advance readers’ edition

The AREs for Get Lucky are all printed up — and just arrived in the mail at my house.  It’s still a 6-month wait for the actual book, but it’s always a thrill to see the AREs.

It’s amazing how different the words look on the pages of the book.  The new layout seems to change the rhythm and the sound of the language. I’ve been so used to 8 1/2 by 11 sheets of white paper — double-spaced in Times New Roman.  And then suddenly, pages are different:  the font’s different, the spacing’s different, the line breaks and page breaks and margins are different.

It’s thrilling, and discombobulating.  And for a while, until I get used to it, the sentences look funny all rearranged — and sound wrong in my head.  But then I get used to the new shape of the story on the page, and the new shape starts to feel more and more right until, after a while, it’s like this is what the words were waiting for all along.