The best idea ever

CAAF, who finally reached the end of her longrunning saga involving a library, a parking lot, and a dented leg,  links to Wendy McClure’s tongue-in-cheek idea about how to handle book tours:

Speaking of readings, did you see how Margaret Atwood went and invented this thing that signs books from a remote location? No, really: Margaret Atwood totally invented a robot arm that signs books. That’s just surreal. Wouldn’t it be great if writers just did that stuff all the time? Like if David Foster Wallace just came up with some crazy precision laser beam that can render legible footnotes in microscopic -15pt type, or Tom Wolfe devised an electromagnetic wand to detect irony in sex scenes? Personally I would improve on the book-signing invention by solving the women-writers-can’t-get-male-groupies problem at the same time. That’s right–I would build a Book-Touring Femmebot, with Realdoll parts and NPR personality. Among its many features it would adminster a stun-gun-like shock to anyone who says something like, “So your book, it’s really just chick lit, right?” or “Why aren’t you on Oprah?”

I adore this. It would be so handy to have a Femmebot version of me handy if I have to field questions on where I get my ideas and who I see playing my main characters in a movie. Never mind that the bot version can get to all the cities the author simply can’t visit!