Author signings. First things first Hunter Lovins, author of landmark Energy Unbound and most recently Natural Capitalism (we have signed copies and gave us a Top 10 Reading List!) came by followed by Winona LaDuke, author of Recovering the Sacred. But the storm was building, and it wasn’t for our first two ultra-respected authors…

A large black man, lanky but confident moving slides into the bookstore, not around the back to the signing table but straight to the front and asks for a Sharpie. A line of 75 has formed and more are being snagged by the antics of one Aaron King. He is Michael Franti He has put out DVDs, he has sold myriad CDs, and now he’s drawing hundreds of people for not just a book signing, but individual conversations, photos, and for every single person, a hug. His manager was concerned about how the line was moving and I responded, “Sorry, D’Arcy, admittedly we’re not quite used to author huggings.”

Used to it or not, it would go on for an hour followed by the man himself laying some knowledge on us to the tune of a top 5 book list and signing Ryan’s (real) guitar (I say real because earlier I won a Guitar Hero contest on stage, because I am that big of a nerd. I also just got in a discussion with an author about the merits of double dash vs. semicolon). Not too bad, I’d say.

The night will be punctuated with a movie in the tent, re-sorting the books (gotta make it look like we have more after we’ve pushed so much stock!), and rocking out to Diplo to the wee hours. Then tomorrow, more signings and more sales!