Day 3 of the Hellhole book-signing tour, Brian and I left Seattle by train in the morning for the ride south to Portland. On the way, we had a relaxing time to work on our computers, Brian editing Sisterhood of Dune, me writing some notes, and then together we brainstormed some of the plotlines for Hellhole Inferno, the second novel in the trilogy.  We arrived in Portland at 3:30, where our author escort, Kevin, met us and drove us to the hotel.

I reclaimed a package waiting for us at the desk, a shipment of 75 Hellhole books to sign, plus copies of Winds of Dune and The Ashes of Worlds for VJ Books. With an hour break back in the room, I signed all the copies then got them to Brian for his signature, and I also signed 300 bookplates for Kim Herbert and Byron Merritt to distribute at Wondercon, which is upcoming in April in the San Francisco area.

For dinner, Brian’s friend and former business partner Rick Kossen met us and followed us off to the book signing.  Since we had a little extra time, on the way we did a dropby signing in Beaverton, OR, and arrived at Powell’s Books for the evening talk. Three fully uniformed members of the 501st Cloud City Garrison were there to greet us (and also escorted Peter, the bookstore representative up to the stage to introduce us).

“Please Don’t Send Me to HELLHOLE”
501sr Cloud City Garrison members

Both at the University Bookstore signing in Seattle and here at Powell’s in Portland, we were very gratified to see that the crowds for Hellhole were even larger than the turnout for our previous Dune novel.  Many of our personal friends had come out to visit, including vampire authors Barb and J.C. Hendee, fan club members Prester Dilly and his family, Darrin Defouw, Jen Scholes, as well as Brian’s brother-in-law Pat, his wife Kim, and their two sons Alex and Stephen.

Barb & J.C. Hendee

We gave our talk, describing some of the Hellhole background, our upcoming projects, and Brian’s new chapbook “Stormworld,” coauthored with Bruce Taylor, who had also visited us in Seattle; Bruce is the editor of the forthcoming magical realism anthology, Like Water for Quarks, in which both Brian and I have contributions.

After the signing, Driver Kevin arranged for a group of us to head off to one of Portland’s many fine microbreweries, HUB, where we sampled the beer and pizza.  Though it was St. Patrick’s Day, the noise and crowds weren’t too bad, and we had a fine end to the day.

This morning we checked out and left the hotel at 9 AM, so Kevin could drive us around the greater Portland area; we did six more dropby signings at the bookstores, then arrived at the train station with plenty of time to spare, so we could relax before getting aboard for the overnight ride down to San Francisco, and our next signing on Saturday at Borderlands Books.