No. 58: Book Tour Stories
The Other Half of an Author’s Job
On April 1st, I will embark on the 20th book tour of my career. This one for COVEN, my first graphic novel.
I have been on 18 book tours in my career, both U.S. and international. Taken all together, it adds up to almost a full year of my life. A year well-spent, I’d say. There’s certainly been ups and downs, but most of all there’s been stories and growth and experiences, many of which are indelible in my mind.
I’m buzzing with fun tales now and unsure how to structure or tell them, so why don’t we go with an old-fashioned list.
1. “What do you do on book tour?” is a popular question, but every author will have a different answer, depending on the audience for a particular book. In my case, all my books thus far have been aimed at 10-14 year-olds, which means my tours look a lot like I’m running for President of Junior High.
Each night, I take a flight to a new city and land somewhere between 8pm and 10pm. (I’m praying the flight is Delta, where I have all my miles — but inevitably it’s Southwest or… Alaska (shudder).) Then I take an Uber or prearranged car to the hotel, where I’m hoping they have 24-hour room service (they don’t), meaning I go to sleep hungry.
After enough sleep to survive — but not enough to feel rested — I get up around 5:30am, then hit a local Crossfit gym or have a trainer come to my hotel, and work out from 6-7am. Keeping up with workouts is the one thing that makes tour manageable. I’m doing so much sitting, on flights, in cars, in signings, that an hour of furious movement in the morning just takes the edge off the day, plus offsets the food I’m stuffing on the fly.
At 8am, I’m picked up for my first school, or as I think of it, my first ‘show.’ Meaning I walk cold into a middle school or junior high that I’ve never been to and know nothing about, stride into the auditorium where several grade levels are gathered, if not the whole school — anywhere from 200 to 800 students — and try to convince them to read my books. I’ll do this 3x a day for the entirety of the tour.
This show has been carefully honed over 10 years into the ultimate stand-up act. It lasts 44 minutes and consists of a full-on comedy routine, complete with 8 videos, an aggressive takedown of Disney fairy tales (i.e. “Scar is a legend and Ariel is a creeper”), and ends with a raucous game show that has kids jumping out of their seats.
I’ve done this show over 800 times. Somehow it never gets old, because every school brings its unique flavor to it.
After 3 shows, I go to the local bookstore for a “public” event. This is where I get to meet all the OG fans of The School for Good and Evil, plus recent converts, and for 90 minutes or so, I’ll sign and spend time with all of them. (This also consists of a lot of them getting mad at me over various aspects of the movie, at which point I remind them that if they’re mad, there is a high probability, I am mad about it too.)
Afterwards, I’ll go to the airport, head to the next city, shake my fists at the sky over the lack of room service, and we start again tomorrow.
Workout, shows, public event, flight.
This will go on for somewhere between 12 and 24 days.
2. My 44-minute show was not always the lean, muscular machine it is now. It took hundreds of tries to find the magic formula.
I still remember the very first time I tried it, at a school in Philadelphia that had an absolutely colossal, high-tech auditorium, filled with 6th, 7th and 8th graders. The sound guy hooked me into one of those lapel-mics that you slide up your shirt and I was so dazed by the sight of 500 restless kids in the audience that were now my responsibility that I delayed the start of the show so I could hide in the bathroom to catch my breath.
Unfortunately I also had to pee — and forgot I had the lapel mic on, meaning that the show started with 500 kids listening to their guest author take a tinkle.
Things could only go up from there.
3. At one book signing, a couple years in, there was this older man in the line who had an unusually grim appearance. Something in his expression and stance felt menacing, like he was angry at me, plus the fact he had no kids with him. He was also clutching a cardboard box in his hands.
As he came up, I remember this strange feeling of panic. The book had been controversial upon its release — witchcraft, the revisionist approach to Evil, the intense friendship between two girls — and I’d received my fair share of aggressive e-mails. I wondered if something bad was about to happen.
He leaned over my signing table, stared right at me, and without a word, opened the box to reveal two stunningly beautiful wall paintings he’d made out of a pivotal scene in the book, where Agatha saves a girl from death.
Never before had I been so surprised between my expectations of a moment and a reality. The paintings still hang in my house 10 years later.
4. One time, in San Francisco, my flight landed way late — at 7pm — which was a problem, because the bookstore Copperfield’s had organized a dinner with its 50 biggest kid and teen readers for… 7pm. And the airport was an hour away.
I figured we’d have to cancel the dinner.
That is, until I met my escort for the evening.
‘Media escort’ is the official title and it’s given to whoever the publisher hires to take you around to your various events. Normally I prefer to uber myself around or just use a car service, given I’ve been doing this so long, but my publisher flags an escort for me when they know it’s a real pro.
Enter… Elaine.
72 years-old, platinum blond, former girlfriend of Larry King, who picked me up in a red Ferrari at the curb.
“Get in, bud,” she said. “We’re not disappointing these kids, even if I have to drive 150 down the Golden Gate Bridge.”
We were there by 7:30.
5. On my last tour in 2023 for Fall of the School for Good and Evil, I was leaving the auditorium, when five girls cornered me for a selfie. “Let’s do it,” I said. They lined up the photo, but then their friend — Shannara, I think her name was — saw us and wanted to be in it, so she sprints at full speed to slide in… only she misjudges and slides into *me*, like a batter into third, knocking me out so hard that I fly into the wall and land flat on my ass.
