For a long time now I've been meaning to catalogue my tour dates in one
spot on my web site, to put together as complete a list as possible of
all the event's I've done since I first started touring to promote my
books in early 2000. Today I finally got round to making a start!!!
It's not as straightforward as it might seem -- although my more recent
tours are neatly laid out on my Shanville Monthly, I've changed styles
and formats quite often so copying them over is quite a lengthy
process! And with my earlier dates, I have to go back to my old
diaries!! But I've made a good start and already complete 3 of the
years -- I hope to add the other 5 over the next couple of days. If you
want to see what the list was like for my very first year, you can
click on the following link:
http://www.darrenshan.com/monthly/archive/Tours2000/2000index.htmlI've
added some notes (such as when I did my first public event, when I
first used a microphone, etc), as well as approximate audience numbers
where possible -- the figures aren't accurate, but they're pretty close
-- where I don't have any real idea, I've left it blank. I hadn't
realized I spent so much of my first year just touring in Ireland -- in
my memory, I thought I'd toured lots in the UK as well in 2000, but as
you can see, I just did a few events there later in the year. It was
nice going back and putting this together -- I remembered places and
events which I haven't thought about in years, both the good (signing
for more than an hour for the first time) and the bad (my first no-show
at a signing session). I recalled my first ever panel event, where the
"host" spent more time talking than he allowed any of those of us on
the panel!!!! My first trip to Edinburgh -- I was really nervous, but
my nerves were settled when I bumped into Anthony Horowitz for the
first time and he exclaimed, "Darren Shan?!? My son thinks you're a
writing god!!!"
The most amusing thing I came across though was
an entry from the middle of the year, when I complained about being a
bit tired of performing the
Cirque Du Freak
scene where the woman gets her hand bitten off by the wolf man!!! I'd
done it at virtually every event and was getting a bit bored of it.
Little did I know that 8 years later I'd still be performing it
regularly!!!! But these days I get a real kick out of it. It's not
something I need to do -- I have plenty of other books to read out from
-- but it always works the best in a live situation and I have fun
seeing different actors put their own spin on it. It's sort of my
signature piece -- I could no more not do the CDF scene when I'm
touring than The Rolling Stones couldn't do
Satisfaction live, or The Who couldn't do
My Generation!!! I don't perform it at
every
event, but it's never far away, and neither is the plastic hand which I
use in it!! Actually, thinking of that, I just recalled that I didn't
use a fake hand in the early days -- it was something I added later.
I'll have to try to pin down the date when I started to incorporate it,
though I'm not sure if it's something I'll have noted in my diary.
Guess there's only one way to find out ... Watch this space!!!!
