I’m wrapping up a week in Nashville, Tennessee. I’ve been here for a day-job related work conference (not NCTE). In the evenings, I’ve been hanging out at the stunning main branch of the Nashville Public Library where – when I’m not walking around with my mouth open because this building is so incredible – I’ve been doing a bunch of writing. The picture above shows the "reading room" where I've set up camp. Let me just say, WOW.

Wandering through the stacks and stacks of books here makes me realize once again what a treasure we have in our public libraries. I’ve always considered the library a place to find friends in books. Now – even though I’ve never been to Nashville in my life – I see many real-life friends on these Tennessee shelves.  For example, in the Nashville Teen section, there’s a display featuring YA novels about basketball. At the front of the display, I see the book Rebound by Bob Krech. Bob and I met at the Rutgers One on One Conference a few years ago, and he very generously visited the teen group at the library where I work just a month or so ago. In the Nashville children’s area, I saw a couple kids reading Lisa Yee’s Millicent Min Girl Genius aloud to one another and cracking up! I was dying to pull out the plastic slug (which I actually carry in my backpack for good luck) and let those kids know that THIS SLUG WAS SENT TO ME BY LISA YEE!!! But of course, then I’d be arrested and I don’t think the Nashville prison has wireless access so I kept it to myself. Here's a photo of the sculpture hanging above the room where Lisa Yee made kids laugh:

I saw David Lubar’s books and Laura Halse Anderson’s books and the Looking Glass Wars (brought to the U.S.A. by the most excellent editor of all time, Nancy Mercado) and A True & Faithful Narrative (recommended to me by the most excellent children’s librarian Jen Cogan) and Fly By Night (which I read because the amazing Betsy Bird said I and everybody else on the planet should.) By the way, I can't believe how many books I've actually PURCHASED because of Ms. Bird and her Fuse#8 Productions this year. And I work in a library!!!! Bookshelves of Doom and Chasing Ray are equally powerful influences on my spending habits.

People often ask me now what’s the best part about “being published.” Honestly, there are a lot of best parts, but I think I think my favorite has been getting to know some of the real live people – writers, editors, librarians, copy editors (I LOVE the copy editor who worked on Defining Dulcie by the way), booksellers, reviewers, bloggers and especially readers, who make the crazy business of making books go round.