Whew! Yesterday, January 10, was Fräulein M.'s official book birthday. Thank you so much to everyone who shared, liked, reviewed, purchased, or showed my book some love yesterday! My lovely colleagues in the '17 Scribes Facebook group (which you should absolutely check out--full of exciting new books coming out this year) created this graphic for me to celebrate this momentous occasion:
Official release dates for books are somewhat arbitrary. Amazon started shipping paperbacks a few days after Christmas, hardcovers a bit later, and ebook pre-orders automatically delivered on January 1. We've also hosted two parties to celebrate the book's birthday: a solstice cabaret in the Boston area pre-holidays, and a release party in Wilmington, DE (my hometown) last Friday night.
Our solstice cabaret happened at Aeronaut Brewing Co. in Somerville, MA on, you guessed it, December 21. (The longest night of the year is a good time to party.) Johnny Blazes and the Pretty Boys' "genre-bending, gender-bending, tongue-in-cheek" performance brought the house down and perfectly complemented the theme of our evening and the brief reading I gave from the book:
I was thrilled to see two '17 Scribes there, Kelly Ford (author of COTTONMOUTHS, out in June from Skyhorse) and Crystal King (author of FEAST OF SORROW, out in April from Touchstone/Simon & Schuster).
Three smiling '17 debutantes
After the new year I flew down to Delaware to celebrate the book's release in my hometown of Wilmington. I think the best part of publishing a book is going to be seeing friends I haven't had much chance to see in a long time. I was deeply touched by how many of the people I grew up with--and their parents!--came to help me celebrate at 8th & Union Kitchen last Friday night. There's no place like home.
The executive chef at 8th & Union, Brian Ashby, is a high school classmate and friend of mine. After signing books I was starving, and his pork dumplings hit the spot. Delicious.
The past few weeks have been really exciting. I've begun to hear feedback from readers--many friends and family, but also some strangers, which is a surreal feeling. Berni and Grete, who lived for so long as characters in my head (and in an MS Word doc on my computer) are now living in other people's minds. From what I hear, they've even been popping up in some dreams.
I'm still in Delaware and visited my first book club last night! Later this week and throughout the winter, I plan to blog my book tour, highlighting my favorite stops in each city I'm visiting. This week I have one more book club to visit and a rotary club meeting here in Wilmington, and then I'm headed to Richmond for a few days. I'm also going to Cincinnati, DC, Chicago, Fort Myers, San Diego, Boulder, and Providence. (You can view the full schedule of events here.)
Thank you for all the love on my #bookbirthday, and happy new year!