Over the last year and a half a lot of folks have e-mailed me, asking if there’s a place they can buy signed copies of my books.
Other folks email me because they *know* there’s an online store, but they can’t find it.
In the last year, I’d say I’ve had roughly ten billion e-mails of this sort. (I’m rounding up.)
While the e-mails have been a little repetitious, they’ve never irritated me. It’s my own fault that there’s never been any sort of permanent link to the store on the website.
The best we’ve had until now is occasional links in the blog itself. Which is dumb. It’s like having a fully stocked refrigerator, except you can only open the door by walking into the bathroom and putting your foot in the toilet.
Actually, it’s not really anything like that. That’s a really awful analogy. I’m kinda tired right now, so my word-put-togethering is not all, um, good. I apologize.
Anyway, this blog celebrates the first step in the long path of tweaking and updating the website, something I’ve been meaning to do for years.
Those of you reading this blog directly off my site will see the new graphic up there on the right. It’s a little widget that will take people directly to the store where we sell signed books, posters, and other miscellany. A place we’ve decided to name The Tinker’s Packs.
I’m not going to lie to you. Nate sent me the art earlier today, and I’m really inordinately proud of the fact that I bunged that silly little widget together on my own.
I know for a lot of you, maybe even *most* of you, doing something like that is about as difficult as writing a check. But you have to understand that I know about as much html as your average dancing bear. So yeah. I’m gonna feel all sorts of self-sufficient because I didn’t have to run to one of my tech-smart friends for help on this.
For those of you that are interested, here’s a pic you can click to see a bigger version of the art:
Go on. Bask in its untrammeled glory. (I had to trammel it a bit to get it to fit in the space available for the widget.)
As always, all money spent in the store still goes directly to Worldbuilders. We’re not changing that.
So… yeah. That’s all I’ve got right now. I was just proud about my widget and wanted to share. Rest assured that in the relatively near future, we’ll be updating the website, adding some new stuff, streamlining the store, and generally embettering everything.
Later space cowboys….
pat
49 Comments
You’re kind of awesome Pat, but Nate’s artwork is the real winner here;-)
Agreed.
My husband, who isn’t really a fantasy fan and doesn’t read your books, gets to listen to portions of your blog for just such analogies as the foot-in-the-toilet. Because of blurbs like this he’s considering reading your book if I can ever get it back from the line of people who are borrowing it. I’m about to the point where I’m going to give up and buy another copy. Maybe two. One paper, one kindle. If I just get the kindle he’ll never read it because my kindle is kind of attached at my hip.
I have 3 copies of the first book for that very reason (kind of by accident but its worked out pretty well). One is signed and stays on my shelf and the other two get lent out.
I’ve had to buy three copies due to loaning them out then forgetting who has them. Was devastated when this happened just before going on a 10 day trip, during which I planned to re-read NOTW before cracking my freshly purchased copy of WMF.
But lo and behold, what do I find in the nightstand of my hotel room half a world away? Why, a much battered paperback of the NOTW! A copy I of course left for the next lucky reader once I had finished with it.
Moral of the story: Pat has retained a retinue of industrious book gnomes, who reward his loyal followers in their times of greatest need.
Wow. That is a crazy coincidence.
What I do, is buying the book and giving it to my friends at their birthdays. That way, Pat gets the full credits, and I don’t have to keep track.
I’ve been thinking of getting both books for my Kindle, just because every once in a while I’ll be sitting in the break room at work, reading a book and think “I really wish I was reading The Name of the Wind right now.” Also because both of my books are signed copies and I worry about them taking any more damage.
I had this issue with the Dresden series, so when “Wise Man’s Fear” came out, I ordered a signed copy for my shelves and picked up a reading/loaning copy from my local book store. I had given up on my loaner copy, when it suddenly was returned with an entire bag of books. It was like Christmas all over again.
I here you all!! I’ve been pimping out Pat’s books since I finished them and have probably increased his stock substantially. These books are my go-to birthday/christmas/just felt like giving you something gift. LOL! (Or more like, I need someone to talk too about this story gift :) )
ooOOOoo. Good thing I have a birthday coming up… =)
ps. it still jars me every time I see cheque spelt with a ‘ck’. You silly Americans and your strange spellings.
G’day Patrick
Thanks for all of your writing’s mate. :)
I haven’t seen anything from you or Daw about the release date for the third book. Is it somewhere on your site? If not I was wondering if you could post a rough time frame so I can know when to start rereading the first two and be finished in time to go straight into the third.
Woooo! Yay you! I really need to start “embettering” all the things, too, but it’s hard to find the time when there’s so much to do just day to day. For now, I’ll just live vicariously through you and your awesome new widget.
I’m glad to see this widget instead of the exploding thermometer, which made me feel dirty every time I saw it.
Let me know if you want more hats. :)
The hats went over *Really* well. We could definitely use more for next year….
Done. Give me a number and I’ll get started.
How about this? We can easily use as many as you’re willing to send us. The ones you sent us last year sold out in less than a day….
That works.
That poster with you and Ernest Cline is amazing. I was given “Ready Player One” as a Christmas gift (the giver’s logic being “It sounded nerdy and you’re a nerd.”) and thought to myself, “This books sounds familiar and I don’t know why.” Upon looking at the back and seeing a quote by you it all came back to me.
