Getting Published (is awesome)

This morning I got an unexpected parcel in my letterbox. Opening it, I was thrilled to discover that Penguin had sent me the first two advance copies of my new book, The Cinderella Moment.  It was an incredible moment and I have to confess I jumped around squealing with excitement for about ten minutes. They've done a beautiful job and I was delighted to find that they'd done an embossed title  - the words are in black and raised - very stylish and yummy! It's an extraordinary feeling getting to this point - when the words you spent so many hours, days, weeks, months (years!) writing finally appear in this magical form - a book!

It's hard to explain the emotion. It's part disbelief, part euphoria, part amazement, wonder, excitement, awe. Flicking through the pages, a sentence leaps out at you and you think, 'Did I write that?' You wonder how others will read it: will they see what I see? Will they like the characters who are so real to me that I imagine what they are doing now. Will they enjoy Paris? Love the clothes? Revel in the haute couture moments? I remember so many writing moments - of pleasure, frustration, desperation and delight. There were times when it took all day to write 500 words and times when the words just poured out of me. There were even times when my fingers moved over the keyboard producing scenes and dialogue I had never even consciously thought of.Those are my favourite writing moments. When the creative part of the brain takes over and there's a kind of effortless flow of words as characters and conversations take on a life of their own. Writing is such a strange and wondrous thing. Those little black lines that form the letters that make the words that produce the sentences that enable us to create pictures in our minds - extraordinary!

So, here at last is my book in physical form - an amazing, magical feeling to see it at last.