Only for a very short amount of time however. I had just gotten out of my college English class and was wanting to spend some time at Barnes and Nobles before doing my nightly jog and heading home. When I came in, he was just cleaning up after having spoke to a small audience of people, answered some questions, and told some stories. The stories, I overheard a few time by people passing by, were quite funny. Writing is something of interest to me. I love reading, and would like to write someday. Yes, I know this is laughable since my writing here is typically horid, but I can write well…just not here for some reason. Honest. The short experience of meeting a published author really caught me off guard, and I wished I had some prepared questions for him. For a very long time, some guy was yapping at him and I was beggining to wonder if I was ever going to get a word in. I suspect Dorsey was getting frusterated as well after I noticed him squeeze a paper thingy in his hand.
After the guy finally said his good byes and thank you’s, I asked two very contrived questions:
So as a published author, how much do you read?
“I love to read, and do it all the time” he responded, “but I still wish I had more time to do it. I find myself wanting to create more lately than read.”. I responded that a lot of people find themselves wanting to create and teach more and more as they grow older. He more or less repeated this back to me in different words so that they sounded like it was the first time this information was shared in the conversation.
What have you found to be a better way of learning to write: Reading books, or taking English classes? I often find the more I read the more my prose improves…
Really can’t remember the words he used here, but he more or less said that as a writer, you don’t need a college degree. He had a degree in something else…can’t remember for the life of me what it was, but maybe it’ll come back later. At that, he opened up one of his books, The Stingray Shuffle, and reccomended I read the opening as an introduction to his books. Then he abruptly said bye and left.
Nice guy; seemed pretty knowledgable too. After reading the opening to his book, I noticed some very strong similarities between his writing and that of Hunter S Thompson’s. It made me want to put the book down, chase after the author, and ask just how much was he influenced by The Good Doctor. But ultimately I wasn’t too interested. At the time I thought maybe he was just knocking off Thompson’s style (The swine!), but now figure there has to be some good in his book if some of his fans are Dopers, and well read ones at that.
Still, I have a pretty big reading list, so I don’t see myself reading any of his books anytime soon. I’m sure I’d like them; some past threads described them as being Tarantino/Thompson-esque, with plenty of gratuitous killing and dark comedy, and that’s right up my alley. However, there’s other books I’m more interested in right now. I do look forward to seeing him again, and next time I’ll have better prepared questions. He’s bound to show up again, since I know this isn’t the first time he’s shown up to sign books. Last time it was for Trigger Fish Twist.
Now, for anyone interested, Tim Dorsey signed all of the hardcovers of his new book, Torpedo Juice. If anyone around here was interested in owning a signed copy, I could call up Barnes and Nobles, ask for the price of the book, and send out copies. Email me if you’re interested.