Thanks

There were posters of The Given Self dotted around Barnes & Noble Thursday night

The other day my son came by to drop something off and then called me to ask where I was. I said, “I was right here – in my room.”

“Didn’t you hear the dog bark?” he asked.

“The dog,” I said, “barks a lot.”

Writing is a medium that lets you begin to ignore the dog barking.

Thursday, Donny drove me to a bookstore, dropped me off at the door, and went and parked the car. At the information desk, I said, “I’m here for a book signing.”

“Are you the author?”

I said, “Yes.”

Writing is a medium that lets you be an author and, if you’re really lucky, lets you feel like one once every ten years or so.

I felt like one Thursday night. Friends came out in frigid weather, the community relations manager had me all set up, offered pens and water, introduced me in a very fine way, and brought out extra chairs as people arrived. One daughter brought a vase of flowers that matched the book cover. The other brought Henry. My son, who was in the Navy the last time I had a launch, strolled in. A teenager told me I was awesome. There were pictures and hugs and tears.

Having my book launched did what I felt it would do. I told those in attendance, “A book is like a journey. When it’s done, you feel like you’ve been away a long time, and like you’re coming back from a far off land. Tonight, you have met me at the terminal.”

Thanks to everyone who was there, and to all of you who have shared this part of the journey with me.

Endorsements -- Or how do you know it's good?

I was left with the question of, How did I really know if my book was any good?

This is a horrendous feeling – the not knowing. I’ve been writing for a while so I get to this place of not wanting to burnout my upfront readers, (I mean really...I could write a dozen final drafts) or at least I tell myself that. But I think I also don’t really want to know if my reader-friends think my work-in-progress is good or not. When I get on a roll, and it feels good to me, I want to stay there. It could be faith and it could be burying my head in the sand and I know it.

I’ve written lots of manuscripts I never even tried to publish for not wanting to go through all the publishing rigmarole. When I heard about this place that made it easy, I just went to town on the current thing I was writing, finished it up, and sent it. It's not as if I'd send off any old thing. I'm always passionate about what I'm working on. It's just that this all came together quickly. Just as I'd heard, (O Books was suggested to me twice in a short period of time, once by a reader and once by an author), O Books didn't take six months to decide.

Two weeks later I had an answer and a contract.

That’s when I started to get the heebee geebees. And then, after five revisions, the endorsement process started and the first two people who agreed to read it didn’t like it! One said it sounded like a process I was going through and I ought to put it away for a while; when I came back to it I’d see it in a different light. Another said she wasn’t getting a strong “Yes.” That’s when I got freaked out and sent it to two friends with desperate pleas to read it that day if not sooner. Their enthusiastic replies kept me going until I got a couple of totally unbiased endorsements that knocked my socks off.

You can know in an intellectual way that you’ve got to stand by your work no matter what anybody says, but when it comes right down to having it happen it’s a whole different story. It makes you feel like a wimp to need anybody to tell you it’s okay, and it makes you feel bold to keep going, and you feel both ways at the same time and get all confused, and mainly wonder why you ever wanted to publish a book in the first place.