Wish Fulfillment

As close readers of this website—so, basically, me and my husband—already know, when I was seven years old my mom and I sent my first picture book off to the Scholastic Book Club.  It was called The Little Red Train, and I can't show you what it looked like, because I never saw it again, but I can tell you it looked a lot like this—  

—a book I wrote around the same time, only the one we sent off had a red train instead of a purple tugboat.

Weeks went by and, shockingly, I did not hear back from the editors.  Months went by—nothing. Every  month when the book club newsletter came, I kept looking for my book for sale, thinking maybe the editors at Scholastic wanted to surprise me by publishing Little Red Train without telling me.

They didn’t surprise me.  

I got on with my life, albeit with my spirit a wee bit diminished. So I am exceptionally pleased to report that, all these decades later, my book is finally a Scholastic Book Club book. No, not Little Red Train.  But just as exciting for me, a special paperback edition of Imperfect Spiral is an October 2013 Scholastic Book Club selection. The seven-year-old who lives inside of me is very, very happy.

She is also laughing, and here is why: Imperfect Spiral is the "October Tearjerker" and—can you read this in the image I've pasted here?—when you buy the book you get a pack of tissues. And on the pack of tissues is this: "Read it and weep!" You could call this a case of be-careful-what-you-wish-for. I'd rather just laugh, and thank the Scholastic Book Club for finally fulfilling my wish.