Imagine my shock and surprise when I came home from an eye doctor’s appointment this afternoon only to find that UPS had come and gone in my absence…and left a copy of Boy Toy on my front step.
When I say “a copy,” I don’t mean one of the galleys I’ve been signing for the past few months. I mean an actual, honest-to-God finished, bound hardcover book!
I was amazed. The book isn’t out until September and it seems like last year, I didn’t get a copy of Fanboy until much closer to the actual in-store date.
But who am I to complain about getting my book early, of all things?
Anyway, let me tell you something — I absolutely love this book! No, I’m not devolving into a creature of pure ego. I’m not talking about the words at all. I mean the look of it. God, it’s a thing of beauty! Houghton did a nice embossed treatment on the front cover, raising the letters in the title. There are little touches everywhere — the front flap in blue, for example, with the back flap in complementary green. The green endpapers. The way they’ve turned the cover design into a logo, using it everywhere on the cover it says “Boy Toy.”
I really thought that nothing could compare to the thrill of seeing my first book in print, but I have to say this is just as thrilling. It’s a beautiful package and I’m really happy with it. My thanks to everyone involved, but especially artist extraordinaire Jon Gray (who managed to distill a complicated and broad narrative into a simple, eye-catching image) and Sheila Smallwood, who took Jon’s vision and translated into a terrific package design.