On Saturday we held the official launch of my book “Half Him Half Her” at The Quill Collective on Rendezvous Road, Vasse. The venue was perfect. Up until three weeks ago we didn’t know that it existed, but after a conversation with a very dear friend who said she thought it would lend itself to the launch we decided to check it out. From the moment we walked in we knew it was going to be the right place, but what really made it ideal was the welcome we received that day.
We decided to have coffee and the obligatory cakes and I mentioned to the young lady who served me that I was looking for somewhere to host my book launch. She was immediately interested and asked me about my book. I took a copy out of my bag to show her – she looked at the book, then at me, then back at the book and just said “this is the perfect place to launch this book”. She turned and showed the book to her colleague who was making the coffee and her reaction was just as lovely – she looked at the book and then told me her partner is transgender. It just got better and better, we were introduced to another lady who was equally as enthusiastic and she suggested we arrange a meeting to discuss the event.
Absolutely nothing was too much trouble and the date was set. When we arrived at the venue on Saturday the designated area was ready for us, and setting up was easy. Now, I have never attended a book launch before so was probably not expecting it to go the way it did. I thought that people would come, buy a book, have it signed and maybe ask a few questions, have a coffee and leave; but it didn’t quite happen like that. The turn out was probably better than we expected but instead of leaving, the audience just got bigger and I began to realise that I was going to be expected to say a few words. I hadn’t rehearsed anything so it was going to have to be somewhat improvised but I’ve never struggled in that situation so wasn’t panicking until a friend suggested I read a few excerpts from the book. I asked Denise to pick out three for me to read and I stood up to speak. All went well until the third of the excerpts when sadly it all became a little too much and Denise had to take over; there have been some very difficult times over the length of my journey and that particular paragraph happened to be about one of them. In the end it didn’t matter and the audience were very sympathetic.
Overall we felt the whole event went really well and the feedback I’ve had from people who were there has all been excellent. Yet another lovely experience to add to the list, made so much better by being surrounded with positive people.
