Things are getting real, folks. We are now only two and a half weeks from our April 1 release day, and rumor has it the finished books arrived at our office yesterday afternoon (right after I left for the day, as my luck would have it). Over the past week or so, there has been an uptick in post-AWP activity. Here’s what we’ve been up to:

We are busy following up with reviewers, planning a blog tour, contacting bookstores to schedule readings, and chasing down as many publicity leads as we can. This kind of work involves a lot of email; it’s not the most glamorous part of publishing, but witnessing how responsive and receptive people are is rewarding.

We offer free digital review copies through Edelweiss, which is an online tool for all kinds of people who work with books. We review each download request, and it’s always exciting to see requests come through from the people we have been pitching to. (On that note: if you are interested in reviewing The Wax Bullet War, or if you are a blogger and are interested in having Sean write a guest post, please email marketing@ooliganpress.pdx.edu; we’d love to hear from you!)

Last week I promised an exciting update, so I’ll share one final bit of news. For those of you in Portland (or for ambitious road-trippers), Sean will be reading at Powell’s City of Books on Burnside on Tuesday, May 27—the day after Memorial Day—at 7:30 p.m. In the preface of The Wax Bullet War, Sean eloquently writes about his friends who were killed during their tour in Iraq, about how exceptional the men of Bravo Company were, and about how he hopes to use his story to honor them. This reading seemed an appropriate way to observe the holiday and pay respect to these men. I hope you’ll mark your calendars early and join us for this event.

Until next week,
Laurel