A fine day

After a long day of fun and sun at Mystic Seaport on the Connecticut shoreline, including a stop in Bank Square Books, an independent book store where I was unable to purchase a copy of the New York Times (but saw their last copy of my book on the shelf), I stopped in at Borders Books just before closing, hoping that they might still have a copy or two.

Imagine being reviewed in the New York Times Sunday Book Review and failing to pick up a copy of the paper.  I was getting a little worried. 

But thankfully, Borders had plenty of copies left.  And though I was in a rush, I still took a moment to locate my book.  It doesn’t matter how many times I see SOMETHING MISSING in a store.  It’s still thrilling. 

There were three copies of the book on the New Fiction shelf, plus a handful of copies in the stacks, cover-side facing out. 

Two different and relatively prominent spots in the store.  I was feeling pretty good about myself. 

Then I saw this as I was standing in line, waiting to pay:

Wow.  The store is relatively local, but still…  

I also received a message today from a reader who told me that for a time, SOMETHING MISSING had cracked the top 1,000 on Amazon’s nearly indecipherable ranking system of book sales, including hitting #15 in the humor category.  While the news was exciting, it’s more humbling to think that someone who has already read my book is taking the time to monitor how it’s doing for me.

Thanks to all who have been so kind and supportive.  You have helped to make nearly perfect days like today possible.

Interview at RJ Julia

In case you were busy on Thursday night and couldn’t attend, prior to my appearance at RJ Julia I filmed a short video interview with Karen, an RJ Julia, blogger and Twitter (@karencorvello) extraordinaire. 

New York Times Sunday Book Review!

No need to wait until Sunday!  The New York Times Sunday Book Review was published online this afternoon, and (I still cannot believe it) my book, SOMETHING MISSING, was included! 

My book.  My name.  In the Sunday Book Review. 

The review is short but very positive, and it’s the third book listed. 

I still can’t believe it.   

In good company

The Hartford Courant published a blurb about my appearance tonight at RJ Julia entitled “Mathew Dicks and Dr. Ruth.”  Surprisingly, I received considerably more attention than the famed sex therapist in the short piece.

Never could I have ever envisioned my name being published alongside that of Dr. Ruth.

Matthew Dicks and a world renowned German sex therapist. 

Let the jokes begin.

New York Times Book Review!

I just received word that SOMETHING MISSING will receive a review in this weekend’s New York Times Book Review.

This is another one of those moments that I will not soon forget. 

Of course, as soon as I received the email from my publicist, I called my wife to tell her of the great news, but she had left her phone at home and was unreachable for about two hours.  Though she rarely does this kind of thing, she always seems to choose the worst moments to do so. 

Instead, I told Dick, the salesman/golf coach who helped me choose a new set of irons, followed by my in-laws.

Elysha was a distant third.

A follower on Twitter asks:  What is The New York Times Book Review? 

Good question.  I’ll quote Wikipedia, which offers a good description:

The New York Times Book Review is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to The New York Times in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely read book review publications in the industry.  Each week the NYTBR receives 750 to 1000 books from authors and publishers in the mail of which 20 to 30 are chosen for review. The selection process is based on finding books that are important and notable, as well as discovering new authors whose books stand above the crowd.

Readers and booksellers making my day

I had been asked via email and on this blog when SOMETHING MISSING would be placed on Border’s Book Club list.  For those of you kind enough to care, it will be on October’s list.  It will remain in the new release section for a while, then go to regular shelving, and then back to the front of the store as a book club pick. 

I must say that I have both astonished and humbled by the communication that I have received from readers and booksellers on an almost daily basis.  Whether through email, comments on this blog, and via Twitter, I receive constant feedback from people who are interested in the book.  They want to know how well it is doing in stores, share stories about how they promoted the book to friend and family, and quite often ask questions that I cannot answer.

Yesterday someone asked me about the life of Clive Darrow, a character in the book, prior to his appearance in Martin’s life.  Since SOMETHING MISSING is written in the third person, with the view limited to only what Martin sees and hears, I had never put much thought into Darrow’s life prior to his emergence in the story.  That is, I only know the story and the characters through Martin’s eyes.  He learns a little bit about Darrow as the story unfolds, but that’s about as much as I know. 

As odd as it sounds, I don’t know much about my characters unless I actually write about them.  Save for my protagonists, I guess.  I tend to know a great deal about them, more than sometimes reaches the page.   

