There is a moment in a writer’s life when you’re reminded that it’s not just you, sitting alone in the shed: it takes a whole team of people to turn what you wrote on your laptop into an actual, printed book. And you can never picture exactly what it’s going to be like – even though you’ve talked endlessly with your publisher about covers and blurbs, and done the proof edit, and squeed over the idea of the sprayed page edges. Until you actually have it in your hot little hands, it’s just an idea for a book. Then something pops through the letterbox – or, even better, a courier arrives armed with a big cardboard box – and suddenly … there it is.
You Don’t Know Me arrived yesterday. Or the day before. I can’t remember exactly. I’ve been really really busy getting the first draft of the next book ready to show people and organising You Don’t Know Me’s blog tour, and the competition (landing here soon – so look out) and time is just FLYING. Anyway, I took a picture to mark the moment, which was this.
It’s even lovelier than I thought. Loving the page edges, and my name in foil, in the same font as it was for The Look, so people will hopefully notice the two books are related. Inside, it’s awash with photography and illustrations and cute chapter headings (I did the words, Chicken House did the font). When it was sent out to reviewers and bloggers, it even, apparently, arrived in a matching blue foil envelope. *impressed face*
I was sitting in bed last night, writing the new one (I’ve just discovered Focus View on Word for Mac, by the way, which is sheer genius – little black icon in the bottom left hand corner if you need to know), when I was joined by my six year-old for a cuddle. He loves reading from my screen. I explained that this would be the next book. He thought for a moment and his eyes went wide. He collected my copy of You Don’t Know Me and said ‘so you mean it goes from that’ – pointing at my screen – ‘to this?’ His face was full of wonder.
‘Yes,’ I said, still feeling the same sense of magic I first felt in 2009, when I beheld my first printed copy of Threads. ‘Yes it does.’
(You Don’t Know Me comes out on 2nd May. You can admire the awesomeness of those sprayed page edges then. You can also enter to win a signed copy via Goodreads.)