London Launch
London Leg
Jenne and I drove the first leg of our trip to London, hoping to avoid a weather delay similar to our experience in May, when our trip to Dublin was postponed for 24 hours. In May, a thunderstorm in Atlanta, GA prevented our plane’s take-off from Columbia, SC, so we were stuck, and missed our connection to Dublin and our first engagement during the “One City One Book” festival. On this trip to London, we were on a tight schedule and could not afford to miss a day, which would have necessitated rescheduling 15 interviews.
So, we drove white-knuckled, three hours to the Atlanta airport in torrential rain during a thunder and lightening storm, which was without a doubt the most perilous part of our travel to London. A very stressful drive, but we got there in time for our flight.
Jenne and I arrived in London at 11:30 AM, thirty minutes ahead of schedule and only slightly worse for wear. We met the driver provided by HarperCollins and set off to the Soho district of London and our wonderful accommodations at Hazlitt’s Hotel. We were determined to fight off jet lag, so rather than take a nap we went for a walk to get our bearings. We discovered we were only a five minute walk from Piccadilly Circus, which like Times Square in NY, is the pulse of the fine city of London. Ironically, it is also the location our Dracula the Un-Dead where a certain body is found impaled!
Waterstones Piccadilly, the largest bookstore in Europe, where the Dracula the Un-Dead presentation and book signing would be held the next evening was just off the circle. We wandered in to scope it out and after fifteen minutes of searching I was in a bit of a panic. We could not find one copy of Dracula the Un-Dead. We were reluctant to ask at first, but I wondered-had we come to the wrong city- got the date wrong or had any of a hundred other things gone wrong? I got up my courage and made an inquiry to a sales lady, who informed me sales were so good, it was hard to keep restocking the shelf, and the present inventory had just been moved into the lecture hall on the 6th floor for an appearance by the author and book signing the next night. She asked if I want to buy a ticket? I did not have the heart to tell her who I was.
The next day was a whirlwind of press interviews and call in radio programs at the very comfortable HarperCollins offices. The routine was a 20-30 minute interview followed by a 5 minute break. I was nursing a bit of a cough, so I consumed plenty of hot tea, resulting in many trips to the men’s room during my breaks. Essentially, I found myself repeating many of the same basic answers during all of the interviews, however interesting variations occurred with some of the journalists’ creative questions, as they strived to pique the interest of their particular readers or listeners. I found the journalists who had read our book, really liked it, or so they said, and presented much more in depth questions than those who had only read the press releases and trade reviews.
The evening “power point” presentation and book signing at Waterstones was very well attended by about 60 people, including some familiar faces; World Champion Court Tennis player, Australian Rob Fahey, and Hampton Court Palace Tennis Club members, John Clark, Richard East, and Robin Mulcahy. It was also really an honor to have in attendance graphic novelist Tony Lee, his lovely wife Tracy, and Tony’s publisher Harry Markos of Markosia Publishing.
The next morning involved a few radio interviews at the BBC studios, followed by a lunch meeting with my cousin Robin McCaw (great grand son of Bram), as we discussed my upcoming audience with a Dublin city official and the procedures to gain approval for a Bram Stoker Statue in Dublin.
Throughout our London visit, the HarperCollins staff could not have been nicer. The three ladies who ushered in our book and organized the promotional events in London affectionately became known as Team Un-Dead. Led by the extraordinarily organized and charming Liz Dawson, everything went off without a hitch, even an impromptu photo shoot in a nearby churchyard.