I lost three pounds while I was on my Family Tree tour. That’s roughly a pound a week, and, on one hand, this is great news. I’m thrilled to have those pounds off before the summer. On the other hand, they were lost the hard way. Don’t believe me? Consider the following.

I visited twelve cities in twelve days, with an added day each week in transit. Often it’s the “in transit” part that makes eating difficult. When you’re picked up at 4:30 am for a dawn flight, can you really think about having breakfast prior to leaving? So you get to the airport, where there’s nothing remotely appetizing available, and once on the airplane, the offering is a beverage. I often have a stick of string cheese or a tiny box of raisins in my carry-on, so that was usually breakfast. Not many calories there.

Once I land, things aren’t much better. I usually hit the ground running, with a media escort driving me either to the local tv station for an interview or to a lineup of local bookstores, one after the other, to sign stock. A good media escort will know of a spot where we can stop for a quick lunch, but not all do that, and “quick” is definitely the word.

In most instances during this tour, we got lunch at two in the afternoon, which was too late to bother with dinner prior to the evening event. In some instances, I had a quick something from room service when I got back to my hotel. In other instances, I just went straight to bed.

Lest you’re feeling sorry for me, please don’t. There was one hotel in Philadelphia that had a little dish filled with six small candies and three humongous chocolate-dipped strawberries; I scarfed down every last one. Likewise the lunch I had of Southern fried chicken and stone-ground cheddar grits at the Horseradish Grill in Atlanta; I ate half for lunch and finished the rest in my hotel room much later that night. And then, of course, there was the night in Nashville when, famished, I ordered a room service hamburger from the restaurant downstairs. The hamburger was pure chuck and the bun dripped with more grease than I usually eat in a week, but I’ve never tasted anything so good in my life!

Getting back to weight loss, exercise helped – and I’m not talking about using the workout room in a hotel. I’m talking about great, long, double-time hikes through airports to catch planes that seemed always to be at the farthest gate in the concourse. But hey, I’m not complaining. I ate that chocolate, those grits, and that chuck, and still lost weight.

Now to keep it off.

Posted by Barbara Delinsky at 01:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I’m in Nashville today promoting Family Tree , but thinking about all the things I’ve heard from readers since I started this tour. One of the most poignant came during the Q&A after my reading and talk last week in Freehold, New Jersey. A woman raised her hand and told how, in preparation for a fiftieth birthday that her friends were throwing for her last year, they sent emails to her favorite authors and entertainers, asking for a personalized birthday note to be part of the celebration. I was the only one who responded.

Later, at the same event, another woman remarked that I was the only writer who had ever answered an email she had sent.

I’m stunned in both cases. I simply can’t imagine someone who writes for a living not being able to shoot off a short note to someone who buys all of his or her books. Especially with email, replying to reader mail is a snap. It takes no time, but it means so much to the reader.

When I was in sixth grade, my father took us to New York City for the first time. During that visit, I saw my first Broadway show. It was “Peter Pan,” starring Mary Martin. I came home and wrote a letter to Mary Martin telling her how much I had loved it and that I wanted to be an actress when I grew up. She sent me a personal letter in reply, encouraging me to work toward that goal. I’ll never forget it. Her letter was typed on pale blue stationary, with her hand-written signature at the bottom in beautiful blue ink. I can’t tell you how I treasured that letter. I never did become an actress (can’t sing or dance if my life depended on it), but the fact of her response, itself, left a lasting impression.

Answering reader mail is a priority of mine. It has been from the start of the career. I’ve built my following one reader and a time, in part thanks to the personal connections readers feel both to my characters and to me. I’ve had readers tell me that they still have a note I sent them six, eight, ten years before. They cherish these notes. In turn, I cherish their appreciation.

At one of the signings I did earlier this week, a reader posed an interesting question. After all the books I’ve written, she asked with a glance at the beautiful spread of Family Tree before her, did I still get a thrill seeing my new book in print? The knee-jerk response would have been to say yes. But I had to stop and think about it. What I finally said was that, no, I didn’t feel the same thrill. The joy I feel now, I told her, doesn’t come from the physical book itself, but from the reader response to the book. This, my friends, is the honest-to-goodness truth. So keep those notes coming in. You all are my reward for a tough day at work.

Posted by Barbara Delinsky at 05:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I’m waking up in Philadelphia this morning. It’s actually the first night of the Family Tree tour that I’ll have been away from home. Earlier this week it was all Massachusetts, and I’ll be home tomorrow for the weekend before heading to the airport again Monday morning. Not too bad, huh?

Let me say here that the best part of touring – the very best part of touring – is seeing my readers. I love meeting those of you whose names I know through email correspondence. I love meeting those who’ve never written to me, but have been reading my books for years. I even love meeting those who simply saw a notice for the signing and had nothing better to do, so decided to drop by. I love talking with all of you – love hearing where you’re from and why you came.

I meet other writers when I tour. Well, that’s not really true. I don’t meet them. I just follow them. Over the years, I’ve followed the likes of Jodi Picoult, Jacquelyn Mitchard, Mary Higgins Clark, and Jane Hamilton, whose tours were a week or two before mine. One year I even toured after Dan Quayle, our former Vice President. He used to sit at a table while handlers passed his book in front of him in a steady stream. He would barely have put his squiggly “Q” on the page they held open when that book was gone and the next book was there. He squiggled one “Q” after the other. He never even touched a book with his hand!

I suppose that, technically, that is a signing. But where’s the personalization? Where’s the little note saying how nice it is to see a fellow Bostonian, or how good the reader was to venture out in the snow (or the rain or the heat), or how thrilled I am that the reader brought her mom? I want readers to remember meeting me. So I take time with signings. I never do get writer’s cramp. Not signing books. A writer’s nightmare is when no one comes and there’s no signing to do!

Lest you think that signing is all I do on tour, consider this. I’ve actually been “on tour” for the last few weeks, if media interviews count. I’ve been doing tapings, both for radio and TV, to be aired in the next days and weeks, now that Family Tree is on sale. I’ve been doing written interviews for months. And there will be more media at each of the stops I make.

What else does a tour entail? Shopping – getting the clothes right, with all different weather zones considered. Shopping – stocking up on the foods my husband normally eats so that he won’t starve when I’m gone. Shopping – buying extra cat food and litter for Chelsea. Shopping – buying birthday cards, Valentine cards, all the things I’d have taken care of if I were home.

It’s all done now. So here I am in Philadelphia, on a sort of vacation. After all, “touring” has been one of three jobs I’ve juggled in the last months, the other two being new website work and new novel work. For the next little while, it’s just touring. Ahhh.

Posted by Barbara Delinsky at 10:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

We told you that you’d have the new site by February 1, and here it is on February 1. Huge kudos to Steve and the crew at www.authorbytes.com, who made this happen in record time. Please explore. Take a look at the multimedia e-preview of Family Tree, accessible from the HOME page. Click on PODCASTS and listen to the first of them, which addresses the funny little matter of why I write about daughters when I only have sons! Surf through the other pages to see lots of different pictures of me. The knitting one (on the Berroco raffle page, accessible from HOME) is one of my favorites. And of course, start getting more of a feel for Family Tree. Five days and counting ‘til it goes on sale!

Posted by Barbara Delinsky at 11:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)