New York, Random House

My wife tried to murder me.

Now I know why she's been so supportive of my author career. It was all part of her diabolical plan to murder me. Her foresight was amazing. Spend years encouraging me, helping me, giving me feedback, pushing me, rooting for me. Make sure I get with a major NY publisher, get a book to be promoted heavily at BEA, convince me to bring her to NY with me. All part of the plan of my demise.

But I foiled her and survived anyway. At least so far.

We've been here for roughly 48 hours. In that short span, we've visited the Statue of Liberty, toured Ellis Island, visited Ground Zero, saw a movie, walked six miles in Central Park, toured the St. Patrick's Cathedral, New York Public Library, and Empire State Building, walked all over Times Square and many blocks around it, had three amazing dinners, several life-threatening trips in cabs, and, last but certainly not least, attended a meet-and-greet with everybody at Random House.

But I had the last laugh! I'm still alive despite my wife's efforts. My feet and knee caps hate my guts, but I'm kickin' and breathin'.

It's really been awesome. Now I know why everyone comes back from NY yappin' about how much they love it. It's an incredible place, and I'm so glad the book industry is grounded here because I want to return many, many times.

But no real need to go into what we've been doing. If you wanna know about NY, google it. What I want to talk about is how incredible the last few hours were.

My wife and I walked the ten blocks from our hotel to the Random House office building and met my agent, Michael Bourret, in the lobby at 3:30. I had this sudden rush of nervousness right before that probably would've resulted in an unfortunate aneurysm (as opposed to a fortunate aneurysm) if he hadn't walked in shortly after us. It all melted away as soon as I saw him.

Seriously. I hugged the guy, introduced my wife, and boom, all was well. He made us feel comfortable and like we'd been friends for twenty years. We've spoken countless times on the phone, but still. There's something about meeting in person, and I can now say with complete confidence that Michael is one of my favorite people on planet Earth.

Next was Krista Marino, my editor for THE MAZE RUNNER. Almost the exact same experience. We met, we hugged, and suddenly it was like we'd all been together a thousand times before. I won't ramble on and on, but I could never say well enough what a complete thrill it was to finally meet these two awesome people in person for the first time. Just amazing and everything I dared hope for.

Krista took us to a small room where we met Beverly Horowitz, Vice President and Publisher for Delacorte and other imprints within RHCB. This lady is freaking awesome! Funny, down to earth, unbelievably wise about the industry - we just loved getting to know her.

(Cool side note: they gave us a bunch of books then said they'd mail them to our home. Is that cool or what?!)

Next I got to meet my publicists, Noreen Marchisi and Emily Pourciau. Again, same thing. Many emails and phone conversations, but way cooler in real life. I've run out of things to say! Everybody there was too awesome.

Okay, then came the shocker of the day. I don't know what I was expecting, but not this: somebody signalled that "it" was ready, then we all went to a different floor and walked into a large conference room. Inside, at least twenty Random House employees clapped and cheered as we entered, and the next hour was a complete blur.

I met people from marketing, sales, design, and many other things that I'm not smart enough to remember. I met the Big Boss, Chip Gibson, President of RHCB. Many incredible and genuine people. Everyone was so nice to us and told us all kinds of cool things that I probably can't even share! But I'll say this: just when I thought I couldn't get more excited about what RH has in store for MAZE, once again I was blown away. Completely blown away. Like, really, really blown away.

(Many of these fine people told me they read the Dashner Dude, which worries me that they think I'm fluffing here. I promise I'm not! This is honest Dashner at your service.)

Afterward, Michael, Krista, Beverly, Lynette, and I went out to dinner. I don't even know what to say anymore. Almost three hours of pure fun. Absolute pure fun. I couldn't believe how fast the time went by, and I was very sad when it had to end. But now I have BEA to look forward to!

So, there you have it. First two days in NYC complete, another five to go. But tomorrow is my wife's last full day here, so we're going to make the most of it. Museum of Natural History, The Lion King, SoHo for dinner. Just pray I continue to defy the odds and prevent my wife from killing me.

Here are four random pictures. We got a good one with Michael and Krista, but it's on my wife's camera so you'll have to wait on that one. For now you just have these pics taken with my crappy camera phone:

NY Public Library, 100 years old and unbelievable:

Random House Lobby:

Statue of Liberty (duh!):

View from Empire State Building, looking south: