Apr 4, 2025 5 min read 2025 tour

Home for a Spell

Last night I slept in my own bed for the first time in a month.

A turquoise bedspread on which are two black and white cats. The one in the foreground, Devon, is a little more sprawled, looking away to the right of the image; in the background, Millie is more loaf-like, looking in the same direction. They look relaxed but alert to the return of their monkeys. — for certain values of "my"

I keep repeating the tour stops like a sort of litany. From Ottawa to New York to Portland (Maine) to Chapel Hill to Cincinnati to St Louis to Tucson to Denver to Los Angeles to Anaheim to Dallas and back to Ottawa. When I got home, I realized that my office calendar was still stuck in February – I'd been so preoccupied with pre-tour preparations that I hadn't even flipped it to March before leaving.

Since March 3, I've travelled through fifteen airports and signed books in three of them; done book events in eight states, including a festival, a convention, and a librarians' conference; signed so many books that I emptied two fountain pens' worth of ink and had to re-up with a week to go; and added 20 new birds to my Life List. I left Ottawa in the wake of a winter storm and temperatures of -20 C, and returned to find the garden and pavements released from snow beneath a gentle, seasonally appropriate sun.

I had such a wonderful time. There's absolutely nothing like getting to meet people who want to tell you, over and over, how much they love the writing you've put into the world; how they're buying it for their friends, their family, their students, their lovers who couldn't make it to the event. It's an almost unbearable grace, a cup lifted overflowing to my lips. One person asked me to inscribe a copy of The River Has Roots to a person they were about to ask out on a date, and I can't tell you with what solemnity I held it as I tried to endow it with all my best wishes through the medium of a signature.

I wrote about the first week of tour here (the bookstore stops) and the second here (the Tucson festival and Colorado resting place), and then fell off of posting for a while because of being among friends in Los Angeles and looking at birds and generally thriving in the sunshine away from screens.

Although it also rained while we were in LA! Which felt magical!

Close-up on two pink crossvine flowers, dotted with raindrops, against a blurred background of outdoor cafe.

Stu joined me in LA, and we got to do a bit of sight-seeing together, visiting The Last Bookstore, the Bradbury building, the Academy museum, many excellent restaurants, and the Griffith Observatory, which absolutely took my breath away.

A photo of my spouse and me in front of a magnificent mountain vista at sunset. To our left is the setting sun in hazy clouds; to the right the soft grey smoke-like clouds obscure the top of the Hollywood hills, the Hollywood just barely visible. In the foreground, my husband, a tall white man with light brown hair, a beard, and glasses, wears a white flannel shirt and brown corduroy trousers, and has his arm around me. I'm wearing a billowy black t-shirt catching some of the wind.

Both Wondercon and the Texas Library Association's conference were one-panel affairs for me; I sheepishly didn't get many photos at Wondercon, except for when I was mesmerized by this bookseller wizardry in support of stock-signing.

A stack of interleaved copies of THE RIVER HAS ROOTS, open to the title page for signing, cascading like a deck of cards mid-shuffle.

At the TLA, though, I at least remembered to take a photo of our post-panel signing line and, crucially, my outfit.

In a very large event room, the audience is queued up against the left-hand wall, leaving all the chairs in the middle of the room empty. In the foreground is a microphone and a stack of HIS FACE IS THE SUN by Michelle Jabès Corpora

Bathroom mirror selfie in which my dark hair's up in a braided bun, and I'm wearing a dark green silk headband by Jasmine Chong, a stained glass necklace by Jen Parrish, a green and black keffiyeh over the Banner corset by Samantha Pleet with a medieval tapestry print on black, over black velvet trousers. I'm also wearing painted pomegranate earrings by Luna Sangre and a dark red lipstick by Kaleidos called Dahlia, a leather bracelet with brass buckle details on the wrist of the hand holding up my phone as well as several rings.

Dallas made such a huge impression on me in such a short time, not least because our dear friend Bo Bolander gave us extremely good restaurant recommendations. I'm still thinking about the incredible meal we had at Tei-An, as well as the gorgeous cacophony of great-tailed grackles, northern mockingbirds, and white-winged doves just outside the Omni hotel.

Not to mention its rooftop infinity pool.

A dramatically lit rooftop pool at evening, turquoise water rimmed by a purple walkway, surrounded by tall light-spangled buildings beneath a warm cloudy night-time sky.

It was a very indulgent end to a tremendous tour.

I noticed a strange thing on returning. One of the most vivid markers of spring in Ottawa for me is the moment that I can feel the sidewalks underfoot unmediated by snow or ice. There'll be leftover grit that crunches in a specific way before it, too, yields to rain – but there's a lightness, an ease to feeling sneakers on solid ground instead of boots on snow, something deep and specific that makes me relax into the season. My whole body knows it – a shift into stability, an ability to stand a little straighter instead of leaning forward, counterbalancing the possibility of ice.

But despite having spent the bulk of the past month in places without snow, I never got that shock of connection, of transition, until I found myself in my driveway again. That this ground, in this place, should have its own distinct feeling underfoot – that I should notice it, starkly, after a month of walking freely elsewhere – is a quiet revelation. I'm forever building new taxonomies of light when I travel – London's rich and syrupy in the late autumn, Vancouver's white and clean in early spring, Ottawa's rich and yellow in deep summer – but it's never occurred to me to look for this kind of rooted recognition.

A, well, soleful experience. If you will.

Anyway! I'm only back home for a week; I'm off to C2E2 in Chicago next Friday. More on that, and the UK tour, below.

I hope you're keeping well and safe in the midst of all the turmoil of this world, and finding ways to work for the liberation of all sentient beings.

Wishing you every good thing,

Amal

A photo of me at the Griffith Observatory standing in front of a gigantic pair of outspread bronze wings while dressed all in black with my arms folded, making it look like the wings are sprouting from my back. My hair's in a top knot and I'm wearing glasses, stud earrings, and an amusedly thoughtful expression as I look towards the top right of the photo. In the background is a bright sun setting over the Hollywood hills.

Postscripts

Catch me at C2E2 in Chicago on Saturday, April 12! I'll be on a panel at 1:30PM called "From Time Travel to Kingdoms Long Ago: How Writers Build Universes," with J. S. Dewes, John Scalzi, Kel Kade, and Mary Robinette Kowal. There'll be a signing afterwards at Booth 163 (Anderson's Bookshop), from 2:30 - 3:15.
You can now get tickets for all my UK events this month via this one handy link! There'll be two stops in London, one in Leeds, and one in Glasgow! I hope to see you there!
Canada stops are shaping up! So far you can be sure to catch me in Ottawa on Saturday, May 3, at 8:30 PM during the Ottawa International Writers' Festival, with events to be announced in Toronto and Montreal soon!