Announcing the Picks and Shovels book tour
There’s a nonzero chance that you and I will shortly be in the same city!
If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2025/02/06/picks-and-shovels-tour/#19-cities-plus-plus
My next novel, Picks and Shovels, is officially out in the US and Canada on Feb 17, and I’m about to leave on a 20+ city book-tour, which means there’s a nonzero chance I’ll be in a city near you between now and the end of the spring!
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels
Picks and Shovels is a standalone novel starring Martin Hench — my hard-charging, two-fisted, high-tech forensic accountant — in his very first adventure, in the early 1980s. It’s a story about the Weird PC era, when no one was really certain what shape PCs should be, who should make them, who should buy them, and what they’re for. It features a commercial war between two very different PC companies.
The first one, Fidelity Computing, is a predatory multi-level marketing faith scam, run by a Mormon bishop, a Catholic priest, and an orthodox rabbi. Fidelity recruits people to exploit members of their faith communities by selling them third-rate PCs that are designed as rip-off lock-ins, forcing you to buy special floppies for their drives, special paper for their printers, and to use software that is incompatible with everything else in the world.
The second PC company is Computing Freedom, a rebel alliance of three former Fidelity Computing sales-managers: an orthodox woman who’s been rejected by her family after coming out as queer; a Mormon woman who’s rejected the Church over its opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment, and a nun who’s quit her order to join the Liberation Theology movement in the struggle for human rights in America’s dirty wars.
In the middle of it all is Martin Hench, coming of age in San Francisco during the PC bubble, going to Dead Kennedys shows, getting radicalized by ACT UP!, and falling in love — all while serving as CFO and consigliere to Computing Freedom, as a trade war turns into a shooting war, and they have to flee for their lives.
The book’s had fantastic early reviews, with endorsements from computer historians like Steven Levy (Hackers), Claire Evans (Broad-Band), John Markoff (What the Doormouse Said) and Dan’l Lewin (CEO of the Computer History Museum). Stephen Fry raved that he “hugely enjoyed” the “note perfect,” “superb” story.
And I’m about to leave on tour! I have nineteen confirmed dates, and two nearly confirmed dates, and there’s more to come! I hope you’ll consider joining me at one of these events. I’ve got a bunch of fantastic conversation partners joining me onstage and online, and the bookstores that are hosting me are some of my favorite indie booksellers in the world.
BOSTON (Feb 14): Boskone, 4PM, Westin Boston Seaport District
BOSTON (Feb 14): Brookline Booksmith with KEN LIU, 7PM, 279 Harvard Street, Brookline
VIRTUAL (Feb 15): YANIS VAROUFAKIS, sponsored by Jacobin and hosted by David Moscrop, 10AM Pacific, 1PM Eastern, 6PM UK, 7PM CET
MENLO PARK (Feb 17): Kepler’s Books with CHARLIE JANE ANDERS, 7PM, 1010 El Camino Real
LOS ANGELES (Feb 18): Diesel Bookstore with WIL WHEATON, 630PM, 225 26th Street, Santa Monica
SEATTLE (Feb 19): Third Place Books with DAN SAVAGE, 7PM, 17171 Bothell Way NW Lake Forest Park
TORONTO (Feb 23): Another Story, 630PM, 315 Roncesvalles Ave
NYC (Feb 26): The Strand with JOHN HODGMAN, 7PM, 828 Broadway
PENN STATE (Feb 27): Kern Auditorium, 7PM, 112 Kern Building
DOYLESTOWN (Mar 1): Doylestown Bookshop, 12PM, 16 S Main St
BALTIMORE (Mar 2): Red Emma’s, 2PM, 630PM, 3128 Greenmount Ave
DC (Mar 4): Cleveland Park Library with MATT STOLLER, 630PM, 3310 Connecticut Ave NW
RICHMOND (Mar 5): Fountain Bookstore with LEE VINSEL, 6PM, 1312 E Cary St
AUSTIN (Mar 10): First Light Books, 7PM, 4300 Speedway/43rd
BURBANK (Mar 13): Dark Delicacies, 6PM, 822 N. Hollywood Way
SAN DIEGO (Mar 24): Mysterious Galaxy, 7PM, 3555 Rosecrans
BELFAST (Mar 24) (remote): Imagine! Festival with ALAN MEBAN, 7PM UK
CHICAGO, Apr 2: Exile in Bookville with PETER SAGAL, 7PM, 410 S Michigan Ave, 2nd floor
BLOOMINGTON, Apr 4: Morgenstern Books, 6PM, 642 N Madison St
PDX, Jun 20 (TBC): Powell’s Books (date and time to be confirmed)
I’m also finalizing plans for one or two dates in NEW ZEALAND at the end of April, as well as a ATLANTA date, likely on March 26.
I really hope you’ll come out and say hello. I know these are tough times. Hanging out with nice people who care about the same stuff as you is a genuine tonic.
