Perhaps you remember that, for the last year or so, we have had a whole new relationship with the Flatiron Building.

It used to be the thing we’d crane our necks to stare up upon and say, “They don’t make them like this in Chestertown.”

Now it is the place where we make books with our editor Erin, including our very first trade children’s picture book, Babies Ruin Everything.

But the making of the books is just the first part of Erin’s job. As we found out when we went to New York a few weeks ago for a brainstorming session and marketing meeting, once the creative development process has been laid to rest, a whole army of people spends about a year spreading the word — to bookstore owners, reviewers, publishing industry influencers, and . . . librarians.

Yes, the good opinion of librarians is instrumental to the success of any book. Because they are the ones who decide which books to purchase, which books to recommend, which books to display prominently as you walk into the children’s section, and which books to read at circle time. And so, periodically, editors at Macmillan invite a bunch of librarians to the Flatiron for Librarian Preview.

I was not there, so I can’t say exactly what went down, but from the looks of the photos Erin posted to Instagram yesterday, the mood was festive, to the tune of confetti and cupcakes and various smiles.

While it’s impossible to know for certain whether each and every one of these librarians carefully read and absolutely loved our book, one has to assume that they at least didn’t hate it.

I consulted with my mother (recently retired librarian and extremely powerful woman), who insists that no self-respecting librarian would willingly pose with a book that he or she was not willing to endorse.

And so we must conclude with something like near-certainty that at least 80 librarians (when librarians are thus gathered, they are referred to as a “stack,” apparently) are not actively opposed to our book! You can fault our logic, but not the smiles on these faces. A special thanks and shout-out to Erin Stein, editor extraordinaire, who graces the lower right-hand corner of this photo.

The Babies Ruin Everything publication date inches ever closer (July 21, 2016). It’s hard to think about July this close to Christmas.

But thinking of all those smiling librarians, it’s also kind of hard not to.