I wonder if Chris Crum, my ex-pat friend in Isla Mujeres, Mexico, has read Weed Wine Magic yet. Either way I’m happy he got his hands on a signed copy of my latest novel.

I know.

I know.

If he hasn’t yet read the novel he’ll get to it when he gets to it.

We’re back home in Scranton a couple of weeks now, it’s the new year and I’m wondering about other copies of Weed Wine Magic I signed and presented to readers in Isla Mujeres where a crucial part of the novel is based.

I hope they also have read the book already but know people are busy with lives that keep them busy and from settling down from start to finish with my novel. That’s true here at home, too. I have to admit I get edgy when I think about people holding onto my novel who haven’t yet read the story.

That’s like holding a bottle of weed wine without pouring and drinking the magic elixir. When I hosted a radio talk show I used to close the show by saying, “You better listen!” Now my message is even clearer. You better drink that weed wine!

I’m also jumpy about readers who read the book and haven’t told me how the story impacted their thinking. I’m not interested in hearing what people don’t like about my work, what they didn’t understand or what they would do differently if they wrote the book. Let them write their own novels.

I want to know what readers liked, how they identified with my heroes and villains. I want to know how readers feel about tense situations I shared. I want to know if the book got them high. That kind of feedback means more to me and to them.

Chris Crum was the first personal contact I made on Isla Mujeres. An American who lives and works on the Island of Women, Chris and his partner run a lovely place to stay with a little lending library for which we provided a copy of Weed Wine Magic.

Chris was the first person in Mexico to express interest in my work when I announced our Isla Mujeres book tour on several Isla-based Facebook groups I joined. I could see Chris was supportive and smart. I could see he was interested. I could see he was a thinker. I thank Chris for that and for taking the time to stop by our hotel to pick up his copies of the novel. The photograph shows him and me standing outside the lobby at the Lotus Hotel where Stephanie and I stay in Isla.

As a writer, I value my readers more than they know.

Without people like them, the world wouldn’t need people like me.