Published Again

I am, once again, a published author.
 
But this time, there will be no mention on the New York Times list of notable books.  There will be no royalty checks.
 
Oh wait; I didn’t have those things last time, either.
 
And since I actually served as ghostwriter, I will not even receive credit as the author, which is a shame really, because the prose is gripping—if I do say so myself—as evidenced by the following opening lines: 

Hi.  My name is David and I am so happy to be in class with you this year.  I know that we will have a lot of fun together.  I am looking forward to getting to know you.  I want to tell you a little bit about myself.

I know—it rivals opening lines like 

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness.

Obviously, I am being somewhat sarcastic, which I suppose is only to mask the fact that I somehow feel as if this book is one of the most important things I have written.

On Tuesday, all of David’s classmates received copies of my newest creation, All About David, to take home and read with their parents.

Here is the SparkNotes version.  All kids have things in common with each other and things that are different.  David likes to swim and play video games; he likes to watch SpongeBob and loves the color red, just like many of his classmates.  And, David has autism, which means that he had a difficult time learning to talk and can be hard to understand, that he sometimes thinks noises are too loud and may wear headphones, or that he might want to have a break for a minute on the playground.  But, like all kids, David wants to have friends.

I wrote the book from David’s perspective, which is somewhat amusing because David refuses to read it.  Or have it read to him.  Or really even to lay eyes on it to look at the eight pictures which were lovingly chosen, painstakingly inserted into the text before I even considered the fact that eight full color pictures would make printing this little masterpiece somewhat pricey.

That is why I hand-delivered the books to school on Monday afternoon rather than send them with David because I was afraid that they might end up in the restroom garbage can.

Next year, I hope to write a new and improved second grade version.  Maybe by then, David will actually be ready to read it. 

But if not, that is alright because, although I wrote this book about David, I did not actually write it for him.