I am back. And I am ready to revisit the Andrew Smith How To Be A Writer conference, with some all-new breakout sessions. I flew home last night, alone. You know how whenever you come back from a trip you always kind of expect to see your house burned down to a heaping pile of charred debris? Well, that didn't happen. I did get an editorial letter from David Gale, my editor at Simon & Schuster, for my first book coming out with them. That will be a topic for a breakout session, I'm sure. Because I don't know if anyone else handles revision and editorial comments the way I do, which is the best way to handle them, even if it does mean waking up with a hangover, naked, in a gutter. There was also a flat from FedEx on my doorstep. It was from somebody at Macmillan. I wasn't expecting anything from them. It was very nice. A great way to make me feel better after saying goodbye to my son and getting on an airplane. Here's what it was:
It was a torn-out page from last week's
Publishers Weekly with a starred review for
Stick, my new novel that is coming out on October 11. Plus, there was a very nice note attached from Jean Feiwel, my publisher at Feiwel & Friends, and she stuck a gold star through the page, too (which I am wearing as a tie tack today). It was a sad weekend, but it was really a nice thing to come home to.
Thank you, Jean.
