following gaiman/ to fully booked (i will not be censored)

it's been a very exhausting weekend for me and karl, following the great neil gaiman around the city. despite the lack of sleep after friday's agaw agimat gig, my sister and i arrived at 10:30 am at rockwell to get our numbers (427 & 429). after lunch, shopping, coffee, an anticipated mass, dinner and what must be like going 5 or more times around rockwell, we lined up at around 11 pm and finished with a hug and kiss from neil at 11:45. my calves hurt till yesterday. i also screamed my lungs out, much to my throat's chagrin. today i have a sore throat. karl went to the opening of the gathering last saturday, and got something signed at his interview the following day. he gave neil some amulets from quiapo, while my sister and i gave him chrysanthemums (or something like that, he wrote in lana's book). yesterday we went to the presscon/writers' forum where many people asked stupid questions, so we ditched that eventually. upon arriving at gateway, we saw the impossible line that probably reached aurora blvd. sadly, rica and karen were there, and they limited the number of books at one point, and many other unfortunate, unnecessary decisions that could have been avoided had fully booked prepared better. up yours, beotch!

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I am deeply disappointed in some of the decisions made by Fully Booked in the handling of the recent signing events. First of all, I do not appreciate the announcement of one set of rules, only to be replaced with several major changes. I think the biggest lapse of judgement on the bookstore's part is opening the signing to the general public instead of limiting it to the store's patrons. As someone who bought a Gaiman book from Fully Booked, having it signed is part of your promise to me as a consumer, and to all other customers who patronized your bookstore. Opening the signing to the general public, some of whom arrived earlier in line, caused some of your customers to forfeit their book signing privilege. I think it is very unfair for one to not be issued a number if they have several book signing passes while others have a number and yet did not buy anything from the bookstore.

Also, giving out numbers for Sunday and Monday DURING the Saturday event is also very unfair to those who have planned to arrive only on Sunday or on Monday. We all must take the risk of going to one particular signing and sacrifice the same amount of effort in securing numbers. Instead, people who were LATE ON SATURDAY but GOT A NUMBER FOR SUNDAY DON'T EVEN HAVE TO ARRIVE EARLY THE NEXT DAY BECAUSE THEY ARE ASSURED OF HAVING THEIR BOOKS SIGNED- they are late TWICE OVER!! What about those who made an effort to arrive early on the second or third day? NAISAHAN NA SILA! In addition, you promised that people will be issued only one number, hence stamping our arms with your logo. This control truly failed because I know of people who had a number for Saturday and was able to secure another priority number for Sunday.

I am quite sure that several industry standards would have been available to you during the preparation of these events: a) that signings are limited only to those who buy from the hosting bookstore; b) that it is also limited to ONE TITLE being promoted by the author. I truly believe that IGNORING these standards resulted in the DISSATISFACTION of many of your clients, as well as the UNNECESSARY EXHAUSTION of Mr. Neil Gaiman.

I hope you can remedy these lapses, and keep in mind this sad incident the next time you host a book signing.
Sincerely,
Tanya Tiotuyco