My newest book, Exit Black, launches on Tuesday. That would have been my father’s 88th birthday–I would give a lot to be able to hand him a copy.

Right now, the strangest and loveliest part of the process has been watching the fine team at Blackstone, my publisher, promoting the book. They are way better at it than I would have been, thank goodness.

I self-published my first novel, Stranger Bird. That was an experience that I will always treasure: the feeling of putting a book together with a tiny group of friends and family, mostly newbies, doing our own copy editing and picking typefaces and buying ISBNs and learning how expensive it is to publish a book. I imagine the feeling is analogous to playing in an independent-label band, driving around the country in a van and playing a hundred bars and grange halls. And I know that even now, with a traditional publisher putting my book out, I am still a tiny fish in the big publishing ocean–I’m not the kind of writer who is ever going to win a Hugo (good thing, maybe, considering the latest scandal) or be on Reese’s book club list. But, even though I am most definitely small potatoes, I’m still a potato. And it is a sweet and oddly disorienting experience to have a team of people from a publishing house supporting your book. I couldn’t be happier with Blackstone, and I will have a good word for the folks there for as long as I live. Thanks to them, I am orbiting your reading list.