After some good questions from the audience (I didn't take any notes, this is from memory, and I would love to see a transcript), Guy prepared to read the young people in the meadow sequence. He prefaced his remarks with the now-familiar threat (he would say "invitation") that any reference to his reading glasses (he used a phrase like insidious instruments of incipient senescence, but his was better) making him look distinguished would lead to a misspelling of one's name at the signing.
Guy described himself as slow to come to realization a couple of times during the Q&A and during this reading, I finally realized (after reading him since the Summer Tree first came out) that as a writer, he is an unabashed purveyor of delayed gratification. This might also explain his proclivity to engage in blood sports like teasing with people like Mark and Debby, often to his peril. Guy loves to craft scenes that build like this: innocuous setting, nature and peace. A threat slowly intrudes and grows. A confrontation, which then pauses. Time passes very slowly as the reader is drawn deeper and deeper into the scene with detailed description of the surroundings and/or key instrument. Sweat drips. Suddenly the tension is resolved, but obliquely. (What, what? says the reader) Detailed gentle description follows (birds chirp) as the reader agonizes over the resolution while lingering over the sensuous details. Pushed and pulled at the same time. The young people in the meadow scene is emblematic of the sort of scene that Guy writes so well and a technique he uses so effectively. I love his execution but it has taken me 20 years of reading to come to the slow realization that Guy just loves to tease. In life, and as a writer.
It seemed like half the room lined up to get a book signed and we were duly handed sticky notes to have the spellings of our names handy, and I discovered I was a thorn amongst roses, between the Two Tanyas, waiting in line. Guy signed for the ladies, and some wag pointed out that everyone else's book would be signed to "Not-Tanya". I paid my respects, noted I had been enjoying following his exploits at Bright Weavings, and Guy said that the weblog was ending, for which he was in a sense grateful because he was concerned that it risked becoming writerly, or that the experiences would bleed one into the other, the consciousness of the audience.
So it was a very enjoyable evening. I'm glad to hear the book is doing very well. Gone to reprint in both the US and Canada two weeks after publication.