Last month I did a reading in San Francisco, at A Clean-Well Lighted Place for Books. The reading — and a question and answer session with the audience — was recorded and broadcast as part of Writer’s Voice Radio. If you’re interested, take a listen. (One caveat: the audience members’ questions were not picked up by the microphones, so you’ll just hear my answers.)

By the way, an unabridged audio version of The Colony is available, in CD and also MP3 formats. For more details, check here.

The Harvard School of Public Health just released some national Avian Flu polling results, conducted as part of the HSPH’s Project on the Public and Biological Security. There’s some interesting data in there, including the expected general level of unease about the disease:

More than half of Americans (57%) report that they are concerned about the potential spread of bird flu in the United States. However, only 15% are very concerned at the moment. A higher proportion of African Americans report that they are concerned about this than whites (70% versus 54%). Similarly, the majority of Americans are not currently concerned that they or a family member will get avian flu within the next twelve months; only one in five (21%) people are worried about this possibility. Six in ten people are concerned about a pandemic outbreak of avian flu, that is, an outbreak in many countries (62%), but only 20% are very concerned.

But check out these stunning figures regarding quarantine:

Most Americans are supportive of quarantine measures. Ninety-six percent of respondents said that they would agree to be quarantined for two to three weeks if they had avian flu. Over four out of five people said that they would also agree to be quarantined even if they might have the disease (83%).

So, four out of five Americans would submit to quarantine even if only suspected of having the disease. Perhaps those numbers would drop if the government decided, as they once did, that the most ideal quarantine site was an isolated island prison—and that the quarantine was meant to be permanent.

So, my editor just alerted me that The Colony has just gone back for a third printing. Excellent news, for which I have all of you to thank. I have a full round of tv, radio, and print appearences pending next week, and when possible I’ll post links to the venues, so you can follow along.

A few more nice reviews of The Colony over the weekend, including the Rocky Mountain News (that’s the Denver paper, if you did not know), and The New Yorker. And of course, a full slate of reviews are archived here.

Some of the many reader letters I’ve been receiving now have their own page on the site. Have a look. And, of course, if you have thoughts or questions about the book, or about the colony, please drop me a note.

Yesterday I did an hour-long interview with “The Talk Show,” which broadcasts on KERA, the public radio station serving Dallas and northern Texas. The host, Jeff Whittington, did a very good job, and the call-in questions were varied and interesting. (This being Texas, I was expecting questions about armadillos and leprosy–and, yep, I got some.) If you’re interested, you can download the interview as a podcast here.

As I mentioned, I’ve been receiving an abundance of e-mails and letters from people with a personal connection to the colony. Some want help in finding lost relatives, others want to know if I have more details on their ancestor, and many write simply to tell me their story. And again, I’m happy to share my research. Just send me an e-mail.

Dear Mr. Tayman,
I just finished reading your book and found it one of the most extraordinary and best written stories I have ever read. I thought you wrote this history with great sensitivity and thoroughness. I do have a question that I would appreciate your help if it is possible. My aunt, Alice Wickman, worked at the Colony as a teacher or a nurse for several years, I believe in the 1930’s, before she contracted tuberculosis and sent back to the mainland. My question is there some kind of registry of nonpatient workers and if so where is it located? I would like to inscribe her history in the book so our family does not forget her dedication. Again, congratulations on writing such a terrific book.

Dear Mr. Tayman,
Thank you for writing the book. It is of extreme interest to me because my aunt’s sister Mary Teresa, from New York, worked at the colony for about 30 years. In my meeting with her, which was only twice, and when I was very young, she told me only about the goodness of the people that lived there. She was a nurse and worked mostly with the girls in the girl’s orphanage. I had no idea of what the place was even about. Her name was Katherine, Aunt Kitty to her family. Thank you so very much.

I’m guest blogging this week at Powells.com, the online home of one of the country’s best bookstores. Several months ago they decided to experiment with having authors prattle away blog-style on their site, alongside entries posted by their very witty staff. On the author front, the always-excellent Susan Orlean kicked things off. Eleven guest bloggers later, they’re down to me. This is progress?

A couple of brief articles about the book in a pair of newsweeklies this week. First, Time. And now The Week. And, of course, a more full slate of reviews are archived here.

If you missed the interview that NPR’s Terry Gross did with me about The Colony earlier this week, don’t fret: you can hear it here.