Anyway, do you have any idea if video exists online of this head-to-head interview the poster is advertising?
It was actually a reading we did together at a bookstore in Michigan. No video was taken, I’m afraid….
Pat, have you ever seen a dancing bear programming in html? They are as mind blowing men, better than most humans even, they just can’t get hired because they leave in the middle of the day to catch fish, and sleep most of the winter, plus, they sometimes maul their bosses to death… it’s a sad unkown fact (the programming part, not the mauling).
Those are the same reasons I make a pretty bad employee, too.
I’m not in the bubble-bursting business, but your “Categories” drop down menu is shootin’ out way off the page, for me at least.
Yeah. It still works though. You just have to click on it…
Yes! Finally!
“It’s like having a fully stocked refrigerator with a door you can only open by walking into the bathroom and putting your foot in the toilet.”
This made me laugh like a lunatic! Which considering I’m in my university’s library is not a good thing and got me some glares and those looks you give people whom you think are insane.
It’s more like having a fully stocked invisible fridge that will occasionally turn visible for short periods just to screw with you. :D
EXACTLY! ahahaha
I’ve been wanting to get a signed hardcover of TNOTW for ages! Thanks to the roughly 10 billion people that emailed Pat about this.
Pat! I’m glad you are getting around to updating the site. I always just searched “Tinkers Packs” on google to find it, since I like browsing around on there just for fun.
Mostly I was jus commenting to say Happy St. Patricks day! Too bad you cant bring cookies to the blog :(
Great. Now I’m going to have that Tim Minchin song “Bears Don’t Dig on Dancing” stuck in my head all day. Well, it could be worse.
While you’re embettering your site, though, Pat, I wanted to ask you your thoughts on WordPress. Do you love it? Even after all this time? Or do you find yourself eyeballing younger, sleeker webhosting services?
Glad I can find the Tinker’s Packs more easily now. The couple of literary pinup calendars I bought from there, I had to link over through the blog. First world problems!
I love WordPress. It does everything I want, and doesn’t cause me trouble. Why would I want to look for something else at this point?
Plus, migrating the blog again would be a real bitch….
It might be a little early in the year to start talking about 2013 calendars, but are there any plans for a 2013 Literary Pin-Up Calendar?
Stay tuned….
Huzzah!
I think it’s more like having a fully stocked Whole Foods that you can only get to if you have the notes you drunkenly scribbled that one time at that bar seven years ago, which you washed with your jean but is still mostly legible.
For those of you that didn’t know, the folks over at Suvudu.com do a SciFi/Fantasy Cage Match every year. They take characters from different novels pit them against each other in a battle to the death. For each match they come up with a very entertaining write up of how they think the encounter would go. And, occasionally the authors will submit their own version of the melee. In the end the winner is determined by voting from the readers. Back in 2010 everyone’s favorite red-headed namer brawled for life and honor. Kvothe ended up finishing a very respectable third place behind Rand al’Thor and Jaime Lannister, which required him to hug the God-lion Aslan into submission along the way (arguably the greatest match of the year if not the history of the competition).
This year Kvothe favorite student, Bast, has thrown his hat into the ring. He has already advanced past the first two rounds by mysteriously slaying Richard Rahl and drinking Seregil into oblivion. Now he is battling against the 300,000 year old son of Darkness, Anomander Rake. Wielding Dragnipur, the night-bladed sword, millenia of fighting experience, and the ability to turn into a dragon Anomander presents a daunting challange to Bast (cause he can turn into a freaking dragon). But, Bast holds power and cunning of unknown strength and ability. So much so that the writer of the match has them evenly matched and feels that it can only be determined by a coin toss.
As I write this Bast is trailing by 227 votes. He needs our help! Go over there right now and cast your vote. (follow this link) Voting ends on Thursday, March 22, at 5:00 pm EST.
P.S. Rumor has it that Pat will do a write up of the next match if Bast gets voted through. Don’t delay, vote today!
Done, and happy I did.
Just a suggestion, but it might be useful to mention the tinker’s pack from your But the Book page, which can be reached the the top navigation bar of any page, or a handful of other places.
Yeah. When we do the official redesign of the site, the store will have its own tab.
But that is a good idea mentioning the store in the Buy the Book page….
Is your occasional ‘Later Space Cowboys’ sign off a Firefly or (I’m assuming) Bebop reference? Both?
This is going to sound awfully picky but you have both the picture and the text lead to the Tinker’s Pack webpage. Which is fine but redundant. As I read what I just wrote to you I realize that I’m a bad fan.
The link is there in case the picture fails to load for some reason. Or in case someone’s browsing the web pictureless because they have a crap internet connection…
I like the Cowboy Bebop tag.
I also know the joy of adding code, did you have the “fun” of spending at least an hour chasing down a stray comma? I love that one.
Of course, now it’s easy to find I’m cursing the fact it’s a week till payday…
Tiny little comment, and I apologise for noticing, but your new code is in upper case and xhtml should really be done in lower case. I haven’t found it to make any difference for most browsers but thought you might like to know.
The picture is awesome as well.
You mean to say that you don’t HAVE to open the refrigerator door by waltzing into the bathroom and plunking your foot into the toilet?
To think that I’ve been doing it wrong after all these years….
if I ever write the story that’s in my head, I want Nate to do my artwork. :D
I saw that I could get actual talent pipes and I totally geeked out.