But thank you for all the words of support and appreciation, and for all the interest that so many of you have shown in the book.  It’s been remarkable.  Just last week a European reader posted information about my upcoming appearance at RJ Julia on my author page on librarything.com and helped to arrange an author’s chat on the site beginning on August 17.

Yesterday an high school English teacher informed me that he plans on assigning my book to one of his AP classes next spring.

And Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Cleveland, Ohio had posters made to promote the book in their stores and offered to send me one in commemoration of the publication and its selection as their Book Pick of the Month.  SOMETHING MISSING has been a bestseller for them for the past two weeks, and they couldn’t be more kind and generous to me.     

I have many, many good people helping me along in this process, including my agent, my editor, and my publicist, but little did I know that readers and booksellers would also be so supportive and helpful in getting the book into peoples’ hands.  

Thank you all so very much. 

Worlds collide

Ten years ago, I was teaching second grade, my first year as an elementary school teacher.  With a fondness for Shakespeare and a desire to try something, anything, to garner my students’ attention, I decided to read some of Shakespeare’s plays, adapted into story versions, to them. 

They loved the stories.  Sword fights and betrayal, love and tragedy, large-scale battles and even a few laughs, the kids ate these stories up and kept asking for more.  At the end of the year, that class of second graders performed an adaptation of Julius Caesar, a shortened version of the play that retained all of the original language, that brought down the house.

Since that year, I have introduced Shakespeare to all of my students, both the third graders that I taught for eight years and the fifth graders who I teach today.  And each year, the end-of-the-year plays become longer and more elaborate.  I have a stage in my classroom now, complete with lighting, curtains, props and sets with which we perform Shakespeare’s stories for parents, students and community members.   

Last year my class of fifth graders performed Julius Caesar again, the first time that I have ever repeated a play, and much to my surprise, five of the students from that original second grade cast showed up to watch the performance, including the lead, a young lady who I will call Beth, who did a marvelous job portraying the would-be emperor.   

Yesterday I received an email from Beth that read:

Hi Mr Dicks!
I just wanted to let you know that I found your book in a bookstore called Bunches of Grapes on Martha's Vineyard. It was in the staff picks section.

I can’t tell you how rewarding it is when my life as an author and my life as a teacher collide.  To think that Beth, who will be a senior in high school this year, was still excited enough about her second grade experience to return to my classroom to see the play in which she once starred, and was then willing to take the time to email me after finding my book in a bookstore on Martha’s Vineyard, answers the questions that I often get:

Why are you still teaching? 

Can’t you stay home and write for a living? 

Couldn’t you write faster if you quit your day job?

There are many, many reasons why I remain in the classroom and am in the process of preparing for my eleventh year of teaching, but students like Beth are the primary answer to those questions.

To miss the opportunity to have someone like her in my life would have been worse than any tragedy that Shakespeare could have imagined. 

Just the facts

One of the most surprising parts about publishing SOMETHING MISSING was learning about the fact-checking that goes into a work of fiction.  During the process of final revision, an editor was assigned to fact-check nonfiction elements of my book.  She went so far as to confirm my assertions about lock picking and verify the route that a character drove when traveling from Newington to West Hartford.  She even found a possible problem in timing due to daylight savings time, a factor I had failed to consider when writing the book.  It was quite a thorough examination of the manuscript. 

Recently I had an idea for a book in which the main character is one of these fact-checking editors, and it’s now competing in my mind with one other idea to be my next book once THE CHICKEN SHACK is complete.  If it wins, I hope to spend a couple days in New York meeting a couple of these fact-checking editors, in order to learn more about the job.

And apparently fact-checkers are in demand, at least at the New York Times, where a piece by Alessandra Stanley about Walter Cronkite included an astounding correction:

Correction: July 22, 2009
An appraisal on Saturday about Walter Cronkite’s career included a number of errors. In some copies, it misstated the date that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed and referred incorrectly to Mr. Cronkite’s coverage of D-Day. Dr. King was killed on April 4, 1968, not April 30. Mr. Cronkite covered the D-Day landing from a warplane; he did not storm the beaches. In addition, Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon on July 20, 1969, not July 26. “The CBS Evening News” overtook “The Huntley-Brinkley Report” on NBCin the ratings during the 1967-68 television season, not after Chet Huntley retired in 1970. A communications satellite used to relay correspondents’ reports from around the world was Telstar, not Telestar. Howard K. Smith was not one of the CBS correspondents Mr. Cronkite would turn to for reports from the field after he became anchor of “The CBS Evening News” in 1962; he left CBS before Mr. Cronkite was the anchor. Because of an editing error, the appraisal also misstated the name of the news agency for which Mr. Cronkite was Moscow bureau chief after World War II. At that time it was United Press, not United Press International.

