Come gather round friends.....
Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2008 9:17 am
Gather round friends, for I have to share with you a story of woe and whoa! For I have been to the other side, and I lived to tell tale.
As some of you know my main office is in Sacramento, but I have lots of job duties in Seattle. I travel up here frequently, and as a matter of fact I am in Seattle as I write this. This evening after work I went to my favorite Seattle bookstore, University Books in the University Books in North Seattle. They have a big SF selection, and as I perused it this evening, I noticed three things. First, the Herbert section was almost empty. Second, it was almost empty of Pail of Dung copies. Once I noticed that the shelf had only three copies of that book, and nothing else, and the three copies were scratch-and-dent, my heart sunk. I thought, “if they sell a lot of these fucking dogs, its never, ever gonna end.” Then I looked closer at a loose tag on the shelf. It said:
BRIAN HERBERT
KEVIN J. ANDERSON
SEPTEMBER 16-17 ONLY!!!
Waidaminnute! WTF???
Today is the 16th!!!!
So I shot my head around to where the area where they usually store the visiting authors, and lo and behold I saw an old man looking at the ground, and a beadie-eyed charlatan whose lips were flapping a mile a minute. Shit! It was Brian and Kevin!
Off I trotted to the gathering. The first thing I noticed was that not all the chairs were occupied. “Fuck,” I thought. I’ve got no camera!” But it was OK. Good ole’ Shawn was there preserving the event for posterity. Again.
So I had an immediate dilemma. Do I ask about the bannings on Dunenovels? Should I ask if KJA read a few Edmund Hamilton novels before he started writing this thing? Should I grill them on the notes? Then I saw Duane, the guy who runs the place. I go there a lot, and it would be very sad if I were declared persona non grata, so I kept my mouth shut. But I’m sure that there was some OH’ers in the audience. Others grilled them on the notes for me. Not that they gave anything up though. I’m sure that they have told those lies so many times that even Brian does not have to be reminded what to say before every event any longer.
I did manage to get some nuggets. For example, BH said that the infamous notes were stored in a bank box at Seattle First National Bank and Trust, now the Bank of America, and that the estate attorney who was present when the box was opened, and who alerted the Herberts to its existence, was a guy named Walt Tabler, or Walt Taber. Ill look him up on the State Bar website today and let you know what I find. $10 says that he is dead now. BH said that the disks had “35 pages” (not ‘about’ 35 pages, but 35 pages exactly). I put my hand up to ask if they would ever be putting those docs in the Fullerton Archive, but they would not call on me. BH said that they are in his fire safe in his house.
They were also both asked a great deal about the movie. KJA strongly implied that the production crew was talking to he and BH about story elements. I wanted to ask what elements those were, but they wouldn’t acknowledge me. As a matter of fact, as soon as they mentioned the lawyer’s name I excused myself to go get a pen. I walked back in writing something down, and a few times I looked up from writing and saw KJA’s beady little eyes on me. As soon as I left I realized that I was wearing that same shirt I was wearing while taking a shit when my wife photographed me. I wonder…… I also was asked to sign up for an e-mail list that Kim Herbert was putting together. I said “no thank you,” but as soon as I left I remembered that I had an e-mail address that has “Omphalos” in it. I just may go back tomorrow and take care of that.
Oh, and KJA said that they are for sure going to be writing three more books after the current four were finished. They will be about the founding of the great houses. Sisterhoods (plural?) of Dune would be the first, followed by something else, then Suk of Dune. BH beat me to the punch by saying “Dune Suks.” And Kevin joked how they would stop before getting to Paperclips of Dune. Wasn’t it one of us who came up with that one? Chig, was that you?
So if I do go back tomorrow, I’m open for questions from the gallery. Nothing rude please, as I do NOT want to get the boot from this store.
I cant believe that I randomly ran into those fuckheads. I think Ill try to go to the Sacramento ass-kiss-fest too. I wonder if Byron will show at that one? Kim Herbert was there too, and she was every bit as sweet as she seems on-line. Shawn asked a few kiss-ass questions about the movie. A young guy with short brown hair and a red, blue and white plaid shirt was grilling KJA and BH on the notes for as long as they would let him. Is that person here? Show yerself dammit, and receive my kudos! Another guy with a green t-shirt and some arm tats seemed to sound as surly as I felt. Be you here too?
