Nazi Garden Gnomes

If you get discouraged when writing a story and start despairing that anyone will ever read it, remember that this book was picked up by an actual, respected publishing house. It even received a NYT cover endorsement. Sort of. So even if your story starts off with "It was a dark and stormy night...", I'd say you're still one up on THIS book. Assuming you don't include any Nazi Garden Gnomes, of course.