I have returned home from the Roswell UFO Fest safely and a lot less naive about what an uphill battle I have in getting Alien Attitudes: Alura Allen, Alien at Large atop the NYT Bestseller list. I encountered several other people at the event in similar circumstances.
I had gone to the event thinking it was the perfect crowd to start the ball rolling on publicizing my book, but found, instead, the crowd to be mostly conspiracy theorists, abductees, abductee wannabes, and the fringe crowd that surrounds such individuals. These were congregated in the same hotel where I stayed, as that was where the regular lecture series played during the festival. In a blocked off part of downtown, while live music was played on the stage in the background, were a few vendors selling food, t-shirts, alien merchandise of varying type, and the assorted what-know one expects to find at these small town events. In the Civic Center, they had several sci-fi authors set up to for book signings. Nowhere were the crowds anywhere near large and were so much smaller than what I had expected to see in attendance, that I was disappointed from the very first.
As such, I went on side trips to the nearby mountains and to Santa Fe. I did have fun and leaned a valuable lesson, as well. I am glad I went and glad I have come home again.
*The non-Bilbo Baggins authored version.
Posted by Tiger at July 4, 2005 09:35 PM | TrackBack