They say you can’t but, believe me, you can.
There are authors, painters, sculptors, rock groups and god knows who else who manage little else across the span of entire careers. Theresa May has an honorary doctorate in it. Ditto Corbyn. It is a skill that is probably taught in every creative degree course in the country, so here’s some sol y sombra of my own.
Up until yesterday, I was averaging 65 book sales per signing event that I have done since Unlimited Overs was foisted onto an unsuspecting public a couple of weeks ago. By the evening, that average has slipped a little, but is still a decent 43.33 recurring which, given that the average book published in the UK sells 60 copies in its entire lifetime, is not unrespectable.
The problem is, and you don’t have to be Einstein to work this one out, it means that my lunchtime event yesterday sold a big fat zero. Rien. Nada. Null. Nialas. Nula. Shout it out any way you like, the 120 minutes in which I was the ‘event’ at this particular bookshop were possibly the most uselessly spent in my life. I suspect I made more cultural impact on the world brushing my teeth this morning, or forgetting to shave.
Happily, the British character is super-prepared for this kind of failure. We simply take out the cassette marked ‘modesty in the face of great triumph’ and replace it with ‘cheerfulness in the face of total calamity’.
I had chosen a small box of twenty books to bring along, knowing that there was back-up stock in my car. It would be enough to be busy for an hour or so, without looking as if I was expecting too much from a small shop. That’s was my thinking.
It’s a lovely bookshop, and they were lovely about it. I like to think neither they, nor I, were to blame. OK, possibly I could have been more centrally placed, but then I’m not exactly John Grisham. At first, the manageress put me at a desk with my bits and pieces and went through small crowd control and invoicing issues with me. After a quarter of an hour of silence, we reassured each other that it would be mere moments before people came flooding in to see me. Mere moments passed, like they do, and I sat there at my desk trying to convey an impression of insouciance and accessibility. When no one was looking, I worked on the cryptic crossword from the Times; when they were, I smiled bleakly at them, trying all the while not to look creepy.
After 55 minutes had flown by, a lady of a certain age stopped in front of me and said that her 91 year old father was a huge cricket fan.
‘Utterly obsessed,’ she said encouragingly. ‘Reads and watches little else’
I created a modest segue onto the particular book in front of her, my book, and said that I felt he might enjoy it.
‘It’s very gentle,’ I purred. ‘Positive about age’
‘Well, good for you,’ she said turning on her feet. ‘It’s lovely to make a bit of an effort when you’ve written something.’
25 minutes later, a studious young couple stood in front of me looking awkward, and it was only after I had put them at their ease that they politely explained I was blocking the section on politics, and they were after a book on Marx. Presumably like the one Lennon read in American Pie.
And on we went, me and the manageress, trekking our very British footsteps through the arctic wastes of total apathy. Never once did either of us mention that the whole thing was as bad as it could possibly have been. Actually, that’s unfair: at least no one came along to return one that they had bought elsewhere at a previous signing.
‘I suppose you could risk leaving now,’ she said with fifteen minutes left to run. It was a masterful piece of litotes.
‘I could do,’ I agreed, ‘but what about the little boy who might have been waiting for this all week, and can’t get to the shop till one minute to two?’
‘Good point,’ she agreed.
So I stayed where I was. But then so did the little sod, if he ever existed, probably on his oversized bottom in front of his X-Box.
‘Well at least the invoicing is straightforward,’ she offered as I handed her a couple of books to be getting on with. You know, for the hordes who were busy and couldn’t make it today.
‘True,’ I said, thanking her sincerely for her support and running for the quiet anonymity of my car.
It turned out that the turd I polished was to keep someone’s book-keeping simple, and for that I am both proud and grateful.
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