Yesterday, I gave Amazon visitors a chance to get an unauthorized PRE-view copy of my upcoming novel, STILL SUMMER. I offered three beautifully bound copies (kidding! They are spiral-bound by the copy shop) since that was a much larger population. I'm also going to include a stunning prize (well, it's a little stunning) for any comments they might make.

I want to make the same offer to loyal site visitors (excluding, to my sorrow, my devoted students who already know so much about this novel that it bores them).

But since there are fewer of you, the pre-view for a pre-review will only go to one reader.

The book will be out at the end of next August.

It's a different kind of Jacquelyn Mitchard novel (although you'll notice the same bright, almost uncomfortable light that shines on the most complex relationships, as well as ordinary people caught in extraordinary circumstances. But it's also an adventure, a story of survival at sea in circumstances fraught by human frailty, treachery from within and without and the sometimes fragile bonds among friends, between mother and daughter.

I'm betting you'll like STILL SUMMER: but I want you to tell me if you DON'T!

Write me at the function on this site that says "E-mail Jackie" and request a copy (AND a fabulous trinket!) and one will arrive in a few days.

Don't forget to leave your address.

Then share your comments by starting a new discussion thread on the website.

This isn't my publisher's idea, but my own little experiment.

Let's see what comes of it.

It's finally cold today her here in Wisconsin -- not JANUARY cold, but at least not this creepy semi-fall we've been having all year. And last year. I've taken out my cross-country skis ONCE, only to see that they went straight through to the mud. I'm dreaming of a white February!

AND P.S. WATCH FOR THAT GIRL ON YOU-TUBE! KEEP CHECKING....