As some of you know my main office is in Sacramento, but I have lots of job duties in Seattle. I travel up here frequently, and as a matter of fact I am in Seattle as I write this. This evening after work I went to my favorite Seattle bookstore, University Books in the University Books in North Seattle. They have a big SF selection, and as I perused it this evening, I noticed three things. First, the Herbert section was almost empty. Second, it was almost empty of Pail of Dung copies. Once I noticed that the shelf had only three copies of that book, and nothing else, and the three copies were scratch-and-dent, my heart sunk. I thought, “if they sell a lot of these fucking dogs, its never, ever gonna end.” Then I looked closer at a loose tag on the shelf. It said:
BRIAN HERBERT
KEVIN J. ANDERSON
SEPTEMBER 16-17 ONLY!!!
Waidaminnute! WTF???
Today is the 16th!!!!
So I shot my head around to where the area where they usually store the visiting authors, and lo and behold I saw an old man looking at the ground, and a beadie-eyed charlatan whose lips were flapping a mile a minute. Shit! It was Brian and Kevin!
Off I trotted to the gathering. The first thing I noticed was that not all the chairs were occupied. “Fuck,” I thought. I’ve got no camera!” But it was OK. Good ole’ Shawn was there preserving the event for posterity. Again.
So I had an immediate dilemma. Do I ask about the bannings on Dunenovels? Should I ask if KJA read a few Edmund Hamilton novels before he started writing this thing? Should I grill them on the notes? Then I saw Duane, the guy who runs the place. I go there a lot, and it would be very sad if I were declared persona non grata, so I kept my mouth shut. But I’m sure that there was some OH’ers in the audience. Others grilled them on the notes for me. Not that they gave anything up though. I’m sure that they have told those lies so many times that even Brian does not have to be reminded what to say before every event any longer.
I did manage to get some nuggets. For example, BH said that the infamous notes were stored in a bank box at Seattle First National Bank and Trust, now the Bank of America, and that the estate attorney who was present when the box was opened, and who alerted the Herberts to its existence, was a guy named Walt Tabler, or Walt Taber. Ill look him up on the State Bar website today and let you know what I find. $10 says that he is dead now. BH said that the disks had “35 pages” (not ‘about’ 35 pages, but 35 pages exactly). I put my hand up to ask if they would ever be putting those docs in the Fullerton Archive, but they would not call on me. BH said that they are in his fire safe in his house.
They were also both asked a great deal about the movie. KJA strongly implied that the production crew was talking to he and BH about story elements. I wanted to ask what elements those were, but they wouldn’t acknowledge me. As a matter of fact, as soon as they mentioned the lawyer’s name I excused myself to go get a pen. I walked back in writing something down, and a few times I looked up from writing and saw KJA’s beady little eyes on me. As soon as I left I realized that I was wearing that same shirt I was wearing while taking a shit when my wife photographed me. I wonder…… I also was asked to sign up for an e-mail list that Kim Herbert was putting together. I said “no thank you,” but as soon as I left I remembered that I had an e-mail address that has “Omphalos” in it. I just may go back tomorrow and take care of that.
Oh, and KJA said that they are for sure going to be writing three more books after the current four were finished. They will be about the founding of the great houses. Sisterhoods (plural?) of Dune would be the first, followed by something else, then Suk of Dune. BH beat me to the punch by saying “Dune Suks.” And Kevin joked how they would stop before getting to Paperclips of Dune. Wasn’t it one of us who came up with that one? Chig, was that you?
So if I do go back tomorrow, I’m open for questions from the gallery. Nothing rude please, as I do NOT want to get the boot from this store.
I cant believe that I randomly ran into those fuckheads. I think Ill try to go to the Sacramento ass-kiss-fest too. I wonder if Byron will show at that one? Kim Herbert was there too, and she was every bit as sweet as she seems on-line. Shawn asked a few kiss-ass questions about the movie. A young guy with short brown hair and a red, blue and white plaid shirt was grilling KJA and BH on the notes for as long as they would let him. Is that person here? Show yerself dammit, and receive my kudos! Another guy with a green t-shirt and some arm tats seemed to sound as surly as I felt. Be you here too?