I have an RSS Feed. I HAVE AN RSS FEED. Amazing. Get it here. I have been assured by people who know such things that this will dramatically change my life forever, or at least get more people to visit this site. Obviously I should have done it a long time ago, but it just didn’t feel like a priority.
It’s not that I don’t want more traffic, but I guess I never cared that much about it. I figured the people who wanted to read the site, would. Like my mom and some other people and that was going to be about it.
I’ve never allowed commenting, which I know can help build a readership. It’s not that I don’t care what people think (although kind of I don’t, but not in a mean way, just in a this-site-is-more-for-me-than-anyone-else kind of way), but I’ve seen how people can squabble on comments, and I’ve never really wanted to host that kind of negativity. And I’ve never been big on any of the other things one can do to get attention for a website, like: insult people, flatter people, write about pop culture incessantly, link to other people till my fingers bleed. Any time I tried those things it felt extremely phony to me.
Once upon a time I did write about my sex life in extremely graphic terms but I was young and high and new to New York and I thought no one would ever figure out it was me. Somehow the naughty literary exhbitionist gene has slightly receded after all these years. Or at least I have finally figured out how to get properly compensated for it by mainstream publications.
Anyway, an RSS feed! Now more people in the world will be able to easily find me talking about having an RSS feed. Pretty exciting stuff.
In other news, my kick-ass publicist, Summer, and I are slowly planning a little book tour for me, and you can see some of those dates down below in the left hand column. I’m basically focusing on NYC, Chicago, and Boston, with some spring diversions on that other coast. As much as I will miss visiting these smaller cities – where I can usually expect less than ten people to attend but then it’s tempered by a charming/inspirational moment (“It was worth it after all! God Bless America!”) when I meet the nicest bookseller/reader/stranger in a bar ever – we’re going to focus this time on places where people actually know me. But don’t you worry, for paperback I’ll be back at it, reading for empty seats across this great country all over again.
Tonight I’m going to drink with Rosie at my favorite bar in New York, Temple Bar, and tomorrow I have a long day, starting with a meeting, and giving way to a dumpling tour of Chinatown.
Am I writing much? Eh. Not much. But I am plotting a lot. I’m letting my brain work on the problem of how to get people to read my new book, The Melting Season
