compiled by
Phyllis
PHANTOM
AWARDS
November 1998 -
JUNE 1999
There's been a nasty
rumor, perpetrated by some guy named George Lucas,
that the Noraholics are a PHANTOM MENACE! To dispel
that misinformation, I'm handing out awards to all
our hardworking fans who have been introducing
family, friends, coworkers and absolute strangers
to books by Nora Roberts and J.D. Robb. Here are
the winners in no particular order. If you have AOL
and want to read their stories, I've included the
date of their posted nomination:
The Best Laid Plans
Award goes to
Edith (ApleHeart) who wanted to introduce the OR
staff to Nora by listening to River's End during surgery. Unfortunately the
anesthesiologist knocked her out rather than giving
her a local. It was their loss.
The It's True Love
Award goes to our
newlyweds Lisa (Enseno 11/30/98) and Keith, son of
JJ (Frolic). Keith bought Lisa a copy of PMT,
completing Lisa's Nora collection and making her a
member of The Queen's Court. He obviously was well
brought up and loves Lisa very much. A match made
in cyberspace.
The Thanks for the
Dinner & Here's Something Else to Spend Your
Money On Award
goes to Tammy (Tn Thb 11/11/98) for convincing 2
friends who took her out for her birthday to spend
more of their money for The Reef & Naked in
Death.
The Perfect Wedding
Shower Gift Award
is for Lynda (MiladyJane 11/16/98) because she gave
her good friend copies of the Calhouns, the
Donovans, Sanctuary, Montana Sky & True
Betrayals. As time has gone on, Kristi has cleaned
Lynda out of all her duplicate books and now Kristi
has hooked another friend on Nora.
Elaine (Eschmook 11/19/98)
wins the Pass It
Along Award for
loaning the Dream series to a former co-worker and
then allowing her to pass them on to someone else
to read. Of course these were only reading copies,
but it's the thought that counts. Elaine knew to
keep her autographed copies at home. She also gets
the You Say Potato,
I Say Potato Award
for giving Sacred
Sins to a
different co-worker, who swears that she never
reads romance and now wants more, more, more
Nora.
The With It Senior
Neighbor Award has
been won by Shannon (SRHDexter11/23/98) for loaning
her Nora's to a 60+ neighbor who also has her
husband read them. The neighbor thought that Nora's
heroes have an aura that says "Do Me"!
CADutch (11/26/98) has
The What Are
Sisters For Award
for giving her sister the Born In series as a
present and now her sister is running around to all
the UBS's trying to find Nora's backlist.
The It Seemed A Good
Idea At The Time Award is for Gerri (GHamm58078 11/30/98)
who hooked her mil and aunt on Nora and now they
hang around giggling and reading the good parts in
stereo. For your sake Gerri, I hope they don't do
this to you during tax season. Of course when
Gerri's not totaling columns of numbers, she's at
the bookstore winning her In Addition Award (5/17/99) for pointing out the
Born In series, in addition to The Quinn Trilogy,
in addition to The Dream Trilogy…well, you get the
idea.
Holly (Hfur 1/1/99) wins
The Doing Two
Things At Once Award for being able to cheer her
daughter on at basketball games and letting someone
sitting next to her know that there's more than one
MacGregor or Nora book as well.
The Yes I Do Listen To
Her Sometimes Award is for David, dh of PhylL9226
(1/3/99) who was seen at the Virginia Beach Library
Book Sale placing Nora's books in prominent places
so people could find them.
Melinda (MelindaST 1/5/99)
and her dh get The
Any Port in a Storm Award because while working on a yacht
in San Diego, her dh let her know the captain had 2
copies of The
Reef out for
guests to read. Melinda reminded her dh to let the
captain know that Nora was also J.D. Robb and he
might like those stories as well.
The What Should I Do
While I'm Waiting Award goes to Karen (Bobkbee 1/7/99) for
finishing Inner
Harbor in a
hospital waiting room while waiting for her dad to
get out of surgery. She was so psyched, that she
talked about it to some other ladies who were also
waiting and got them interested in reading
Nora.
Keishon (KET2567 1/15/99)
has won The Go
Ahead, Make My Day Award for letting a Nora reader know
that she is also J.D. Robb. Keishon says that it's
the little things like that which make her day.
Ours too!
The Angel in Disguise
Award was given to
Kristine (JLK197 1/20/99) by an older lady who
struck up a conversation in line at B&N.
Kristine told her all about the MacGregors and left
the line with the woman to take her back to the
Romance racks to help her get all the books that
went with that series and some of the trilogies as
well. What an apt description of one of our
BB/N's.
Crystal (Fourftsq2
1/21/99) gets The
Healing the Sick Award for letting her aunt, who was sick
in bed, know that there were more In Death books
than just the ones she had read. The aunt sent a
friend to get them so she could read them while
bedridden. Hmm, I would think that Roarke would
send someone's temperature up, not down.
