How I found magic at Barnes and Noble

by Mary Margret Daughtridge

It was the last week in March and I hadn’t received my author’s copies yet, but I figured I would any day because SEALed With A Kiss was slated to be released around April 14.

I was in the local Barnes and Noble. I’m a great believer in the power of visualization so my intention was to go to the romance section and visualize my book there under the D’s. But first I swung by the new release shelf, because I like to see what’s just come in.

When I saw the new release shelf, I was overcome with the weirdest, most swimmy-headed, what’s wrong with this picture feeling I’ve ever had. Finally I realized what was odd was that one of the books on the shelf had a cover all in blue with a hunky guy--just like the cover of my book. Shocked, I read the author’s name. Mary Margret Daughtridge. Same as mine too. Finally the truth dawned. It wasn’t just like my book. It was my book.

But I didn’t think it had been released. Now, I wasn’t sure if I was really seeing it, or if I had finally succumbed to self-induced delusion.

After a while, I got up the courage to touch it, and run my finger over the embossing, and open it and inhale new-book-fresh-ink, and let the truth sink in: my hands were holding my published book. The magic was real.

In the Spring, another SEALed book, SEALed With A Promise, will appear. I will go to Barnes and Noble and there it will be.

I know more about what to visualize these days. Now I don’t only imagine SEALed With A Promise there, I imagine hands picking it up. I visualize a center aisle display. In my mind's eye, I see readers laughing and crying, and feeling so good as they read the last sentence.

But when I try to imagine how I'll feel when I see it on display for the first time...a big grin spreads across my face and once again the only thing I'm sure of is that I'm witnessing magic.