When I first decided to quit my sensible career job and focus on writing, I suppose this is the day I had in mind. At the end of all the early mornings and late nights and rejection letters and self-doubt and setbacks and new starts and hating the chapters I loved yesterday and editing and wondering and dreaming and starting again yet again, I finally have a book in my hands.

Of course, I had seen endless pdf proof copies of the cover and all the inside pages, and indeed with all the obsessive reading and re-reading and detailed line-editing had got a little sick of seeing them. But holding the physical copy in my hands, flicking through the pages and running my fingers down the spine was a different experience altogether. It reminded me what I made all those sacrifices for.

Not only that, but I realised that, at the end of it all, I have a book I am happy with. In fact, it’s a book I am proud of. I don’t know what the world will think of it, or even if the world will pay enough attention to form an opinion at all. But I am happy with it.