When Brooklyn In Love launched earlier this month, it was a thrill. So much anticipation and joy, so many people cheering me on, it was great. It was also a relief as it had been years in the making.
As soon as I published Paris, My Sweet, I knew I wanted to write another book. But about what? Just like Paris, My Sweet couldn't have happened until I had lived in Paris, Brooklyn In Love couldn't have happened until I met Andrew, moved to Brooklyn and had Parker.
So all those wonderful (and some not so wonderful) things happened. I wrote a couple book proposals before I had a viable idea and got the contract to write this book. And by then, I was pregnant and newly married. I was still working full-time. I didn't exactly have the time - or the writer's life of complete focus and devotion - to actually write a book. But when you have a contract, and some determination, you make it happen.
Brooklyn In Love was written largely in 2016. I eked out time on the weekends and wrote long-hand on the subway to and from work. I would edit chapters on my lunch break. I kept at it week after week, month after month, while Parker started walking and talking. I submitted it, edited it, tweaked it, and then... waited.
2017 was spent mostly anticipating, worrying, preparing and twiddling my thumbs. February 2018 loomed. Would the book do okay? What would its reception be? Was it going to be a success?
Three weeks in, it remains to be seen. The early reviews - mostly from friends and fans - are good. I'm hoping more and more people. That my story resonates with all the women - independent, single and married; ambitious, curious, unsure; looking for love, looking for a new start, looking for things they don't even know they want yet - and becomes a reassuring touchstone for years to come.