I'm Published!

Okay, so not in the larger sense of the word as I hope to someday be, like "my book" has been published, but a girl's gotta start somewhere, right?    

A few months ago I received an email from a woman at Woman's World magazine who writes the "You Deserve the Best..." column for the magazine.  The July 18 issue would be focusing on chick lit escapes and because of my reviews for Chicklit Club, she asked me to provide a couple of options for that weeks column.  I was totally psyched, but a bit nervous at the same time.  I knew she was asking a few people for their recommendations so I wasn't sure if I would even make the cut.  But this was a weekly national magazine after all and I wanted to make a good impression.  So I sent off my carefully-crafted recommendations for a couple of really good books I had recently reviewed which were being released in time for the summer reading season.  She thanked me for my personal account of the books (which felt as if what I had written was the equivalent of a 5th grade book report) and said she would keep me posted on the finished article.  I then promptly forgot about the exchange and went back to my life.

At the end of June, I received a follow-up email from her with an attachment of the completed article.  When I opened the attachment, I was pleasantly surprise to see she had chosen one of the books I recommended as the Perfect Poolside read!  There it was, my name in print!  And a quote!  I don't think it really hit me until I had the actual magazine in my hands that this was kind of a big deal...on a smaller scale. 

The day the magazine came out, I ran around on my lunch hour to three CVSs and a Borders to see if I could find the magazine.  I came away from each place empty handed but I was a woman on a mission so I made a bee-line for the grocery store when I got home.  I grabbed the magazine and frantically flipped through to find the article.  When I couldn't find it I decided I needed to slow down and check the table of contents.  I found the page the article was on, went right to it and read the whole article (even the parts I wasn't in!).  What a cool experience, standing in the middle of the supermarket reading an article in a national women's magazine with your name in it!  I bought five copies on the spot and rushed home to show my husband (he was sufficiently impressed).  My enthusiasm had the same affect on my mom, aunt, and best friend, who all rushed out to buy their very own copies of the magazine, leaving me with four extra copies I now have no idea what to do with.  If they are all this excited about a blurb in a magazine, wait until I publish my first book!

By the way, the Perfect Poolside read I recommended was "Ten Beach Road" by Wendy Wax.  Pick it up.  You won't be disappointed.  And of course, like any good reader/reviewer/writer, the other books highlighted in the article are now in my "to be read" pile.