Don't look at the sales... here are the sales...

America Unchained was published on a Thursday. I'm not sure when the book industry collects its weekly sales figures but they reveal them on a Tuesday. Which is why my publishers called me during the week of publication and said, "By the way, don't be worrying about the sales figures when they come out... you won't be in the charts because you've only got two or three days of sales compared to everyone else."

I took them at their word. But then last Tuesday my editor called me.
"Do you want to know the sales figures?" he asked.
"Not really," I said, "You told me I shouldn't worry about them this week..."
"That was before we saw them," said he. "It's good news... you're in the top ten!"
"That's brilliant!" I said. "And we've only had two or three days of sales!"
"I know!" he squeaked. "You're in at number nine. But," he continued, "don't get too excited about next week..."
"But we'll have a full week of sales next week..."
"Yes... but you've done a lot of press and a lot of readings," came the reply, "you won't have the same exposure next week so things might tail off..."
"Okay," I said, "that makes a lot of sense... I won't go looking next week."
"Just celebrate this week... it's a real achievement... well done."

And so on. Cut to an hour ago when I received a phone call...
"Do you want to know the sales figures?"
"Not really," I said, "You told me I shouldn't worry about them this week..."
"That was before we saw them," said he. "It's good news... you've gone up to number six!"

In other news... this is what Mark. E. Smith would look like if he wore my glasses:

For the time being, I think signed copies of the book are still available from Play.com but if they run out, you can always get the book from here.