Listen, I’m not here to make you talk about Game of Thrones. But I’d be lying if I said this wasn’t my headcanon for what becomes of Drogon after the show’s end. Eat a snack, buddy. Eat two.

Anyway.

Yesterday, Invitation to a Bonfire came out in paperback, and I hope this means the book will continue to reach a new audience. (Please buy one!) It’s exhilarating and scary to watch a book’s destiny unfold, because that destiny is outside your control. Art is a subtle expression of the mind made concrete; it is the intersection of the deeply personal and the profoundly social. And now it’s in the hands of readers.

I’m still at a residency, so I won’t go on at length, except to say thank you to everyone who has contributed to the success of the book so far, within the publishing paradigm and outside of it (readers, reviewers, booksellers, librarians, dear treasures of my heart). You mean everything to me.