wanted: cake occasions

some small updates & my favorite mini tradition

In lieu of a cohesive newsletter this week, I’m going to just do a hodgepodge of smaller things, because otherwise, I wasn’t going to send one at all!

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Event Reminder!

I should theoretically have one more newsletter before this event, but it’ll be getting sent out just a few hours before the event starts, so I want to flag it up top here!!

I will be joining Alicia Thompson next month to discuss her new book, Never Been Shipped, on Friday, June 13, at Kirkwood Public Library in St. Louis, Missouri, hosted by The Novel Neighbor. Never Been Shipped (read the first chapter & see the preorder campaign deets here!!!) is a friends-to-lovers band reunion romance, set on a TV show–themed cruise, where our reuniting band have been invited to perform a decade after their painful dissolution. You can read a more in-depth plot description at the link above, but I will tell you that I ate up every bit of estranged-friends-to-lovers tension, and that I cherished the honesty and complexity Alicia brings to Micah and John’s reflections on both the creative and business sides of art-making. I’m rereading this book right now, and I really think you guys are going to love it. Honestly, I could write a whole essay about why friends-to-lovers is THE superior trope. Friends-to-lovers until I die. Sorry! When it’s done right (and it is, here!), it’s the best one, and I can prove it!!!

I’m so excited for this event! I love Alicia, I love Alicia’s books, I love THIS book, I have been wanting to visit The Novel Neighbor for SO LONG, I’ve never been to St. Louis—so much to look forward to. I hope you’ll join us!!

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Three June-Related Requests!

Okay, Pride Month is coming up. That means people are going to make a lot of lists and graphics and videos telling you to read queer books. And you should. You always should, but I have a feeling this is a preaching-to-the-choir situation. Still, I’d like to ask you to do, or consider, a few additional things this month.

First. When you talk about books—queer books, yes, but any book, and especially any book by a marginalized author—can you please talk about the book’s plot? Can you tell us how the book made you feel, or what you loved about it, or what stood out to you? Fuck, even the GENRE would be a good start! No one’s pitching the latest book by [redacted cis, straight, white author] as “[redacted title] is about a cis, straight, white woman, and the cis, straight, white (& probably wealthy, let’s be honest) man she falls in love with; there is a background character with box braids and a they/them pronoun pin who appears in one (1) scene and never comes up again.” So when you’re talking about a book by a marginalized author, please stop just listing out the characters’ identities and then slapping a #RepresentationMatters or a #QueerJoy on it and calling it good. You can say something about the characters’ identities—for example, it does matter that Gene is trans, it is very relevant to the plot of The Prospects, it’s okay to say it!—but also tell us what the book is ABOUT, at the least!

Second. Please reflect on what books you buy, and which books you check out from the library and/or just get on NetGalley. I love the library, and I am so immensely grateful to people who review books early. This is nothing against the library or NetGalley. But if you’re getting all your straight, white, cis books from the bookstore and all books by queer, trans, BIPOC, and/or disabled authors from free sources…I mean. Come on, now. Think on that.

Third. Oh my fucking god, check authors’ pronouns before you tag us in posts.

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Prequel Zine Wrap-Up!

I mailed 275 zines yesterday!! I had an experience at the post office, but I always have experiences when I go to the post office. My branch has below two stars on its Google rating, and let me tell you, that is far, far too generous.

Still, it felt so good to drop these all in the mail finally!! In May, as promised!! For people in the States who got a copy, I’d guess it’ll take…I don’t know, one to two weeks? For you to get your copy? Depending how far you live from New York? Longer for international, and I shan’t embarrass myself by guessing. My apologies for the bad timing, vis-à-vis the Canada Post strike.

When I started this project, I said I’d match donations up to $150, because it felt like $300 would be a decent number to raise! I’d feel good about that!! We passed that number in approximately fourteen minutes, and then ended up raising $3,272!!! More than ten times my secret private goal. Was it a time-efficient way to raise money? No. Did I love it? Yes!

I’d do some stuff differently next time (like, do a digital version for $5 so I can make the minimum donation for a print copy higher, because oof, those printing/shipping costs, y’all, stamps ADD UP when you have to make and mail approximately 245 more copies than you expected), but I had such a good time with this project. Thanks for helping me do it.

