Unbreakable spirits (although they keep trying), by Catriona

What single moment of being a published writer has been the most memorable?

I write this sitting, not in the kitchen sink, but outside a winery on the regular Wednesday write-in of the Wednesday Writers. So I thought I'd ask them.

Lisa, Spring, Tamsen

Eileen Rendahl, who's not actually here tonight because she's off on a troll hunt (i.e. looking at the giant wooden trolls of Oregon, not fighting cyber-bullies - although imagine if she was doing both. I'd watch that show.), texted to say that her sweetest moment was when she wanted to branch out into more than one genre and gave her Pocket editor a couple of ideas. "Then I met up with her at a conference. She gave me a big hug and said 'Apparently, you can write everything!'."

Tamsen Schultz "A woman wrote to me to say my books had helped her through the treatment for a brain tumor. They took her away to a different place and gave her something else to focus on. That letter made me cry. Also, I've got this great one-star review on Amazon - 'very Nora Roberts' Failed attempt to bring me down, lady."

Spring Warren "It was when I had won a prize, for The Breaks, which has a male protagonist. I went into the room for the presentation and people I half-knew said polite hellos but kept looking over my shoulder for someone else to talk to. [Don't you hate that? CMcP] Finally someone asked "So, Spring, why are *you* here?" and I said, "Well, I won the prize." They had been looking for the guy (sic) who wrote the prize-winning book. Ha!"

Lisa Nalbone "The one that pops to mind is the *first* time I got a tag on Instagram saying a total stranger had found my book and it had really helped them. (That's the book that became Learn More, Worry Less, Love Learning.) She was going to do a podcast and feature it . . . somewhere . . . Oh, what wasn't she going to do? And what did she do? Correct. But it was a sweet moment."

And now me, Catriona. I'll go for one of my worst moments. Funny now, but at the time . . . ach, it was funny then too. But pretty dark humour. I was having a book launch in the big Waterstones on Princes Street, in Edinburgh. We were taking over the top-floor cafe, with the view of the castle. Swankerama. I arrived and started climbing the stairs, feeling like quite a lot. At the first landing, there was a sign and I caught sight of my name. Here's what the sign said: [big writing] THE CAFE WILL CLOSE AT 5PM TONIGHT [small writing] because of an event with Catriona McPherson [big writing] SORRY FOR ANY INCONVENIENCE.

Cx

Eileen and me one night when she wasn't troll-hunting