I Saw My Book on the Shelves!

Okay, so I shouldn't get that excited. This is the 57th time. But it never gets old, seeing a book with my name on it at a bookstore or grocery store.

I still remember the first time it happened. Of course I knew down to the second the exact moment my first book (ROSES HAVE THORNS) would be released, and it was several days into the future. So I was not looking for ROSES when I entered Rainy Day Books. I was just looking for something to read, perusing the romances, and suddenly there it was on the shelf!

I think I must have screamed, because the bookstore lady ran over and asked me what was wrong, whereupon I probably threw some kind of hysterical fit about seeing the book I wrote on the shelves for the first time.

I remember the clerk smiling indulgently. She’d probably witnessed similar displays in the past, as Rainy Day Books was a favorite hang-out for everyone in our RWA chapter, and many of us were selling our first books way back then.

There are lots of firsts associated with selling your first book. Getting THE CALL, of course, ranks right up there. Seeing your first cover, meeting your editor in person for the first time, receiving your first check, reading your first review. But nothing makes it more real than seeing the book in a bookstore, and knowing that thousands of people around the country also see it and are maybe buying it and reading it. 'Cause ultimately, for me anyway, writing is a way to connect. I enjoy the act of writing (most days, anyway!) but connecting with readers is what it's all about.