Book launches are funny things. You publicise it as much as you can, decide how you're going to handle it and then jump in with both feet. Air conditioning helps if you plan to read an excerpt from your book, so long as you remember to stand close to the vent. If you stand downwind of it, your voice will just blow away unheard. I stood directly under the ac vent in Waterstones' deceptively big little bookshop and my voice carried lightly, happily right to the back of the room, untroubled by partitions and half walls. My co author Tye Jamie Coxston travelled from Wales to the middle of England for the occasion and together we gave a flavour of our book.
Because the launch was a part of the first ever Nuneaton Summer Poetry day, there were many other writers there - mostly poets as it happened, and so much superb poetry. Keep an eye out for poetry by Michele Brenton and Kate Garrett. Brenton (also known as the Banana Poet) will make you laugh, or smile wryly at the very least, while Garrett may pinch tears from your eyes.
I met another rather special person there, Rach Gee, someone I've interacted with on Facebook for a couple of years now. Without ever setting eyes on each other we've changed the UK music chart for a week, raised over £100,000 for charity and attended a concert laid on free by Rage Against the Machine (at least, I did), the band we pushed to the Christmas No.1 (a big deal in the UK). Since then we've done other things, raising awareness of species on the edge of extinction, turning the spotlight on great musicians who couldn't get a break and generally trying to make the world a better place, one life at a time.
The launch finished late this evening when my lovely husband wrote Green Living, Sacred Life on a chinese lantern and let it fly off from our garden over the trees and houses and up into the clouds. It seems like a good omen.
Green Living, Sacred Life by Susan M. Phillips and Tye Jamie Coxston (Capall Bann Publishing www.capallbann.co.uk)
