Coming soon to a bookstore near you

I am probably the worst saleswoman, ever. I was disorganized, unprepared, and unprofessional. And yet, I still managed to get copies of 580 Split accepted at the local bookstore. I credit William Vollmann.

Today, I wandered into Walden Pond (on Grand Avenue in Oakland), walked up to the counter, and announced I had a local literary journal that I was trying to place on shelves. The manager was called over, and I tried to extol the virtues of the magazine (interview with William Vollmann, work by Daniel Alarcón, etc). He seemed interested, and agreed to take all three copies. Then he asked how to contact me if they sold out and they wanted more.

Now, maybe it never occurred to me that such a situation would happen. Or maybe I just figured the managing editor would worry about such details as following up. So I pull out a piece of notebook paper and write down my name, phone number, and the magazine's website. The manager asked if I had an invoice, and I said, "uh, no, I'm sorry," so he wrote '3 copies' at the top of the handwritten note.

Then he asked if I was part of the magazine's dedicated salesforce. I said we couldn't afford such things, and that I was the poetry editor. Hopefully that let me off the hook for being such a flake.