Ah! Now this is interesting. According to the (excellent) Pratchett biography Rob Wilkins published last year, book signings did seem to bring out the worst in Terry. It's easy to understand why; he felt like book shops, particularly the big chains, didn't really know how to run signings, so would give the author an uncomfortable chair, crappy desk and then leave them marooned in an endless sea of fans without any real crowd control (or ability to end the thing).
So, he probably was a bit of a dick to you, as the present face of the Chain Book Industrial Complex. Tony Robinson also thought Pratchett hated him, for years, until they spoke and he found out that Terry hated the abridged versions of his books that Tony read for audio, rather than the actor himself. The impression comes through that he could be unreasonably gruff in the moment, but recognised this when he'd calmed down. It should also be noted that, once the Alzheimers became too much, he continued to conduct book signings, where he would use a rubber stamp and fingerprint instead of a signature.
That makes sense. Crowd control ammounted to a sequence of those stretchy-barrier-things they have at airports snaking through the store and out the door. I don't recall there being any security staff for signings, aside from Mrs. Thatch, which were more the black suited types, probably packing heat. There would've been extra staff about, of course, but the signing table was often a scrum that little 'ol me probably didn't manage very well.
I remember this well (sorry Richie!) and always wondered whether the subject was ever broached when Rhianna started at Zone.
(I completely understand the regret, but the brief tale of your encounter and use of the phrase, "Oi, you, show me the way to the bogs" always tickled me, along with the pantomime anger/bitterness that followed...)
That May '99 issue of Zone was the same one that featured Macca's 'How to get your girlfriend into games' feature... My (faulty) memory was that the angry response to this prompted an invitation to a female reader to write a review, but that was a couple of years later. (Alison Baker was the reader, and she got her own 'Meet the Team' profile, but it was a one month - and a one review? - cameo only).
Teresa Maughan's review of [awful 'adult' point and clicker] The Orion Conspiracy was in the first issue of Zone that I ever bought - it was a delightfully sober and funny takedown, of the kind that was just as much a part of what made the magazine great in those days as the more off-the-wall stylings of Brooker, Mr Cursor et al. But I can't remember seeing too much more of her writing after that.
Ah! Now this is interesting. According to the (excellent) Pratchett biography Rob Wilkins published last year, book signings did seem to bring out the worst in Terry. It's easy to understand why; he felt like book shops, particularly the big chains, didn't really know how to run signings, so would give the author an uncomfortable chair, crappy desk and then leave them marooned in an endless sea of fans without any real crowd control (or ability to end the thing).
So, he probably was a bit of a dick to you, as the present face of the Chain Book Industrial Complex. Tony Robinson also thought Pratchett hated him, for years, until they spoke and he found out that Terry hated the abridged versions of his books that Tony read for audio, rather than the actor himself. The impression comes through that he could be unreasonably gruff in the moment, but recognised this when he'd calmed down. It should also be noted that, once the Alzheimers became too much, he continued to conduct book signings, where he would use a rubber stamp and fingerprint instead of a signature.
We are multifaceted things!
That makes sense. Crowd control ammounted to a sequence of those stretchy-barrier-things they have at airports snaking through the store and out the door. I don't recall there being any security staff for signings, aside from Mrs. Thatch, which were more the black suited types, probably packing heat. There would've been extra staff about, of course, but the signing table was often a scrum that little 'ol me probably didn't manage very well.
I remember this well (sorry Richie!) and always wondered whether the subject was ever broached when Rhianna started at Zone.
(I completely understand the regret, but the brief tale of your encounter and use of the phrase, "Oi, you, show me the way to the bogs" always tickled me, along with the pantomime anger/bitterness that followed...)
That May '99 issue of Zone was the same one that featured Macca's 'How to get your girlfriend into games' feature... My (faulty) memory was that the angry response to this prompted an invitation to a female reader to write a review, but that was a couple of years later. (Alison Baker was the reader, and she got her own 'Meet the Team' profile, but it was a one month - and a one review? - cameo only).
Teresa Maughan's review of [awful 'adult' point and clicker] The Orion Conspiracy was in the first issue of Zone that I ever bought - it was a delightfully sober and funny takedown, of the kind that was just as much a part of what made the magazine great in those days as the more off-the-wall stylings of Brooker, Mr Cursor et al. But I can't remember seeing too much more of her writing after that.