So, two days ago my agent emailed me and asked for a photo to go out with the Publisher’s Weekly announcement, and I was like, “Ermygawd, no!”

I’d always intended to go out and get a nice author photo done, but somehow it always escaped my mind. Instead, I made do with an out-of-date and not-horrendously-attractive pic that was still miles better than every single other picture that has ever been taken of me.

Luckily, I was able to call my housemate, a poet and Hopkins MFA named Summer Greer, and he rushed home, transformed our living room into a photography studio and snapped some quick shots that, thankfully, don’t show the stain on my only pair of khakis. He is a lifesaver.