The ARCs are here! The ARCs are here!

Well, it's almost the new year. I've got a lot to do and I've not been very productive this last couple of weeks, but I did have a lovely holiday with my son. We heckled each other (a must for our get-togethers), ate a lot of good food, watched Everything Everywhere All At Once, offered snarky opinions on old episodes of Chopped, and just relaxed and enjoyed each other.

And then today, an unexpected package arrived from Sourcebooks with a thrilling surprise: a paper ARC (Advance Reader Copy) of "Curves for Days"! ARCs are preliminary book copies that aren't for sale; the publisher sends them out for people to read and review or write blurbs for or, I guess, other things that can help generate buzz for an upcoming release.

I hadn't been expecting this at all because we don't have a cover design yet. I think the people at Sourcebooks have been working hard behind the scenes on all kinds of things including the cover, and I'm looking forward to seeing what they come up with for that. I just hadn't realized that I might see an ARC even sooner!

It's an amazing feeling to hold in your hands a paper copy of a book you've written. To crack it open and to see your old friends, your characters, your words, there on the pages. To read it and think, "I like this," and to hope others like it just as much.

I've raised a child to adulthood and there comes a point where you have to let go and hope you've done a good enough job that they'll be okay and loved and treasured once they're out in the world beyond your control. This is kind of like that. Lovely, but scary.