What if you throw a party and no one shows up?

Or how about if you send out a call for submissions and no one answers?

Work for the anthology has been on the back burner lately, while I struggle valiantly with my Master's thesis and my now five-month-old daughter, Oona. One of these two things is delightful; the other is a great big drag that I wish was over.

For those of you who eat this stuff up, here's a taste of the little delight in my life:






And for those of you who either know what it feels like to write a thesis or for those of you who are thinking about starting one, here's a little something my husband (the other half of UpStart Press) whipped up one day to cheer me:



At least it gave my thesis advisor a chuckle.

With a mid-April deadline for submissions, there hasn't been much for me to do but wait. So I have been waiting, pushing down my "no one will come to my party" fears as much as possible. Imagine my delight when the submissions started trickling in last week. As did the casual inquiries ("When was that deadline again?") and earnest promises to "get something in soon."

I bumped into Elizabeth Greene downtown today. She was toting home an enormous and heavy-looking bag full of books, contest entries, and she had an afternoon of reading and sore arms ahead of her. She promised to get something in to me "soon" and asked how things were going. I told her my only lament so far was that I wasn't able to find Judith Pond. Google, Facebook and all email inquiries had led nowhere. "Leave it with me," said Elizabeth. Two hours later I was reading a very enthusiastic email from Judith herself. Elizabeth Greene is the bomb.

The deadline for submissions is April 15, and my fears are fading away. It's going to be a great party!