What came out of her little sister's brain...

My sister is vacationing at the beach and has been reading my book, Song of Scarabaeus. With six young children, she hasn’t found it easy to get through more than 20 minutes at a time, but she just texted me to say she finished it, she loved it, and she can’t wait for the next one. Wow. “I can’t believe all these ideas came out of my little sister's brain,” she tells me. (It shouldn’t surprise her. We spent our childhoods keeping each other awake at night telling stories, and filled our vacation time by drawing comic strips and typing out silly ditties on our typewriters.)

Almost a year after the book’s release, it still amazes me when someone tells me they enjoyed it. Is this reaction of mine just a lingering effect of being on debut-author cloud nine? I don’t know. I wrote the kind of book I wanted to read – smart female protagonist in a no-win situation, sexy hero/sidekick, strong scientific elements, interesting secondary characters, and loads of action. Every time I read a nice review on a blog or on Amazon, I think, “Yay! Someone else ‘got it’.” Someone else wants to read the kind of book I want to read, the kind of book I wrote.

Last week, much to my astonishment, my book was nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award. Heady stuff. But I’ll be honest: hearing my sister enthuse about my book – my big sister, who almost never reads fiction – means even more to me.