Dayton, Ohio – I used to work in television news and well remember the special community of anchors, techs, producers and camera people who gave the studios a festive and particular air. Studios now are eerily barren and remote, many of the jobs lost to robot cameras and computerized control rooms. Anchors sit in quiet electronic hives, dark and disconnected. Izzy and I came in for the noon interview at WDTN-TV promoting my talk tonight at Books & Co. in Dayton.

The anchor, Marsha, was intelligent, thoughtful. She had just been given the book that morning and had no chance to read it and we talked between segments. Many of her colleagues had been let go by the robot cameras who slid back and forth silently. We are becoming a series of disconnected worlds, good jobs lost to save a few dollars here and there to keep stockholders happer. There is no end to the human cuts that can be made in the Corporate Nation, not that any politician will ever talk about it.

Book tours sometimes feel like a journey through disconnected worlds – TV studios, hotels, chain restaurants- punctuated by close encounters with readers and book lovers at bookstores.

Izzy, who loves to greet people, went off by himself and lay down. This egregiously social dog reflected the eerie character of the robot floor.

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Good news. Local TV producer Joe Rodio has found a place for me to go to talk to readers and book lovers on the guerrilla book tour on October 26: the South Hadley Public Library. Part of my joint effort with Random House to find new ways of using a book tour to connect with readers Details to come.