Strangers,

Thanks to all of you who flooded me with Strange Flesh sightings in its natural habitat. I finally got out this weekend to make my own observations. Which were:

1) I did not care for the way a few local urchins were handling Chardahlia [my name for the cover model].

2) I was nonplussed by the following exchange with a bookseller:

“Sir, are you photographing the books?”

“Yeah. That OK?”

“It’s really not. You mustn’t photograph the books. We can’t have it.”

3) I spent a while trying to parse why this might be, and was poised to argue. But then I realized: Chardahlia deserves to be treated like a celebrity.

So I left her to her work.