Good news. When I last visited the local Barnes & Noble, I learned that two out of three of the autographed copies of Hungry Thing had already been sold, and the manager had ordered three more!

Because I put something different in each copy, I opened up the remaining in-store copy to see which bonus autograph variant had not yet been nabbed. It was this one. (see image below). I hope that's not a reflection on the poem!

 

"On His Deathbed, Uncle Mort" was actually composed as a companion piece to a longer, humorous story poem, "On Her Death Bed, Aunty Rose", first published in the now defunct Dastaan Magazine, Chapter 6: "Fantasy Lands" (Once free online, archive issues of the e-zine are now only available behind a paywall, here).

 In other poetry news, I printed a ream of my poetry already published online (much is available as free reads, see side bar) and mailed it to my parents. My father, who is also a poet, phoned me to say, "I bow to the master!" My mom reported that he cried with joy reading some of it. Now, that's good parenting.

Finally, I wrote a new humorous poem, "Angels Congregate on Wings", which I'm considering reserving unpublished for a chapbook of my poetry. I have a few about angels, which might allow for a themed chapter. So far, reactions to the poem have been overwhelmingly positive.

Months ago, I visited the Barnes & Noble book store in O'Fallon, Illinois, and mentioned to one of the managers there that I was a local author, and showed him my book.

He said that they sometimes do "Local Author" displays, and could give me a call then, when they might include my book. I left him a copy, to help him remember.  He never did. 

Months later, I visited the same store and spoke to a different manager, who happened to be a fan of poetry. He took down my information and made a purchase request on the spot for three copies. 

I checked back after a few weeks, and he apologized, explaining that the purchasing manager declined to put through the order. However, he made a second request, this time adding arguments for why the purchase should go through.

Eventually, he called me to say that the books had been ordered!  He promised to call when they arrived, and suggested I come by the store to autograph the copies. I said I would autograph three copies I have at home and swap them out instead. He thought that was a good idea.

I don't have a lot of experience yet autographing books, so in the future, I may improve my efforts by using a thicker pen, etc., but one thing I did which I think was fairly novel was to hand-write a brief darkly humorous poem to accompany my autograph in two of the books. I wrote a different original poem in each one.

At the beginning of April, I visited the store and saw my books on display! (See photos above and right)

I learned this past weekend that one of the three store copies had been sold.

Poetry is not everbody's cup of tea, and mine is not even the most common subgenre of the art. Though dark, it playfully embraces numerous of literary devices, including aliteration and rhyme.

And Norbert Somosi's surrealist artwork! There are more than 20 detailed, ink line-drawings.

I have good reason to believe most people who discover Hungry Thing will enjoy it. 

See all the Amazon reviews here, and check out the poster below (fashioned by my talented neice, Tiphany) for why I believe so:

Amazon reviews of Hungry Thing  

Finally, here are the purchase links, in case you'd like your own copy:

Hungry Thing on Lulu (this direct option pays the author and illustrator the most) 

Hungry Thing on Amazon 

Hungry Thing on Barnes & Noble