And now I've met the man behind these books. He's so unbelievably sweet to his fans. It's almost as if he remembers what it is to be a fan. Oh wait, that's because he does. He's big enough to draw a crowd of hundreds, but small enough to still be in awe of his idols. He treats his fans as I imagine he would like to be treated as a fan. So simple... so wonderful. He treated us all, all two hundred plus of us, as individual people that he wanted to meet. He posed for pictures, and laughed, and laughed, laughed, and smiled and looked appreciatively at everyone. He accepted gifts, and shares stories and listens graciously, and answers questions. It was lovely. It made you feel special even though he treated everyone that way.
His Q& A was great. He refused to talk about the new book for fear of spoiling it for the people who hadn't finished it yet. I didn't have any questions. What could I possibly ask? My only questions are for the future book. Things that I wouldn't really want answered... things I'm speculating. My comments would only be that I love this or I love that.
He did answer that his favorite season of Buffy was season two which has long been my favorite season. I've argued that one to death. That pleased me to no end.
He read one of his college advice columns on having pets in a dorm room. I'd tell you about the guinea pigs but, I'd be laughing too hard to type, and I don't want the damn PETA people coming down on me for retelling this story.
He sang to us which was sweet. It's not often that you get serenaded by and author. It was a pretty song by Jonathan Coulton called I crush Everything. He sang it acapella and in his self described wheezing baritone it sounded terribly sad and mournful and lovely. About a giant squid. Very brave of him, and wonderful.
He answered questions about how he writes, he uses a computer with some sort of special clicky keyboard that authors and nerds might prefer. Something IBM and another M in there somewhere. Right. He doesn't write his daily ideas down in little notebooks or record them in dictaphones, he just waits for the ideas to come back to him. He doesn't listen to music while he writes, he thinks that is weird. He doesn't drink beer, but I think he doesn't drink at all. Or not often. Or not as often as me.
I did get a book signed by him. Oh no wait. I got four books signed by him. I had three books just sitting around my house. I forget one at my mom's. I bought a hardcover of The Name of the Wind. I know that was kind of bad. But hear me out. I had too. I'm giving away my two paperback copies of the Name of the Wind. So I needed to pick up another one. And I have the hardcover of The Wise Man's Fear so... whatever. Don't judge me!
I waited a little over three hours in line to have these books signed. I was on the tail end of thing, but there was at least another hour and half or two hours after me. I had got there an hour early too. I had been there a long time by the time I got up to have things signed.
I shifted my books from hand to table and gave a little inadvertent sigh. He looked up and smiled wearily at me "I hear that, hello".
"Hello" I answered. as I stepped a little closer. I knew I didn't have time. I had something I need to say. I wanted to get my story out before he started talking.
Which sound bad but you have to figure it like this. He's an author, I obsess over his books and blog and everything. I get to hear his words all the time. He never hears a word I say. Maybe he doesn't want too. But this was my one shot to tell him my story.
So I launched into my story "I didn't want to buy your book. I didn't want to read it... I was forced. I haven't read fantasy in years, I was done with that. I didn't want to read it."
He looked up and nodded with sympathy. As if he was saying of course you wouldn't want to read my book. Why would you?
I rambled on with a little more passion than I had intended "A store clerk, made me buy it, he walked me to the register, he escorted me to the door so I couldn't sneak back and return it."
Pat nodded again looking even more sympathetic. "That's awful" he said "they really shouldn't..."
"I was stuck with it. I opened it on the train and I read about a page and a half and I stopped and I reread it and thought..."my voice shifted, filled with awe "this is different. It was wonderful, it was like coming home, it was amazing."
He looked surprised at that. He might have forgotten that I was actually a fan and waited hours just to sign my books. Pat looked uncomfortable with my compliments, much more so than he had with my saying I didn't want to read his book. But he smiled cheerfully and handed me my books. "Yeah, I have fans who love my books, I call them Zealots, they talk about my book all the time and then there are the Missionaries. And they want to force everyone to read my book... and that's not as uhm..."
I fumbled with my bags and gave him a sly side look and smile. "I might have bought a dozen of your books and distributes them" I offered shyly. This was an exaggeration of course. I had bought at least 8 copies of his book and lent them out and given them to people.
His eyes went wide and his smile grew bright. He burst out laughing and pointed at me "You're a Missionary!" he accused me throwing his his head back laughing.
"Sorry!" I shrugged and walked off smiling, feeling pleased with myself and only slightly embarrassed.
It's terrible being a fan of someone. It's almost worse meeting them. But I came out unscathed this time. I'm just lucky he's so easily amused.
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