June 2: Release day for A Head Full of Ghosts/Brookline Booksmith Fun

I know, I know, I’ve been endlessly blabbing on and on about the book, but A HEAD FULL OF GHOSTS is a real thing now. Crazy, yeah? Yes. It is. Today I’m feeling thankful and incredibly, obnoxiously lucky to have so many amazing friends and loved ones and talented cohorts who’ve helped and supported me, even when I didn’t/don’t deserve it.

Last night the wonderful Brookline Booksmith hosted a reading/discussion with my good friend, the brilliant and sometimes angry Jack Haringa as interviewer/James Lipton.

Make with the pictures, already, and some poignant funny descriptive words!

Jack’s kind intro and fun questions. I only got 9 and 10 correct.

Here’s a goofy pic of me listening to the intro. Maybe thinking about food when Jack said “tantalizing”

Next up, a couple of pictures of the discussion. We were such happy discussers! I hold the mic with my left hand apparently. Who knew?

After the event a mob posse gaggle gathering group of revelers friends and family when down the street to the Fireplace and ate tantalizing appetizers. I personally completed a meat Olympiad: salmon, short rib, lamb, slider burger, chicken wing(s). You’ll notice my brother’s large head in one shot. If you look closely you’ll see my sister and her husband Steve; their house was the model/setting for the house in AHFoG. I thank them for letting me make their cute house creepy.

One final picture and a warning. This is my copy of A HEAD FULL OF GHOSTS. If I get the opportunity to sign your book, you’re going to sign mine as well. Fair is fair!

Here’s what the morning after a release party looks like. It ain’t pretty. Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn. Sorry, just coughed up something nasty. Me and ineffable evil shuffling to the laptop to obsessively read ever digital pixel that might be said about my book today to check the weather, some email, that kind of thing.

Thank you everyone who came out last night. Thank you to those sending along kind messages, and to those who may purchase the book. If you’ll allow me to get a little contemplative navel-gaze-y  I admitted to the crowd (yes, crowd, there was a crowd: noun, a large number of people gathered together, typically in a disorganized or unruly way) last night that after my second novel was published and didn’t sell well at all, I allowed myself to sink into a self-pitying writing funk that lasted for longer than I care to admit. I only came out of it because of the support of friends and family. I’m eternally grateful to them all.

So lets end with the text of the acknowledgements pages from the book:

FIRST AND FOREMOST, thanks to Lisa, Cole, Emma, and the rest of my family who love, support, and put up with me. My wife, Lisa, went above and beyond this time around being a beta reader and her input was invaluable. Thanks to my sister Erin and brother-in-law Steve who let me fictionalize their house.

Huge thanks to this novel’s other beta reader, the talented John Mantooth. I think it was Louis Maistros who once said, “Being asked to read another writer’s rough draft is the literary equivalent of being asked to help a friend move a couch to a new place.” He’s so right, and I so appreciate the heavy lifting that John did with this book.

More huge thanks to my agent, Stephen “They’re coming to get you” Barbara, for his friendship, advice, and support. I’m so lucky to have him on my side.

A thousand and one thank-yous to my amazing editor, Jennifer Brehl. She helped make this the best book it could be. I’d never be able to fully explain how much her belief in me and this book means. (Everyone, put down the book and clap for Jen, please.)

Big thanks to Camille Collins, Pamela Jaffe, Ashley Marudas, Andrea Molitor, Kelly O’Connor, Caroline Perny, and everyone at William Morrow for their support, enthusiasm, and hard work. I’m so proud to be working alongside all these great people.

Thank you to two of my best friends and co-conspirators, John Langan and Laird Barron, for listening to me whine, agitate, complain, pontificate, and fret my way through this book, once a week by phone (and too occasionally in person).

Thank you to friends and colleagues who’ve supported, inspired, and helped keep me sane: Karen Brissette (the real one!), Ken Cornwell, Brett Cox, JoAnn Cox, Ellen Datlow, Kurt Dinan, Steve Eller, Steve Fisher, Andy Falkous and Future of the Left, Geoffrey Goodwin, Brett Gurewitz and Bad Religion, Page Hamilton, Jack Haringa, John Harvey, Stephen Graham Jones, Sandra Kasturi, Matt Kressel, Michael Lajoie, Sarah Langan, Jennifer Levesque, Kris Meyer, Stewart O’Nan, Brett Savory, Mark Haskell Smith, Simon Strantzas, Dave Zeltserman, and Your Pretty Name.