Delayed Celebrations and GIVEAWAY!

If there's one thing (pick just one!) that's frustrating about the writing and publishing sphere, it's how often the things you really want to celebrate have to be kept quiet..for ages.  Centuries.  Aeons, even.

Ok, but even a few weeks or months on the silent circuit can feel excruciating when you really want to run around like a toddler on a cookie high with a fistful of sparklers and order MY BOOK IS GOING TO BE A REAL BOOK AND BE PUBLISHED AND STUFF! on a cake.  You maybe haven't quite refined the cake wording yet.

Which is why I've never really blabbed much about how, a year ago today, I got a quick text from my Agent of Awesome to see if I had a minute to chat.  I was at work at work, at a community college writing center, and a minute something I had to scrape up given that it was nearing end-of-semester time and I was neck-deep in papers submitted to the online tutoring portal I managed.

But that minute was going to have to give, because I Just Knew that this was good news.  

At least, I hoped so.  It was either that, or Jessica was telling me she was moving to Argentina and starting a marshmallow farm because I was such a terrible client.

It was good news. I tried not to bubble over in the hallway of the college, but did a silent internal happy dance.

I then had to go back to work and read freshmen term papers and give them comprehensible feedback in the form of literate, written English.  It was really, really hard.  And even harder--I had to keep mum.  I kept mum for a while, then I got to squeee when the news came out officially.

Even though this is delayed..waaaaaay delayed...I want to celebrate that moment of bubbling-over-happy from a year ago.  So--a giveaway!

Just leave a comment on this post (and pick up extra entries on Twitter and Facebook!) with something you're celebrating--something you're currently proud of accomplishing or working hard on, something that's maybe been "old news" for awhile but still makes you feel a little bubbly to think about, anything at all.  I'll draw a winner at random at 5 pm Eastern time on Friday.  Open anywhere the mail will take it; void if such drawings or these prizes disallowed where you happen to inhabit.

And the prizes!

A signed (and personalized per your request) coy of TORN, plus two of my favorite writerly things:

A notebook from Rifle Paper Co--I carry one in my purse to jot down notes and ideas and things I will definitely forget and what were we talking about? NOTEBOOK! Yes.

My favorite tea, in loose leaf form for optimized tea-strength personalization.

ALSO! If you're a writer, this prize pack INCLUDES a critique of your query letter, synopsis, and first five pages (provided by me, a writerly person who is not an industry pro but is a professional writing teacher and tutor, so that's...something? I guess?).  If you're not a writer...well, you got tea and a notebook and a book :)

Good luck and thanks for celebrating a year late with me!