Happy release day to me!

I once had someone ask me what I do to celebrate a new release and the answer, disappointingly enough, is: not a lot.
I blame the International Date Line. I blame the International Date Line for a lot of things, basically. Combined with my inability to do basic maths, it makes it hard to understand when things are happening.
Adulting 101 came out on the 15th –

—but the 15th in the US is, of course, already the 16th in Australia. So by the time Adulting 101 went live on Amazon, it was probably late Tuesday? The middle of the night sometime? Who even knows?
The thing I actually enjoy most about a new release is lurking on Goodreads and watching readers’ status updates. Those are more immediate than a review. I get to find out exactly which bits made them laugh. Hopefully it was a lot of them! It’s a little like watching a favourite movie with a friend who hasn’t seen it before – and you end up spending the whole time looking at their reactions instead of the screen.
And yes, of course I know the prevailing wisdom is that authors shouldn’t read reviews. But I read them in the full acceptance of that old piece of wisdom: that eavesdroppers never hear good things about themselves. So anything I read there that makes me go ouch? Yep. Deserved that.
I’m not super-sensitive about reviews. I mean, sure, I’d love it if everybody who read what I wrote absolutely adored it, but that seems unreasonable since half the time I side-eye my own writing. What an incredibly boring world it would be if everybody liked the same things.
And I’m definitely not a “my book is my baby” type of author.
Unless it’s a baby bird. I hatched it, then I kicked it the hell out of its nest, and now it’s on its own. That’s how it works. Toughen up or perish, baby bird! No, I’m not your mother. I’m the digger. Go away and leave me alone.

To sum up.
I have a new book out. It’s called Adulting 101.
I hope you like it.
If you do, that’s great.
If you don’t, that’s also great.
And I think I’m going to celebrate like this:

Cheers!