provides a very professional face to the entire con. We were set to go.

Traffic was kind of slow the first day. It seemed like I talked to a lot of people but I wasn't very busy. I was selling a lot of books. One guy showed up and said that when he heard I was here he decided to come. He had my Manhunters series. He wanted to say hi and see if there was anything else to buy. He dropped $85 on me. He bought nine books. Shook my hand, we talked for awhile. And that dude went home. He told me he had come to see me. 

This con has always been good to me. But I had a really slow day, so I didn't know what to expect. When we counted up at the end of the day, I had sold on average a book every six and a half minutes. I think we can all agree that's not a slow day. And all the way home, me and my wife were trying to figure out what had just happened. Willow was as confused as we were. Then we realized that because we had been positioned facing the front door, we saw everybody come in. Most of them walked right past us, did a circuit around the room, and came to us last. So the illusion of being passed up so many times had made us believe that we weren't selling much.

I didn't sleep that night because of my 48-hour schedule. I was 24 hours into my day when we found ourselves behind the booth again. And it all happened all over again. Slow day, people walking right past us. On this particular day they had a cosplay contest. If you don't know what cosplay is, that's when a person will dress up in a costume of a favorite character. They had the cosplay contest, took two hours. They had delays. So for two hours we didn't see much. Not many people came to talk to us. I lost two hours of my day of selling. I was exhausted and falling apart. 

We saw a little bit more traffic as the day was winding down. When we had a look at our numbers at the end of the day, we realized we had sold a book every seven and a half minutes for the duration of the two-day con. And I was leaving That Geeky Con behind me again for another year.

I love That Geeky Con. The first time we went, I sold out of books. This time I damn near sold out of books. I sold completely out of Manhunters. I had one Goat song left. I had sold completely out of Wrath, Plight, and Fate of Madness, and I only had two Onslaught left. My table had been decimated at a two-day con. And I can't wait to go back next year. I'd like to thank Geeky and the people who set it up. I loved everything about it, except how when I got home, after 35 hours of being awake, I could barely walk, could barely think. I collapsed in a haze, a cloud of Geeky surrounding me. And I just breathed in the experience.

the Opera of Peace

the Opera of Peace, book two of Flowing in the Trenches, is coming out very soon. It's up for pre-order now and will be released July 28. We're very excited about this book. I've been very impatient all year. I haven't even put Song of the Leviathan in my bookcase. I keep it sitting on the middle of my desk. I just keep looking at it. About once a month, all year, I've flipped into the book and read a poem at random. It's coming. You can't prepare yourself. Don't try.

The Silent War of the Sour Eye

Here's your access to The Silent War of the Sour Eye. The recently expanded short story collection includes: 

The Banshee
The Slave
The Gilded Mares
Son of the Demontser
The Forge of Souls
The Master of the Hoodsmen
Crease *NEW*

PDF
Jesse Teller
timea@jesseteller.com

PREVIOUS NEWSLETTERS
April | May | June

Share to Facebook Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Twitter Forward email Forward email

Jesse Teller, 2443 S. Ventura Ave., Springfield, MO  65804 USA

Tired of hearing from me?
Unsubscribe
MailerLite