A Texas-sized Welcome from Austin
When I learned I’d be speaking and signing at BookPeople in Austin, TX, on Saturday, January 20, I knew it’d feel like coming home. And the day didn’t disappoint. BookPeople is one of my all-time favorite book stores, which made it all the more significant. But it was the crowd that made this day so memorable: uncle, cousins, siblings (Tessa and Paul), friends, former co-workers, even folks from Granger (a town of 1,200 where I grew up) arrived after seeing me interviewed on KXAN-TV early that morning. My sister-in-law, Camm, and her friend drove all the away from Corpus Christi. One of my mother’s dearest friends, Betty Thomson, was there — which made it feel like Mama was in the front row cheering me on. All in all, there were more than 30 people. My husband, Andy, was able to make it at the last minute. The big old softie got teary-eyed (and would many times on the Great Texas Book Tour of 2018). But of course he would. He knows better than anyone that the trip represented a dream many, many years in the making.
