Today, I had the pleasure of meeting a group of Barnes & Noble managers and community relations coordinators at the Twin Cities Grill in the Mall of America.  Very fun.  Such marvelously nice people, to put it mildly.  We all love books, of course, and we have a passion for what we do, so I think that put us all in the same boat.  I only hope I didn’t bore them.  [Can I just interject here that Random House and Bantam Dell, specifically, has treated me so sweetly through all of this, and their representative Cole Becker was a gem.]  I think I received three invites to go to various churches, and a free pass to come visit their stores.  How lucky am I?  Thank you to all of them, in advance, for hand selling Eve!

I reiterated again how Eve is not a “religious” book.  I explained how Eve is a central figure in the three main religions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam.  I had to treat her thus, and I hope I did.  If anything, Eve is a universal story about a woman who was a mother and a wife in the hardest and cruelest of times.  She had no precedent example to follow.  She lived through one son killing another.  I can’t even imagine how horrible that would be.

Eve received a wonderful mention in today’s print edition of USA Today’s Winter Preview of books, which covers January through April.  To reach the online version, go here and click “January 27” on the Winter Books Calendar.  Then click on the cover art of Eve to get full details.

I’m meeting so many thoughtful and inquisitive people; it’s like cool water in a desert.  To think that many words set down on pages can water and grow friendships.  Amazing.

[Post image: My newfound friends–a Meet and Greet with Barnes & Noble reps (Back row: Cole Becker from Random House, Elissa Elliott, Kathy Kaysen, Stephanie Krco, Gary Peterson, Kevin Tjaden; Front row: Mary Shrader, Pete Richie, Lin Salisbury)]