Honk If You Hate Me hit bookstores on July 10! This is my debut novel, so perhaps you’ll indulge me by pulling on some hip boots and wading through my sappiness. You see, I thought I was going to be Ms. Cool about the release of the book. I’d had the cover displayed in my house for a year, an advanced reading copy on my desk for months, and a stack of advance bound books piled up on my desk chair. The Pub Day itself felt anticlimactic. Not that I was troubled by that; I merely found it curious. That’s often how Pub Day feels when one is an editor, which I was for ten years. You see, usually, an editor will have worked so far into the next list of books (or the list beyond that or the list beyond that, sometimes years into the future) that the publication of the current list seems more like deja vu than anything else. “Didn’t that book already pub?”
<>I wondered if I’d experience the same sense of deja vu on this side of the desk. And I did . . . until I spotted Honk If You Hate Me on a Barnes & Noble shelf. I ended up just staring at the book for twenty minutes, mentally kicking myself for not having brought my camera to the store with me. I’d just finished signing fifteen copies of the book with a very special pen, given to me for this very special purpose. The bookstore staff had just congratulated me and said the most flattering things about the story, which they’d already read. I felt proud. And humbled. And amazed. And downright giggly. I couldn’t help myself, I just had to call my editor.
“Hi, Krista. I know you’re not in the office since it’s almost eleven p.m. your time, but I’m having a Moment.”
My book was face out on the shelf, its hot pink and orange cover jumping out at a glance. Surely people walking through the door on the other side of the store could see it. Surely they’d come running over to hold it and then buy it and then read it. Surely. But wanting to be absolutely, totally postive that it was seen, I subtly drew passersby’s attention to it: “That’s my book! Right there, the pink one. I wrote that!” (Picture my wildly pointing finger.) And wouldn’t you know it, every one of my victims the intrigued browsers picked up the book and perused the jacket copy. How’s that for cover appeal?
Now if only I could stand next to Honk in every bookstore in America, twenty-four hours a day….
Woohoo! Congratulations Debbie! I can’t wait to get my copy and read it. Amazon just sent me an e-mail today that it shipped. 🙂
I drove out to Borders last night. Imagine my dismay when they told me, yes, they could see that the book had ‘come out’ but no, they didn’t have it on the shelves. I asked why not and didn’t they know they were missing an opportunity to bring in lots of revenue, and that this book had been written by one of the wittiest, most creative, intelligent persons I know. I then special ordered your book. I’m thinking when I go to pick it up, I should special order another copy for their Manager.
p.s. I want an autograph next time I see you.
Yeah… I was too impatient for my copy of your book to arrive from Target.com so I ventured out today with my two little ones in tow to Walmart and bought
a copy. I am just getting ready to wind down and read your novel. I can’t wait!