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1000 Words of Summer

I used to be a National Novel Writing Month devotee (I participated/finished six years running, ages fifteen to twenty!!), but with the AI nonsense last year, and also just the way my writing life has evolved, I feel like I grew out of it a bit. It was such a great tool for just getting the thing on paper, something that I think is most people’s struggle at first, with something as long-form as a book. It just takes so much endurance! So much time to start feeling bad about yourself!! But it doesn’t leave a ton of room or time for making something…good? Around my junior year of college, I started wanting to figure out not how to draft a book, but how to fix it, and that’s just not what NaNoWriMo is for.

But this year, I’m planning to do Jami Attenberg’s 1000 Words of Summer, which has a similar “sit down, do the work, show up for yourself, follow through” ethos. Just, like, less chaotic, and more warm. Which I need right now, I think! I haven’t written un-contracted fiction in so long!

Originally, I thought I’d try to get through the first three or so chapters of a book I might want to pitch as my option, when the time comes. Instead, I’ve decided to just write whatever I want to write each day, so I can remember how fun writing can be when you’re not imagining how someone might misread it, or how many copies it could sell (or not sell), and whether sufficient people will give sufficient shits about it.

I think it’ll be nice. Let me know if you’re participating!! Let me know if you’ve read the book!! Should I read the book?

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Food I’ve Been Making

I’ve been making overnight oats for breakfasts, because testosterone sometimes lowers your good cholesterol, and apparently you’re supposed to eat oats about that? So I’ve been TREATING MYSELF with these oats. I don’t really use a recipe, so I can’t link it, but here’s basically what I put in (this makes, for me, three breakfasts, because I put a lot of toppings on them; if you’re not a toppings person, it’s probably two breakfasts).

I’m not usually a pictures-of-my-food person but come on

• 1 cup old fashioned oats

• 1 1/3 cups oat milk (you could use any kind of milk, it doesn’t matter; I’m not vegan, I’m just gay)

• Big scoop of Greek yogurt (I like full-fat, I think the 0% kind is nasty, sorry; also “big scoop” is probably, like, 1/3 of a cup?)

• 2 tablespoons chia seeds

• Scoop of peanut butter (I don’t know…a tablespoon? Two? Somewhere in there)

• Scoop of raspberry jam (probably also a tablespoon)

• Little drizzle of honey

I shove all of that in Sarah’s big Taylor Swift Eras Tour Movie™™™ souvenir cup and I blend it with an immersion blender because I hate the texture of overnight oats when they’re not blended. They’re so gross. Soggy AND gloopy AND chewy! What fun! Blended, though, they’re delicious!!

I pour it into three old jam jars, and then they sit overnight in the fridge, and I eat them cold. I’ve been putting raspberries and half a banana and some pistachios on top; also, I sprung for some pomegranate seeds this week, and I feel very fancy about it. Does it show that I used to work at Jamba Juice?

Also made this week: some cauliflower curry (do non-vegetarians eat cauliflower? it feels like such a Vegetarian Food™ to me), which was very tasty; and a rhubarb-apple pie with a crumble top. I made the crust from scratch! I’d never cooked with rhubarb before! The produce came from my local farmers’ market, which made me feel like I was back in Oregon. I miss the farmers’ markets in Oregon so much. The pie turned out so good. I’m really proud of it.

Sarah cameo

I’m always amazed how much it helps my mood to mess around in the kitchen for a few hours, listen to an audiobook, and have something to share with loved ones afterwards.

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Cake Occasions!

Do you celebrate little things? And I mean—do you really take time to feel accomplished, or excited, or relieved, or whatever, about things that no one else is ever going to give as much of a fuck about as you do?

If you don’t, I think you should try it. Some cake occasions last year included The Prospects going to a second printing (it recently went to a third! should we get a cake??), Kirsten Larson’s birthday, and Book 2’s protagonist’s birthday.

I don’t know—I just think it’s nice. The one for Rory’s birthday was $4.99 at Trader Joe’s, and you know what? It did the trick. (It was also a very appropriate pick for him!!)

I spent way too long making these little bunting triangles. it was so fun.

Sometimes it’s nice to celebrate something in a low-pressure way. I don’t even like cake that much, honestly, but it always tastes so fucking good when I’m looking for an excuse to celebrate.

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Notes & Updates

• The whole newsletter is kind of a Notes & Updates section this week, so I don’t really have much to put here.

• If I say I started another Stardew Valley play-through, is that too much of a cry for help?

• (I did. Forgive me. Maybe I’ll marry Harvey this time? I like that he’s older, but I hate how he always talks about food being healthy or not. Something to think about while I build my strawberry patch empire.)