20k-word mark + an informal poll

Playing with an idea and would love to hear your thoughts

Hi, friend! I need your input! Scroll down to take part in a quick poll. Thanks!

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My collaborator is in Finland, drinking Mikkeller and sweating it out in saunas and admiring Finnish architecture and design (have you seen the STUNNING Oodi Library?!), and meanwhile I am both living vicariously through her Instagram updates and plugging away at this novel, which today has passed the major milestone of 20,000 words.

Other things:

• I am reading the most charming book, and it falls into my favorite category of memoir: memoirs of others. It’s Thekla Clark’s 1995 Wystan and Chester, and I stumbled upon it at one of my favorite bookstores in the world, Mercer Street Books, which has an entire section devoted to literary biography. As has been the case virtually every time I have purchased a book in that store — and the first time must have been 2006 when I bought a used copy of February House by Sherill Tippins — I am reminded why I love print books, which, as enduring objects, can be found by chance and change one’s perspective, maybe even one’s life. So much magic in a used bookstore.

• The end of Daylight Saving Time is maybe my favorite day of the year. I love to write in the early mornings, but by this time of year, I am generally tired and it’s not quite as easy to answer the 5am alarm. The end of DST is like a little boost of energy to kickstart my cold season writing routine. I’d rather not have DST at all, but since we’re here, I can at least celebrate its end.

• This week brought a short story acceptance! I haven’t been submitting much (at all) this year, but I sent this one out at the end of 2021 and it was finally picked up by the exact magazine I was hoping would take it. I don’t like talking too much about story acceptances before the thing is actually published because it all feels a bit fragile until the work is out there, but I will say that this story is a spin-off of the novel I was working on before I hit pause to focus on the pond novel. So if you were enjoying the direction things were going before, watch this space for a link in January 2023.

Speaking of how slow publishing is 🙃 I want to take an unscientific poll of my subscribers…

Thanks for your honesty! And a happy End of DST to you if you celebrate.