Totally separate topic--my lifeline since Nov 7 has been to snuggling my dog like a teddy bear. This pic is from a year ago, but now it's like, lifesaving. So grateful to her.

Asha Dore of Totally Biased Reviews asked me recently about using the craft to tell difficult stories, among other things. I spoke to her the week my dad died, and I know I was tender (I still am), but in spite of that, or because of it, or both, it was an incredible conversation.

Just out in LitHub, reprinted from the just-released Invisible Strings anthology. ❤️✨❤️

"I believe, more than anything, that this grief of constantly having to face down our own inadequacies is what keeps people from being writers. Forgiveness, therefore, is key." Ann Patchett via @jeannineouellette.bsky.social

I wrote something over at Writing in the Dark today, and people say it's useful, so I thought I'd share it here, too. Free for all. xo
writinginthedark.substack.com/p/what-an-ed...

WTFJHT is the most succinct daily news source for what's going on, and today's edition is very grim, but it's important to know what's coming down.

In a nutshell, Trump IS declaring a national emergency & unleashing the military against 11 million undocumented immigrants on day 1.

I had 60,000 followers on Twitter after 14 years on the site. I have 30,000 after maybe a year here. If journalists are looking for a place to build back up a coherent reading audience that’s actually engaging with our work, this place obviously seems like it has that particular juice

This is still my advice: Become a writer anyway. Fuck it, do it, it won't save you, but it's still a beautiful dream to write novels and short stories and poems and mingle with other dreamers and make art and laugh in the face of death. And writing is constant death. Live más.

Also, Indivisible, which was awesome in the wake of the 2016 election, is preparing to be awesome again, and has a toolkit. docs.google.com/document/d/1...

It is so discouraging to see that the media hasn't learned a single thing over the past decade. They normalize the absolutely insane things Trump and his surrogates do and treat them as legitimate.

If you haven't seen this yet!

I signed up yesterday and BlueSky asked me to click all those boxes of things I like and I clicked Animals because you know Animals but wow that's a lot a lot a lot a lot of cats!

Ok, I'll share a few recent posts from Writing in the Dark, for those who don't know it.
Here's a free one: writinginthedark.substack.com/p/eleven-urg...

Holy shit it's so good to be here in The Good Place. Can't wait to get going and reconnect with everyone!