First time stories....

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veinglory

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By which I mean the first time you found your work in a bookstore. It was mine today! I was in Borders gratuitously searching for my own work on the in-store computer. If found a spiritual nonfiction book (Illuminations) was actually stocked. I tracked it down just to look at my poem on page 83. Yay! Now I just need to have my second first time with a full novel!
 

SpookyWriter

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Congrats! I remember that feeling when I was introduced as a writer for Juicy Parts by Jack Mingo. Keep it going.
 

dclary

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Shouldn't this go in the "bragging" forum?
 

JennaGlatzer

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Nope. Not if she's asking for others to share their first-time stories, too.

Mine was with Conquering Panic and Anxiety Disorders, but I don't remember it very well anymore. Honestly, it's always a thrill to see a book of mine on a shelf, though. The Celine book was the first one I ever saw displayed on front racks and stacked up all over tables... that was very heady.

Anthony stinks about blowing my cover, though. If I ask a salesperson if they have any Jenna Glatzer books, he consistently manages to say, "That's her! She's Jenna Glatzer!" even after I've pretended to be my own groupie. That caused a really embarrassing cash register moment one day.
 

veinglory

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Heh. Yes that was what I was going for. And also to see whether people are as shallow as me and found it such a thrill ;)
 

Forbidden Snowflake

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Oh, I am looking forward to that moment, even though I doubt I will get to experience it. But it sounds like a big thrill. Way bigger than the rollercoaster from last weekend ;)

Congrats veinglory :)
 

awatkins

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Oh, well if you're looking for that kind of shallow, let me in. ;)

The first time I saw my name in print was back in the 80's and I was standing in front of a rack of magazines in a drug store. I'd already gotten my copies but I just had to see them actually on the stand and there they were.

One was Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine and the other was Writer's Digest. I just stood there, holding both magazines open to 'my' pages, grinning like a loon. I might have even giggled hysterically. Yeah, I'm pretty sure it was hysterically. :D
 

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For me, then, it was the February 1992 issue of Black Belt magazine. I looked for it at every grocery store magazine rack I went to.
 

Tracy

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Second only to my baby being born, it was the most thrilling experience of my life. My first novel won a national competition to get published so there was a bit of a fuss over it - so it had its own window in the flagship shop of Ireland's biggest bookshop, in Ireland's premier street. It wasn't the biggest window, nor the most central, BUT STILL!!!

I just stood there for the longest time, forcing myself not to grab passing strangers and point it out to them. I'll remember that experience forever.

And it doesn't diminish. The window devoted to my third book in another bookshop still brings a glow to my heart. And every time I see any of my 3 books in a bookshop at all, it's still a special moment.

In fact, whenever I got into town I go into bookshops to 'visit' my books! (They're not there any more, so much, but when they were ...)
 

icerose

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I'm so jealous. My one and only experience thus far was my Publish America book. I saw it sitting there due to the bookstore manager being a long time family friend and burst into tears because I knew it meant nothing and was so embarrassed to see it there with that grainy cover on a shelf and off colors.

A local teacher bought it who actually didn't know me and wanted it to be included in the Utah school curriculum.

Ah, so depressing.
 

veinglory

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Aw. Well, next time will be even better. And besides, I think there is value to really reaching even one reader--and you did that. So maybe it was the first step to the day when your books are right up front on their own display stand :)
 

icerose

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veinglory said:
Aw. Well, next time will be even better. And besides, I think there is value to really reaching even one reader--and you did that. So maybe it was the first step to the day when your books are right up front on their own display stand :)

Thanks, I hope the next one is exhilarating, rather than heartbreaking. Yeah, I suppose I touched a few readers, but the whole experience was tainted. I hope I haven't become too hardened from the experience to really enjoy the next one, because I know it's that way with acceptances. Like when I get a short story published I kind of shrug and think, so what.
 

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whats it to be a writer if you cant brag about your accomplishments - we should all be so fine to have such bragging right so brag away, i just love hearing success stories
 

Maryn

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When the issue of Ellery Queen with my first short story published in a national market appeared at Barnes & Noble, I surreptitiously took several issues to a somewhat isolated reading area and signed them. I hung around a while waiting to see someone buy one, but it didn't happen.

Maryn, who rarely demostrates that level of ego
 

K1P1

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It's funny, but I can't remember the first time I saw my book in a store, but it must have been at my local independent bookstore when they first got it. I knew they were going to, so it wasn't such a shock. But the day that the FedEx man delivered two boxes of it, straight from the bindery in China, the very first copies to get to the US (I needed them for an event a few days later), I ripped open the box, pulled out about 6 copies and ran down to my husband's office and showed them to him. Then I showered and dressed, and rushed some copies over to the local knitting guild meeting to show them off. I was so excited I could barely contain myself. :)

Then there was the day more recently, when I took my dad to the grocery store, and a magazine on the rack featured my article, listed on the cover. I pulled it out to show it to him. He loved talking loudly about it so other shoppers could hear.
 

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I went to our capital's biggest bookstore and there it was, on the third floor, a quite big pile of my non-fic... I leafed through it and hoped a salesperson would come up and talk to me about it, but alas they did not... It felt good to see it there though. Soon I'll find myself there asking how many copies they have sold...
 

Tracy

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When I said that I visit my books, perhaps i'm hovering suspiciously because staff members come up to me and offer to help me, in THAT tone of voice (i.e. "Either buy something or get out, please". But they're always very nice and pleased for me when I explain that I'm just visiting my books!

Some day I'll be cool and blase about it all, but haven't managed it yet ...
 

Kate Thornton

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That day (back in 1998) I went into the supermarket and bought ten copies of Womans World with my mystery in it - and the clerk asked me (YES! I knew she would!) what I wanted all those copies for so I showed her the story and everyone in line behind me bought one too!
 

janetbellinger

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Must be nice to be published by Ellery Queen, and as a new writer, too. Sigh.
Maryn said:
When the issue of Ellery Queen with my first short story published in a national market appeared at Barnes & Noble, I surreptitiously took several issues to a somewhat isolated reading area and signed them. I hung around a while waiting to see someone buy one, but it didn't happen.

Maryn, who rarely demostrates that level of ego
 

Maryn

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Yeah, it was. Not that it ever happened again. They want "Murder She Wrote" and I'm writing "Red Dragon." (In tone if not quality.)

Maryn, whose short stories are pretty much unmarketable
 
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