Something I forgot….

Tonight I got an e-mail from a friend who just discovered Robin Hobb’s review of my book. I wasn’t surprised that they were geeking out about it, but I was surprised that they had only found out about it now, over a month after the fact. I told them that if they kept an eye on my blogs, they’d get a heads-up when cool things like this happened.

They told me that they did read the blogs, and that I’d never mentioned it.

I didn’t believe them, of course, but looking through my previous blogs proved them right. That’s when I realized this must have been one of the things I meant to write about, then didn’t. This happens with unfortunate regularity.

What happened was this. Last year, when we were trying to collect author blurbs for the back of the book, I mentioned that I’d love to get a quote from Robin Hobb. I’ve loved her stuff for years. When I read her Assassin books back in the day, they gave me hope that my character-centered story might actually be publishable.

I scraped together all the courage in my timid Midwestern self, and introduced myself to Robin through e-mail. She was gracious enough to accept an ARC of the book (Advance Reading Copy) but told me straight up that she was really busy with deadlines, and that she usually doesn’t read or blurb new authors. There just weren’t enough hours in the day. I told her I understood entirely, and that I was flattered that she was willing to talk with me and accept a copy of the book.

Months passed, and we got blurbs from some great authors: Williams and Anderson and Brooks and more. I didn’t hear from Robin, and I figured she was still working against her deadline. I liked that option better than the though that she’d given it a try and simply didn’t like it. It must have been her deadlines. Of course.

Then, about a week before my book’s publication date, I got an unexpected e-mail. Robin told me she’d finally got around to reading it, and she thought it was great. What’s more, she actually went out of her way to post a review up on Amazon. As it was too late to get a blurb from her on the cover.

To put it simply, I was filled with geeky joy. That’s probably why I forgot to write up a little blog about it. I was too tingly.

So for those of you who haven’t already seen it. Here’s a link to the review on my page. Or, if you’d prefer, you can go check it out directly on the Amazon site.

For you Hobb fans out there, sorry I didn’t mention this before. Better late than never.

pat