On Shame, Dread, and Book Launches

By Sara Hosey

If you’ve written a book that you can’t share with the people who love you, or if you have a book coming out and you find yourself sweating and squirming as you imagine others actually reading it, come sit by me.

I was deeply ashamed before the publication of my first book—and it wasn’t even a memoir! I had worked on my novel, Iphigenia Murphy, in secret, only telling my partner that I had written it once I’d found a publisher. (For the record, Jess, my partner, is wonderf...