Does anyone really know who writes these Patterson books? Does anyone care?

(Note: This is a rerun--but an old favorite). 

Tomorrow is July 4th––Independence Day in the US. It’s my absolute favorite holiday. Not because of any red-blooded patriotic thing––but because of all the gaudy American holidays, this one requires very little in the way of preparation or décor. I don’t have to stuff a turkey, cut down a tree, hang lights or buy vast amounts of chocolate. You get to basically avoid a lot of base commercial crassness and just blow up stuff. How American is that?

My favorite 4th of all time was in 1976. (I was a swaggering eight years old). The Bicentennial was a very big deal. Plus the Vietnam War was over, so even stoned-out hippies who'd been protesting the war a year earlier, now rode shirtless in the back of pick-up trucks waving flags––yelling Happy Birthday America! It was beautiful.

But, like Iraqi insurgents, we cleverly removed the bases from our Golden Smokes (like a Piccolo Pete, but less dangerous) launching them, bouncing and smoking into said hippies during the 4th of July parade. But our aim was off. Instead we smoked out a junior high marching band. No injuries or arrests were reported. In retrospect, with all the patchouli oil involved, it’s a miracle one of those poor shirtless fools didn’t spontaneously combust. (Please, kids, don't try the Piccolo Pete thing at home. It's quite dangerous).

Anyway, in good conscience I really can’t tout the 4th without mentioning another, lonely forgotten holiday in the month of July. So without further adieu, I give you:

July 20ish––Chinese Valentine’s Day. Technically it’s the 7th day of the 7th lunar cycle, so the actual day is a little slippery. The legend reads like a letter to Penthouse Forum: The Goddess of Heaven had seven gorgeous daughters, who decided to bathe, naked, in a river. (As you can tell, a guy, invented this holiday). A cow herder named Niu Lang, which I think means, "Where’s my Viagra?" in Mandarin, came by and took their clothes, and probably a few snapshots with his digital camera. The daughters decided that Zhi Nü, the youngest and most beautiful should go confront him. But when Niu Lang saw her naked, they had to get married, and subsequently fell madly in love. How’s that work? Naked—have to get married—then love? Just like Spring Break in Daytona.

Okay, I’m done. I now return you to your previously scheduled holiday. Have fun. Be safe. Don’t lose an eyeball.

(And lest I be too jingoistic. Happy Bastille Day to Aliette, Happy Independence Day (next month) to Bhaswati Ghosh, and a belated Austrailia Day to Amra Pajalic and Daniel Hatadi.

Lisa See's haunting bestseller was recently optioned for the big screen

The latest is that Lisa See (yes, that Lisa See!) was gracious enough to read the manuscript and give me that amazing blurb. The full quote is a bit longer, but that’s the part that’s stuck in my head. That’s the part that I dance to and sing in the shower—off tune, as always.

Lisa See has earned her place in the firmament of great Asian American authors (heck, great authors, period).

I'm awed, honored and incredibly grateful.

I’d meant to blog about my lovely day at Random House much sooner, but a late-night dinner in Manhattan’s Lower East Village changed those plans. Many thanks to my cousin Brian for taking us on the gastronomical equivalent of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, otherwise known as Grafitti’s. If you haven’t been there––and you probably haven’t since they’ve only been open for 21 weeks––get your reservation in soon.

The menu is amazing. We had asparagus wasabi pizza, green mango paneer, chili pork dumplings with grapefruit confit, halva with a mascarpone date cream, black pepper ice cream––I could go on and on. I even bought a cookbook, which, oddly enough was published by the house that came in second in the book auction for HOTEL. (Chef Mehta and I were able to talk food and publishing).

Which sort of brings me back to my day at Random House, which was just as surreal as my dinner. I met EVERYONE. Okay, I’m sure Random House has a few more employees than the fourteen that I met, but it felt like everyone. And they were incredibly nice, wonderfully enthusiastic, and potentially bored enough to be reading this right now--––in which case I can honestly say they were the most intelligent, good-looking, charming people I have ever met, and the meeting would have gone on for hours, filled with their brilliant ideas but we had to cut it short so they could run downstairs and begin passing out blankets to the poor. Did I mention how brilliant they were?

Seriously though, they were great. If you are reading this––thank you. New York is a busy place. You’re busy people. I sincerely appreciate your time and hard work on behalf of this humble little book of mine.

More mañana. My alarm just went off...

It's not a mirage, its an oasis

• Forget Disneyland. Give your kids each $45 and let them take a taxi from JFK to midtown Manhattan—the only things missing are the barf bags.
• The Hotel Chelsea isn’t the Ritz and that’s a good thing. It’s in a relatively quite neighborhood, folks are laid back and the staff is genuine and personable in a natural way, not robotic like some mega-hotels.
• Times Square in June is like being dropped into a frenetic, nicotine-infused, cab-honking, siren-wailing, hurricane of humanity. Last time I was here was in the off-season. (Note to self, the off-season is much more pleasant).
• If you need a quiet place to get away from the above-mentioned hurricane (yes, there are somewhat peaceful parts of NYC) I recommend the New York Public Library, though St. Patrick’s Cathedral is right up the street and almost as quiet.
• I picked up a paper in town and the “good news” is that only 157 pedestrians were run down and killed last year! That’s down from last year’s spleen-rupturing number of 1,287,982—give or take a few.

Tomorrow. Noon. Random House. Can’t wait.

A lot of good it did me at family get-togethers where everyone was speaking Cantonese.

Ah well, it was probably meant to be in some karmic way, because I just sold the German rights to HOTEL. It's my first foreign sale.

Ausgezeichnet!