How is this even possible?

First appearance

My first appearance as an author takes place on Sunday, August 2, at Written Words Bookstore in Shelton, CT.  I’ll be discussing the book and signing for anyone who is interested.

Hope to see you there!   

Uncles can apparently sell books, too.

Not to be outdone by my mother-in-law…

My Uncle Bob recently sent me some copies of SOMETHING MISSING to sign and return to him so that he could give them out as gifts.  He also provided me with a FedEx shipping label to cover the cost of their return, and I assumed that his address and other information was contained within the barcode.  It was not, and so the package went out without an address.

Fortunately, the FedEx label did contain the name and contact information of the purchaser, so the company contacted Uncle Bob to retrieve his address.  In the midst of the conversation with the representative, he said, “It’s very important that the package arrive safely.  My nephew wrote a book and he signed some copies and was sending them back to me.”

The representative assured Uncle Bob that the package would arrive by tomorrow and the they concluded their conversation.  Five minutes later, his phone rang. 

“Hi, this is Claire from FedEx.  What’s the name of the book that you mentioned?”

Uncle Bob told her the title and the premise of the story. 

“I’m going to buy that book!” she said.  “It sounds really interesting!”

It’s nice to have such enthusiastic, persuasive family members.

The best of all booksellers

I have some amazing people working to promote my book: my agent, my editor, my publicist, and all of the booksellers working for my publisher and staffing fine bookstores everywhere.   

But sometimes I wonder if my mother-in-law might not be the best of the bunch.  I received this email today:

So I went into Posner's Bookstore at Grand Central Station and asked why the book was not on the front table of the store. The man looked it up and discovered that they had one copy.

"So where is it?" I asked.

"In the mystery section."

"OK.  Let's check it out."  I found it on the shelf tucked ALL THE WAY in the back of the store on the next to lowest shelf of the mystery department.  I explained that my son-in-law had been written up on the FRONT PAGE of the Sunday Courant, written about in the Boston Globe, and written about in USA Today, and how could they possibly sell this one measly book if they have it in the section that it doesn't even belong in?  I was outraged.

"Well, I will look into this and peruse the book," said the poor chap!

"Yes, and talk to your boss about ordering more copies for all of your Connecticut shoppers.  They will be looking for the book."  I explained that both Barnes and Noble and Borders has the book displayed prominently in ALL of their stores and that they are doing themselves a disservice by having only one copy hidden away. I told him that I will be back in two weeks and that hopefully it will be on the front table (at least six of them) then.

He laughed and said that he will do his best. He is going to look through the book and then talk to his boss.

I'm doing my best to promote and sell the book. On the lower shelf in the back of the store in the mystery department?  Damn!  We can't have that!

In the wild

Yesterday my wife and I brought our daughter to the pediatrician for a quick checkup. As I walked through the waiting room, baby in tow, I noticed a woman sitting on the far side of the room, reading SOMETHING MISSING.

It was thrilling.  Someone was sitting there, reading my book.

Now it turns out that this woman is a friend, a former student-teacher, but I didn't realize this initially, as her head was buried deep within the pages. Even so, I was pretty excited.

My first SOMETHING MISSING sighting “in the wild.”

Another review

Writer and teacher Jim Cullen recently reviewed SOMETHING MISSING for his blog and was kind enough to contact me and let me know that he had done so.  While I’m admittedly biased (especially considering the review is quite favorable), I found his comments about the book to be extremely insightful.  And it’s always an honor when someone takes the time to read and write about your book.   

I’ve also been asked by a couple readers if there have been any negative reviews that I have avoided posting here.  So far every review pertaining to SOMETHING MISSING that I have found or have been pointed to has been linked to or copied on this blog in its entirety.  There are a couple less-than-favorable reviews on Amazon if you’re looking for criticism, but one of the reviewers refers to the protagonist as Mark instead of Martin and implies that writing a novel in the third person is uncommon and difficult, so I don’t know how much stock I would put into that particular review. 

