Hey, Everybody, Look At Me, Look At Me

Remember how sick and tired I was of making up magisterial things to say about my second book and trying to trick everyone into buying it? Well, now something has happened and I think it's okay because it's not me, it's somebody else, and it's about my FIRST book, so that's okay, right? If I draw your attention to it, I mean? Let's go back in time. First Tom Franklin gave my book to some nice people. One of them liked it so much that he called me up on the phone and surprised me. Later I began to correspond with another of these strangers, who soon became a special email "buddy," and her name is Laura Lippman. She's a writer, too! And I read some of her work and was "blown away" by it as the charming vernacular would have it and what a happy time we had emailing back and forth and telling each other nice things. Well, next thing you know, NPR asked her to talk about a book she "frequently recommends to other people" and I am happy and proud to say that out of all the books she might have chosen by authors living and dead, she temporarily went crazy in the coconut and picked mine. You can read her flattering essay right here by "clicking" on this brightly highlighted sentence you are reading right now. And those NPR people were kind enough to include the entire text of one of my short stories and even a "link" to this "blog."