We’re celebrating an amazing event this morning!

     After eight years in the womb, the final proof of my novel – 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘎𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘨𝘨𝘦𝘳’𝘴 𝘋𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘮 – is off to the publisher.

     “It’s like having a baby!” I shouted. “Let’s do cigars!”

     Betty raised a dubious brow and gave me that you-are-such-a-weirdo look.

     But seriously, writing a book and seeing it through to publication is as close to having a baby as a man can get. There’s conception … gestation … wild swings of emotion … anxiety … exhaustion … false labor … labor … protracted labor … delivery … exhilaration … and finally, yes, postpartum blues.

     While I’m proud of the accomplishment and very excited to have you read the novel, I’m also a bit embarrassed by how long it’s taken. I mean, they built the entire transcontinental railroad in just six years, and the Golden Gate Bridge in only four.

     More to the point, Betty delivered a real, live, three-dimensional human being in just nine months.

     What the heck have I have been doing all this time?! CONSOLING THOUGHT: It took J. R. R. Tolkien 17 years to write and publish The Lord of the Rings. (You writers out there will empathize …)