But there is certainly criticism of the book out there if you’d like to look hard.  Thankfully, it requires a diligent search, as almost every review so far has been extremely positive.

SOMETHING MISSING miscellany

The Hartford Courant reprinted last week’s front page article about SOMETHING MISSING in their i-Town magazine in the Sunday paper today.  The article also appeared on the Chicago Tribune’s website. 

I also found out that Bunch of Grapes, the independent bookstore on Martha’s Vineyard, has chosen SOMETHING MISSING as one of their staff picks.  Very exciting.  And I also found their blog to be quite interesting as well.     

Since the book first appeared in stores a little more than a week ago and the article was published in the Courant last Sunday, I’ve had many, many readers contact me to chat about the book, my writing process and my career, and almost as many people have stopped me in person to do the same.  Their messages  have been positive and encouraging, and I appreciate all of the communication. 

One of the most interesting of these people is a woman who picked up SOMETHING MISSING in Politikens Boghandel in Copenhagen.  She writes, “Politiken is a daily newspaper and the bookshop lies next to the town square, your book - together with some other English novels - on a table right by the door.”

The world certainly seems a little smaller when someone in Copenhagen can find my book on a table by the door.  And thanks to her, I am now a member of LibraryThing, and you can find my author page on the site.

First sentences, now with ultraviolent zombie mayhem!

Back in March, I wrote about the first sentences in books. I’m expanding on that post a bit here as the topic has recently been tickling my brain cells again:

I like the first sentence of THE CHICKEN SHACK, the book I’m currently writing, a lot. 

They tried not to receive corpses on the same day as chicken, but since it was impossible to predict when a logger might fall from his bucket truck and break his neck, the two deliveries occasionally coincided.

I like to think that it works because it’s unexpected, a little mysterious, but contains enough specificity to make the initial image real for the reader.  Why chicken and corpses would arrive anyplace on the same day is strange, but the specific image of the logger’s fall is enough to also establish the reader within the story. 

At least I hope. 

I also like the first sentence of UNEXPECTEDLY, MILO:

The moment that Milo Slade had attempted to avoid for nearly his entire life finally arrived under the sodium glow of a parking lot florescent at a Burger King just south of Washington, DC along interstate 95.

Again, the sentence contains that combination of mystery and specificity that I like.  The moment that Milo has been trying to avoid for his entire life is left undefined, but the setting is clearly established.  In doing these two things simultaneously, I like to think that I both intrigue and ground the reader in the story at the same time. 

However, this sentence was not originally the first sentence of the book.  Prior to the addition of the prologue, this sentence appeared closer to the end of the book than the beginning.  The original first sentence was:

When he spotted the video camera the first time, sitting on the end of the park bench beneath the dying elm, Milo didn’t take it.

While I like the new first sentence better, this isn’t bad.  The use of the phrase the first time lends an air of mystery, yet I again attempted to make the specifics of the scene (end of the park bench beneath the dying elm) clear to the reader. 

The first sentence of SOMETHING MISSING reads:

Martin opened the refrigerator and saw precisely what he had expected.

I don’t like this one nearly as much, but it accomplished the goal at the time.  Compared with the other two books, I put in significantly less thought into the first sentence of SOMETHING MISSING, but my intention was to begin with action, knowing how much of the story would take place within Martin’s head.  I also revised the sentence much later to include the words precisely and expected, knowing how appropriate they are to Martin’s character. 

One of my favorite first lines of a book comes from CHARLOTTE’S WEB:

"Where's Papa going with that ax?" said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast.

It’s probably my favorite because author EB White appears to have the same goal in mind as I do when writing a first sentence.  "Where’s Papa going with that ax?” is certainly intriguing, but White also firmly establishes character and setting in the second half of the sentence.

My wife’s favorite line is the classic line from PRIDE AND PREGUDICE:

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

I recently attempted to challenge this line, claiming that it may have a foundation in sexism, patriarchy, and/or materialism, but my wife threatened to go out to the shed and get Papa’s ax if I said another word.

But still, doesn’t it?

I’m currently reading PRIDE AND PREGUDICE AND ZOMBIES, the retelling of the Jane Austin classic with “ultraviolent zombie mayhem!”  Expectedly, the famous first line of Austin novel was re-written for this retelling:

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.

