Wrapping Up the Book Tour

Elizabeth Zelvin

I'm home from the road after more than two months of touring to promote Death Will Get You Sober. I've had a grand time, and I'm glad to be home and ready for a rest--except for updating all the information on the website, unpacking the mountain of stuff I somehow managed to fit into two suitcases at under 50 pounds for the airlines' rigorous new limits, laundering, filing, and throwing away all that stuff as appropriate, opening mail, paying bills, printing out all the text that's been accumulating on my laptop, reconnecting with family and friends, and thinking about what I'll write next.

I came back with more books than I started with, more friends than I started with, and enormous respect for the booksellers and librarians who keep the love of books alive and booklovers' insatiable desire for more satisfied one book at a time.

I'm also grateful for 21st century technology: my laptop, which kept me available to my therapy clients in the US and the UK; Sadie the GPS, who found every destination I needed to go, kept me company on long drives, and never once lost her temper; my digital camera, which recorded priceless moments like my signing at Book Passage with Salman Rushdie (we signed in different rooms, but it was a great photo op); my cell modem, which linked me to the Internet when my aging computer didn't want to talk to the wireless connections in friends' homes and cafés; my Bluetooth earpiece, which let me keep both hands on the wheel; and my cell phone, which kept me connected with the old and new friends who put me up in their homes, fed me, drove me across state lines, up and down mountains, and all around urban mazes to give me and Sadie a break, and supported the book and my events in all sorts of ways. Phone and email also allowed me to keep track of a million and one details and stay in touch with my husband and the folks at my publisher's in New York, my publicist, PJ Nunn, in Texas, and booksellers and librarians in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Indiana, North Carolina, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin.

The tour started at the Public Library Association convention in Minneapolis at the end of March (15 or 20 Sisters in Crime and 10,000 librarians) and ended at the American Library Association's annual meeting in Anaheim (15 or 20 Sisters in Crime and 25,000 librarians). Heartfelt thanks to the mystery writers all over the country who proved over and over the truth of the saying that writers in our genre are unfailingly generous and helpful to each other--and to the readers who enjoyed Death Will Get You Sober, told me they loved the title and the cover, asked me when the next one will come out, and talked about Bruce and Barbara and Jimmy as if they were not just fictional characters but real people.