Highways Home: Reflections on the ‘Do Not Follow’ Book Events
Launching Do Not Follow has reminded me that publishing a novel is not a solo achievement; it is a communal celebration. This fall, as I hosted author events at the Henrico Community Authors Showcase, Stony Point, and in living rooms and conference rooms around Richmond, each book signing became more than “promotion.” It turned into a gathering point for all the threads that shaped this story: immigration, grief, family, work–life balance, and the quiet courage it takes to start over at midlife.
As an immigrant, a physician, and a mother, I spend most of my days inside other people’s stories. In clinic and in the OR, my job has been to listen, fix what I can, and respect what must remain private. Writing Do Not Follow asked me to turn that same lens inward. Seema, my middle‑aged consignment store owner who returns to Albany after seventeen years away, is not me, but she carries many of the questions I’ve heard, lived, and quietly collected: What does “home” mean when you’ve crossed oceans? How do we grieve a relative while still raising children? How much of our past belongs to us, and how much belongs to the people who shared it?
Friends, family, colleagues, students, and strangers came with questions not only about the novel, but about the life around it: how to carve out creative time between clinic notes and homework, how to honor cultural roots without exposing family stories that are not ours alone to tell, how to navigate that tender line between authenticity and privacy.
We read scenes from Do Not Follow, signed books, and shared snacks. More importantly, we shared conversations. Immigration fiction often lives at the intersection of nostalgia and negotiation; we carry our parents’ expectations, our children’s futures, and our own unfinished dreams in the same overstuffed suitcase. My publishing journey has been full of surprises—from finding a home with Koehler Books to realizing how many overworked professionals quietly dream of writing their own stories one day.