No question of sexism there.

Do you have a favorite first line to share?  If so, please do.

More praise

Another anonymous friend sent along a couple of positive reviews of SOMETHING MISSING from readers on LibraryThing.com. 

Appreciated as always!

To write or to revise?

My manuscript for UNEXPECTEDLY, MILO arrived in the mail today along with a letter from my editor, Melissa, detailing her suggestions for edits and revisions.  Some are broad and will be difficult to manage and others are small and simple.

Overall, I agree with Melissa’s assessment of what needs to be done to improve the book, but much of it involves “killing my darlings,” which is never easy for me.   

As a writer, I have learned that the struggles with my writing center upon my tendency to ignore plot in favor of character, my propensity to digress and obsess on areas of the story that I find interesting but others do not, and an overall blindness and disregard to pacing.  In Melissa’s notes, for example, she suggests the elimination or serious reduction of chapters dealing with two minor characters who I adore but admittedly do not serve the plot as well as others.  In sort, they slow down the story and serve as digression rather than progression.  Of course, my agent, Taryn, made similar suggestions as we revised the manuscript prior to submission, but I attempted to deflect Taryn’s concerns by wrapping these two characters into the plot more cohesively, though in my heart, I knew that these two characters, a man and a woman, were still guilty pleasures, characters who I loved who might not be right for the story.

To Taryn’s credit, she tried to alleviate my sadness over the possible loss of these characters by suggesting they might be right for another book.  Just not this one.

She’s an excellent manager of my emotions.

So begins the dance between the revising of UNEXPECTEDLY, MILO and the writing of THE CHICKEN SHACK.  Do I put THE CHICKEN SHACK aside for a few weeks and focus on my revisions, or do I attempt to work on both, dividing my time and energy evenly?  Or should I give  UNEXPECTEDLY, MILO the majority of my time but leave a little bit left each day to peck away at THE CHICKEN SHACK? 

My wife suggested I prioritize: If I want to see UNEXPECTEDLY, MILO out next summer, I should turn my attention to my revisions first, and then get back THE CHICKEN SHACK later.  While this may make sense, the problem with this strategy is that I am enjoying my work on THE CHICKEN SHACK immensely and would hate to put it aside for even a day.  Besides, I told my wife my latest aphorism:

Prioritizing is for losers who can’t get their stuff done on time.

I’ll just do both.  

News on SOMETHING MISSING

My author’s website, where you will be able to access this blog, will be up shortly, but until then, here’s the latest news about SOMETHING MISSING. 

First, a few appearances at local, independent bookstores and libraries have been scheduled, including:

Sunday, August 2: Words of Wisdom Bookstore in Shelton, CT (time TBA)

Thursday, August 13: RJ Julia Booksellers in Madison, CT (7 PM)

Thursday, August 27: Wilton Library authors discussion in Wilton, CT (7 PM)

Also, I learned that the audio book version of SOMETHING MISSING will be available on September 9 of this year for those of you who have been asking.

Lastly, for those of you who asked, the cover art for SOMETHING MISSING was designed by Erin Schell, who is no longer with Broadway but can easily be found on the web.

Front page day

It’s been quite a day. The Hartford Courant ran an article about SOMETHING MISSING and my life story on the front cover of today’s paper, above the fold, and alongside stories about the death of Walter Cronkite and the fortieth anniversary of the Apollo 11 missions.

It’s an enormous story that carries on for two pages and offers details about my life, the writing of the book, and my future projects. Overall, I’m pleased with the results. What began as a small story intended for the Lifestyle section of the paper eventually landed on the front page of the Sunday paper, so how can a guy complain?

But the process of interviewing for the article was a stressful one. You speak to a reporter for hours and hours, day after day, and you begin to wonder what material will ultimately be included in the article. News about the book, of course, but what else? There were lots of questions about the robbery that is detailed in the story, but we also spoke at great lengths about a number of topics, including my two near-death experiences, my childhood, my mother, my relationship with my former step-father, my writing process, my career as a teacher and a wedding DJ, and much more. She also interviewed at least half a dozen other people for the story and came back at me with follow-up questions from the interviews. For a while, I felt like I was interviewing for a full-length memoir, and I began to feel guilty about failing to share at least two other important stories from my life that never came out in the interview process.

