Harry W. Schwartz was empty. Oh, the books were there, fresh and smart on the shelves in the large, upscale bookstore in a strip mall in Milwaukee. The salespeople were there, eager, friendly, eyes twinkling with bookish goodwill. And I was there, hungover, wearing a sports coat.
This sure wasn’t the first time for me. I had endured similar ordeals with previous books–that reading in Tacoma that Doubleday had scheduled during the Mariners-Indians playoff game at the Kingdome. The time at the Barnes & Noble on Diversey when they had me read to the people in the coffee shop. When I opened my mouth they looked up, as one, annoyed to have been interrupted by some jerk at a podium, then dropped their noses back down into organic chemistry and guides to cheap hotels in Paris, while I stammered and flop-sweated.
Last June in Milwaukee, there was still hope. The book was in the stores. Ballantine had actually paid the ransom Borders demands to place a book on a table by the front door. Something could happen. I was suspended in an endless, unendurable moment, waiting for a miracle.
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At Harry W. Schwartz, the manager, as friendly and solicitous as a hospice worker, sat in the front row chatting with me. A clerk drifted by and sat a few rows behind her. I did my best to be charming and philosophical–what else can you do? Grace in these situations softens the memory’s sting. At the Tacoma signing, one couple drifted over, the only people in the store. I read to them for a bit, then, detecting some unease in their eyes, closed the book and said, “You’re not going to buy this, are you?” They squirmed. I reached for my wallet. “Tell you what,” I said. “Here’s my card. You buy the book, you read it, if you don’t like it, send it back and I’ll refund your money.” They sat there, frozen. “OK,” I said, smooth as snake oil. “Tell you what. I’ll do you one better. Here’s my card. Let’s go to the register. I’ll buy you the book. You read it and, if you like it, send me a check.”
She agreed to represent me. I excitedly hurried to New York to visit her. I remember a woman with blue hair and a yippy lapdog. I remember her books, books whose authors she’d represented, scattered on the coffee table. They were large photo books with titles like The Flowers of Versailles.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “He’ll decide that.”
A month later, three publishers were bidding on the book. I spent a year writing it, happily trekking to Harvard, to Wisconsin, to UCLA. I loved doing research, loved digging into a subject I was certain nobody in the world was thinking about. I remember crossing one of the lush green lawns at Caltech in Pasadena, my briefcase filled with photos of pranks I had sweet-talked out of the publicity department. I looked around at the palm trees, smiled, and thought, “This–this!–is what I want to do for the rest of my life.”
