Consider these 5-seconds-to-digest lines from my works-in-progress speed dating for readers. Quick aside: Is speed dating really even a thing that happens outside of TV shows and movies? I could watch the Paris Gellar speed dating scene in Gilmore Girls on a loop, but I've never actually met anyone who's done it in real life. Maybe-not-so-quick aside over. Here you don't have to read a whole excerpt and then wait and wait and wait until the book comes out to find out what happens. These are just pretty pictures and (fingers crossed!) lines that will make you laugh.

Narrowing this list down to a top ten almost killed me, so there are eleven. Still, that's not enough. Therefore I attach this disclaimer: There's nothing comprehensive or researched or market-tested about this list. It is a living thing that I will feed and water and watch grow. But for the moment in time when I wrote this, these were the books and characters I was most in love with for one reason or another.

Writer's are taught to use exclamation points sparingly. The recommendation I've heard is no more than two in an entire book. I used both of mine for this home page in the title because I'm that excited to keep in touch (but now I'm out of exclamation points for this sentence, so insert enthusiasm here).