If a large fraternal organization invites you to be the speaker at its annual fundraiser, you should definitely accept. If that same organization asks you to contribute a signed copy of your novel for the silent auction, you should provide it. If they reserve a table in the lobby for a local bookseller to hawk your book, your delight should exceed all bounds!
However...
If they put a starting bid on your book of $25 when it's being sold for $21 in the lobby, don't be surprised if your book is left behind on the auction table. Oops!
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5 comments:
Were you signing the ones in the lobby? Surely your signature is worth $4!
I'm not a robot, but the fuzzy pictures of number plates(?) and the overly distorted letters (they're not even words, so you can't guess one if you have the others!) are pretty annoying. This is my third try.
All the copies were signed that evening! I spent most of my time at the book table.
Zeno, maybe the person who wins the auction for the over-priced autographed copy gets to deduct the entire amount from his/her itemized taxes. Plus, there's a strange quirk in Azorean-American culture where it can be a point of (excessive) pride to pay a lot MORE for something at an auction than it's retail price (not that I understand this, but I've read about it from reliable sources).
Ridger, I can't make out the number plate at all either, so will just take a stab at it, in hopes that if I'm wrong, Captcha will give me another chance.
P.S. I was wrong re the number the first time, but received a much clearer number plate this time.
Oops, should read "...than ITS retail price..." (proofreader hangs head in shame).
Here's a pertinent quote from the exemplary (!) 2009 English translation of Dr. Eduardo Mayone Dias' "The Portuguese Presence in California":
"...[F]estas can foster a sense of ethnic self-affirmation, indicative of a person’s degree of social and, especially, economic acculturation. This is illustrated by the opulence of the queens’ capes and vestments, and the competitive spirit displayed during the arrematações [auctions]. Even five or six decades ago, a loaf of massa sovada would command $20 and a fruitcake $60, while more recently a plate of coconut cakes could not be had for less than $100 and bottles of whisky have fetched from $700 to $1,000 at auction. Nowadays, a single afternoon and evening of arrematações can raise as much as $100,000..."
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