There’s usually not a lot of excitement around here, but last week, Saundra got her advance review copies of her debut novel, Shadowed Summer , to be published next February by Random House’s Delacorte Press.

I’m not going to spoil anything here, but let me say that it’s all good. The descriptive prose is delicious, and the story drew me in immediately, to the point where I went out to the garage to get a soda from the fridge, and just sat down out there to continue reading. I was deep into the scary part of the story, involving the physical manifestation of a ghost, and had just read a phrase that sent a creepy little chill down my spine, when the lights in the garage all went out.

It was the darn timer of course, but in that first moment, when I was jerked out of the ghost story into a dark altered reality, I felt my heart rate triple for a few beats. It took me a moment to calm down enough to go turn on the light switch. Good writing can do that to you, I think.

I’m very proud of Saundra for her accomplishment. I know how hard she’s worked for this, and enjoying the fruition is a great experience, even vicariously.