The sound of the chaos and the other girls smacking Shannara and yelling at her led to the principal and teachers flooding in, all of whom had no idea why girls were hitting each other and I was supine on the floor.
6. At one school in Utah, the teachers kept saying that Miss Bloch had a crush on me.
“How can she have a crush on me if she’s never met me?” I said.
“She’s seen your photo and thinks you look like Donny Osmond,” one replied.
7. In Ohio, one of the shows went particularly well and I could see that even the 8th-grade boys’ baseball team, all suited up, didn’t want to leave the theater to go to their game. One of these baseball boys raised his hand as they were leaving: “Is there a version of the book without the girls on the cover?”
His voice was plaintive, desperate.
I looked at him and every one of the boys on the team: “If you’re so concerned about reading a book that has girls on the cover, just cover it in duct-tape.”
The teachers were aghast. But now wasn’t the time to set the boys straight. Truth is, I don’t care what I have to say to get boys reading.
That night, at my public event two boys came straight from the baseball game, muddy and still in uniform. Both of them had very, very masculine-looking fathers. For the boys to get their Dads to bring them here after a game and buy that first SGE book with a girl in pink on it…
I looked at one of the Dads: “Thank you for bringing him.”
He smiled wryly. “He told me about the duct tape.”
8. Speaking of boy readers. At the end of the Book 5 tour, I was broken. Physically, emotionally, mentally. It was my longest tour — 16 cities, 24 days. And I just wasn’t sure if it was worth it anymore. Kids seemed to have soured on books and replaced storytelling with TikTok and Fortnite and their phones. I could see the end of my career in sight. Hope and motivation were circling the drain.
I was on an Amtrak back home from Philadelphia to NYC and we’d reached Penn Station. All I wanted to do was sleep for a few days and come up with a new path forward.
As I was getting my bag, I noticed a 14 year-old boy reading in his seat, glued to his book, smiling and laughing. I remember thinking: whatever book he’s reading, I should just herd in that direction, even if it’s Captain Underpants or whatever.
Then I looked closer.
He was reading the second School for Good and Evil book.
It made no sense. He was bro-ish, jocky, and not the typical reader, but here he was having the best time with it. The only thing that made sense was that it was a cosmic smack over the head to stop doubting myself and keep going.
Before I got off the train, I tapped him on the shoulder.
“That’s my book,” I said.
“Naw,” he said. “I checked it out from the library.”
“No, I mean I wrote it!”
He stared at me. “Holy shit.”
“Want me to sign the book to you?” I said.
“Yes, but you can’t put my name in a library book! I’ll get in trouble!”
His Dad intervened — “Let him sign the damn book to you!”
Which I did, right before the doors closed.
I never questioned my career path again.
9. Last tour, my left jaw swelled up overnight. I figured I’d had an allergic reaction or done something to cause the inflammation. I texted a picture of it to my dentist.
“Check your temperature,” he said.
I did. 100 degrees.
“You need an emergency root canal,” he replied.
“I literally am about to do 3 shows,” I said.
“If you don’t take antibiotics in the next 4 hours, this can go to your heart and all bets are off,” he said.
“Send the pills.”
He sent a strong course of antibiotics to the pharmacy, which I picked up on the way — and went back to work for two more days.
So stupid! But once I’m in the zone of touring, I stay there.
To this day, I’ve never missed a single event.
(Root canal happened the morning after I got home.)
10. On the book tour for the movie, everyone thought my partner was my bodyguard and kept asking him if it was okay for them to get their book signed.
“Why do they think I’m the bodyguard??” he wondered.
“You’re wearing a baseball cap with a suit,” I replied.
11. After one show in Phoenix, a 7th grader sidled up to me as I was walking out of the theater.
“You should marry my Mom,” he said.
“That wouldn’t go well,” I replied.
“I know,” he sighed. “She’s not really marriage material.”
12. Finally, my favorite story. In rural, very very white Pennsylvania, I showed up at the school and saw posters of my face all over the hallways, with welcome messages. Only these messages often featured the Mexican flag, as well as notes like: “Bienvenido, Soman!” and “Viva Mexico!” Then I got to my signing table and there was a little Mexican flag in my water, Shirley Temple style, and… a sombrero???
I was utterly baffled by all this, until the principal arrived, sheepish and red-faced, and hung his head. “We have a diversity problem at this school,” he said.
I still wasn’t computing.
He swallowed. “Look, they saw your picture and thought you were Mexican. I knew I should correct them…” He shrugged his shoulders. “But the posters were already done.”
Cheers to more stories ahead on this new tour. And don’t forget, if you read this diary, tell me when you see me next week! Here’s the tour calendar with everywhere I’ll be.
Your turn.
Have you seen an author on tour? Any stories from an author event?
Until next time —
Wow, you have a pretty interesting life! These are great stories. (I laughed a lot) It's really awesome that you go on all these book tours and are able to connect with your readers. Not all authors do this, and it is something really special. You are a pretty cool dude Soman. I look forward to meeting you on your Coven book tour. (It's seriously all I can think about because I am sooooooo excited!) :)
I won't be seeing you on your tour for Coven, but I did see you at my elementary school for one of your SGE tours (believe me, the passage of that much time freaks me out too)! I remember when I was really young my mom had one of the SGE books at home and the cover was so pretty that I wanted to read it. I think she made me wait until I was a little older, but that time came along with your tour. I don't remember much about it, but I think it was really cool, and I know my mom (who was the assistant librarian) thought you were amazing as well!