The Sneaky
Award goes to
Julie (BraveJoker 1/23/99) who tells her friends
who won't read romance to read this great author
who writes murder mysteries with romance in them.
They read one and get hungry for more.
The Don't Mess With The
Karate Kid Award
goes, of course, to Edith (ApleHeart 1/24/99) who
had enough when a harridan (her description) was
incensed to see a copy of The Reef in with other best sellers at a
B&N when she was looking for an Oprah
selection. Edith told the woman where to find the
Oprah book (when she really wanted to tell her
where to go) and that it was a boring and
pretentious book. She then mentioned
The
Reef was on the
NYT Best Seller list and proceeded to
buy it to make a point. You go girl!
Joan (JoanOver 2/12/99)
and her sister win The …And We Thought We Had It Bad
Award. They
started talking to someone in a bookstore checkout
line and by the time they finished the
conversation, the victim added 6 more Noras to the
5 she was already going to buy.
Livia (Livwac66 2/12/99),
not to be beaten by Joan, told someone in line that
she shouldn't get Seaswept without the rest of the trilogy
and got the woman to buy those 3 and several single
titles as well. She gets The Anything You Can Do, I Can Do
Better Award. She
and her dh share The Lawrence of Arabia
Award (6/5/99) for
going into a tent in 90+degree heat and educating a
UBS bookseller. He said he didn't have any romance
books, just some by "some woman" that everyone kept
asking about. Livia's dh told him that Nora was
"romance personified" and they convinced the man to
put her up front on his display.
The Let's All Get Eye
Strain Award is
for Diane (Anonym2857 2/25/99) who went to the eye
doctor for an eye problem but was able to see well
enough to recognize a Nora in the receptionist's
hands. It was her first Nora and a MacGregor at
that. By the time Diane left, the receptionist had
several post-its covered with title information and
directions to the book store where Nora was going
to be signing books later that month! Congrats
Diane.
Wym (Wymzee 2/26/99) gets
The I've Got My
Priorities Straight Award for going with her fil to look at
retirement homes and while he was busy looking at
various amenities at these places, Wym was making
sure the libraries there had several copies of
Nora's books. She had a lovely visit at one place
with an 86 year old lady and pointed out the books
to her.
Sue (SueCBDR) is a
professional bookseller, so she has more
opportunity to spread the word, but she gets a
What Me
Share?Award
(3/15/99) for convincing a customer that Roarke is
too special to allow an In Death book to be passed
along to a friend with the possibility of not
getting it back. She also gets a You Have How Many?
Award (6/25/99)
for making sure that regular customers keep up with
the In Death series and don't miss a single story.
Where would we be without ya, Sue? We'd go batty
for sure!
The I'm Not In This For
The $ Award goes
to Judy (Spunkdunc 3/23/99) for taking a young Nora
newbie in hand at the Columbus booksigning,
offering to take a picture of her with The Legend,
and then refusing money from the girl for promising
her a copy. You're right Judy, we're in this for
the pleasure of sharing Nora's stories with
others.
Karen (KLO214 4/19/99)
gets a CyberPhantom
Award for
convincing someone on the Dean Koontz board to try
one of Nora's books. She wondered if being a
Phantom would lead to a decoder ring or a
certificate. No, Karen, but thank you for giving me
the inspiration for how to set up the Phantom
column for this edition.
The Back At Ya
Award goes to
Miryam (RBrewer000 5/2/99) for hooking her friend
on the In Death books after her friend got her
hooked on Dorothy Dunnett. She also asked about an
award, which reaffirmed the way to go for an ADWOFF
article. Thanks.
Courtney (6/6/99 +) wins
The Daughter Knows
Best Award for
sticking in there and finally getting her mother to
read Nora's backlist as well as Nora's latest best
seller. I'm sure she thanks you for your
persistence now that she has all those lovely
single titles to discover. Can the Silhouettes be
far behind?
Tracey (Toheara 6/15/99)
has invented a new way to lose weight. She receives
The Nora Book Diet
Award for getting
her friend Tara to read Nora during lunch, dinner,
etc. Of course, while she loses weight because
she's too busy reading to eat, her wallet is also
getting thinner.
Bon (BonBBN 6/25/99) is
the winner of Hook
One, Get One Free Award. We all know that Bon got her
pastor hooked on J.D. Robb some time back. Well she
now reads Noras as well and has hooked her mom on
them. She's admitted to sneaking ones she hasn't
read yet from her mother's coffee table, but she
always returns them. Bon also hooked her friend
Loretta on Nora at the TBID signing last October
and now Loretta and her sister are fighting over
who gets to read a book first. They better be
careful if they do that in front of Sue at TBID.
They'll each be buying their own copies before they
know what happened!
So remember to keep
posting so The Phantom knows that the word about
Nora is spreading. Good things are meant to be
shared and Nora's not just good, she's the very
best.
The Phantom is © 1997-2001 by
Phyllis & ADWOFF (ADWOFF@adwoff.com) All Rights
Reserved
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