Alice in Writerland

The date for Waiting For Spring’s re-release is drawing closer (May 10…less than a month away!), and lately I’ve been thinking a lot about the actual writing of the book. In particular, I’ve been thinking about the people who were of help to me during that process, and believe me when I say there were a lot of them. Today I want to offer a public thank you to one of those people, my friend Alice McCreary, the first person to ever read Waiting For Spring.

It’s an awkward thing, sending something you’ve written to a friend, especially when the question, “Say…what do you think about this?” goes along with it. Alice is a librarian, an avid reader, and an extraordinarily frank lady, so although I was more than a little nervous about handing my baby over to her, I knew that her feedback would be absolutely invaluable.

She read Waiting For Spring a chapter or two at a time starting in January 2007, before it even had a title, and gave me two great gifts: encouragement and HONESTY. Her initial reaction of “I really like this! Send me more!!!!” allowed me to think I was onto something, but as the weeks went by, if something wasn’t working for her – whether it was a character (Brian originally had a very bitchy ex-girlfriend), a phrase (“I don’t know this word…is this a Maine thing?”), or a plot point (“Tess’s mom is a real bitch on wheels. Why did her dad stay with her for so long?”) – she told me so.

Then there was the email that began, “Okay, I’m home from work. Where’s the next chapter????” That was very cool.

So, Alice: Thank you, a thousand times over. Thank you for your willingness to give me so much of your time and energy, for your advice and encouragement, and for your honesty. Thank you, too, for being my friend.