Maybe for the release of the next book.

But in the end, I thought the reporter, Vanessa de la Torre, did a fine job, linking and weaving elements of my life to SOMETHING MISSING rather effectively and pointing out possible connections between me and my protagonist that had never even occurred to me. She also excerpted part of the novel for the front page and included the cover art as well, both of which can only serve to help sales. There are a couple spots in the story where I can see the heavy hand of the editor’s pen, but overall the writing is excellent, too.

Still, as exciting as it was to see my book featured on the front of the Hartford Courant, it was a little awkward for me as well. There was a lot of hype (advertisements for the story in Friday and Saturday’s paper), a lot of drama, and a lot of sharing about parts of my life that most people know nothing about. I’ve had friends ask me why I never shared these aspects of my life with them, but these are simply not stories that one tells over dinner or during a round of golf, and for the longest time, they were stories that I could not tell.

Still, people were surprised.

But congratulatory phone calls, emails (many from complete strangers), face-to-face conversations, and messages on Twitter and Facebook made today a little less awkward for me, so thank you to everyone who was kind enough to send along well wishes. They meant a lot.

Like I said, it was quite a day.

A side note: I never had a chance to actually look at the story until late this afternoon. My wife got out of bed around 5 AM this morning, the first time ever that she has ever risen from bed before me for anything except feeding Clara, and chased down a paperboy in order to purchase a copy of the paper after discovering that the local gas station was closed. She then brought it home and read it to me as listened from my pillow, still half asleep. An hour later I was on the golf course with friends (two pars, three bogies, a double bogie, and three unmentionable holes), and immediately following the round, we were off to the birthday party of a friend’s daughter. It wasn’t until 5:30 PM that I was able to sit down and look at the piece and the photos that were included.

I think part of me was avoiding it, fearful that the photo they chose to use made me look dumb. But as with the story itself, the photography worked out well.

Oh, and there’s a small photo gallery on the Hartford Courant’s website as well, in case you’re interested.

Overall, it was a fine day, and hopefully the attention that the book received today will result in more people reading my story. If I have to feel a little awkward and overly exposed to increase my readership, that’s a small price to pay.

Is SOMETHING MISSING a bestseller yet?

A lot of people, friends and strangers, via email, Facebook, Twitter, and in person, have been asking me how the book is doing in the bookstores.  Unsure myself, I asked my editor, who explained it to me that it can take a while to find out how a book is doing.  “Right now we’re very happy with the number in-print and out to stores, but it’s sort of in the consumer’s hands at this point.”

As the book sells, she explained, bookstores will place reorders, and if the book does not sell, the bookstores will return the books to the publisher.  Through this process, we will eventually get a sense of how the book is selling. 

She also told me that it can take a while for a book like SOMETHING MISSING to reach its audience (I’m no James Patterson), but that the work of the marketing department and my publicist will go a long way in spreading the word and building enthusiasm.  So tell your friends, your neighbors and complete strangers about the book whenever you can, and remind them that it makes a great gift and that I’m happy to sign any copy placed before me! 

My wife does this especially well.   

So in answer to all of you who have been kind enough to ask about the sales thus far, the short and honest answer is that we have no idea how the book is doing and won’t know for a while. 

On an anecdotal basis, I can tell you that most of the bookstores in my area are sold out and many of the reorders have already been claimed by people who were placed on a waiting list, but I have lots of friends in the area, so this isn’t too much of a surprise.   

Friends and relatives have also reported that the book is sold-out in stores in New Jersey, Florida and Massachusetts, but again, there’s no telling if the stores in question ordered one book or twenty books, so these reports are difficult to rely upon.

Amazon gives every book a sales rank based upon sales conducted through their site, and I have a friend who has been watching my sales rank closely and reporting it to me, but even this data is difficult to understand.  On Tuesday, the release day, SOMETHING MISSING jumped from #68,000 to #25,000, and by Wednesday afternoon it was at #8,000 and had cracked the top 100 in the humorous category. 

But a day later it had shot back up to #42,000, and today the book ranks #6,152 as I write this post. 

So who knows?  I assume that my book is so new that the numbers will remain volatile for some time, but I have no idea how Amazon’s sales rank works or what the data even represents.

But when I hear some news, good or otherwise, I’ll be sure to share it here with all of you!