Bah.

I'm going to write about what happened to my novel some other time (it's not a tale with a particularly happy ending, although I did manage to write a story longer than anything I've ever written before) but today's quota of disappointment must come from the events of the past couple of hours.

By this point in the day I was hoping to have in my hands a signed copy of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, signed by actor Christopher Lee, who is signing in The Cinema Store in Nottingham today.

Now, Christopher Lee, as well as being an actor of many years experience, is a serious Tolkien afficionado with a knowledge of the books bordering on the encyclopaedic. I thought it would be really cool to replace my old copy of the book with one signed by the man who is perhaps its best known scholar, and also to get a chance to meet a man whom I rather admire.

But, after all, Christopher Lee had nothing to do with the creation of the book, and might not have wanted to sign it. So I made it a point to find out in advance whether this was possible. I went into the store a few days ago and asked if they'd be getting any of the books in. "Yes," I was told by two members of staff, and shown a fine hardbound copy of Tolkien's masterwork with a translucent slip cover. "We're getting a load of these in specially." I asked if Mr. Lee would be signing them. Once again I was told yes. Great.

Fast forward to today, and I've made the trip into town, through the rain. I enter the Cinema Store a couple of hours before Christopher Lee is due to show up, and there are no translucent-slip-covered books in sight. I queue, and I'm told when I get to the counter that they have no copies of The Lord of the Rings, and that Mr. Lee would not sign them anyway. He will sign a few other things, I am told, but many of them seem to be on the level of the Star Wars: Attack of the Clones Jumbo Sticker Book, which I feel would have been not only embarrassing to me, but rather insulting to ask him to sign. There were a few quality items on the counter - notably, the DVDs - but they either didn't interest me or were things I already owned. And since you had to buy something in order to meet him, and I wasn't particularly interested in queueing for an hour or more in order to get a signed copy of The Two Towers Visual Companion, I left. Result: one completely wasted journey into town.

I'd like to dedicate this entry to the fine staff at the Cinema Store, Nottingham, who as far as I can tell, told me bare-faced lies on Tuesday in order to get me back into the shop today. Bravo. I regret now not making a scene about this, but I was at the front of a long queue and it just didn't occur to me at the time.

I was really looking forward to meeting Christopher Lee. I'd planned out what I was going to say, so that I didn't freeze up while standing in front of him. I would have told him how much I enjoyed his contributions to the cast commentary on the Fellowship DVD, that I found it informative and fascinating, and that I thought it was one of the highlights of the set.

Oh well. Maybe in the future I'll get another chance.