Many Little Things
Including an amazing sneak peek
Well, Hello!
Did you think I forgot about you? Never! This week has just been so action-packed that I am just now getting time to sit down and write to you.
Usually, when I write to you each week, I have an idea of what I want to say. This week, my mind is so scattered that I am just going to give you a few interesting tidbits that I've been thinking about and you might enjoy.
On the blog this week is a discussion of the film Avatar, and what I view as its (appropriately) anti-colonialism message. As I was writing it, I found myself taking a hard left, away from the overall message to the language we use to talk about people. Since I'm a big fan of keeping things short and focused (and since my wise friend, Lauren, rightly suggested it), I decided to clip the post into two. Look out next week for another Avatar-inspired post that centers around language. If you're feeling extra frisky, you could watch Avatar this week and see if you can anticipate what I'll be pointing out for discussion next week!
I've been reading a book this week called The German Midwife, by Mandy Robotham. I expected to like it, but I didn't expect for it to be as fully in my wheelhouse as it was. There was a bunch of birthy stuff in it, which - if you know anything about me, is right up my alley. But it's also a really cool piece of historical fiction. The premise is that Anke, a midwife who is imprisoned in a labor camp, is tasked with helping Hitler's mistress, Eva Braun, through her pregnancy and the birth of her (and Hitler's) child. As you can imagine, the story is fraught with moral dilemmas - not only as caregiver, but also as mother, human, and countryperson. I think I finished it in 3 days or so. Partially because it was an easy read, but partly because I just enjoyed it that much. Highly recommend! ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Next up is The Maidens by Alex Michaelides. I loved The Silent Patient by the same author, and am very excited to get into this one. I am also halfway through the memoir The Struggle Continues, about overcoming childhood trauma and c-PTSD, but I can't read too much of it at one time so I'm not rushing that one.
Formula 1 (spoiler alert). I got into this sport several years ago with my husband, and have become quite fluent in F1 - teams, principals, drivers, tires, and so on. This week's race was a crazy one, beginning with a crash, and ending on a note I considered sweet, but that turned out to be somewhat controversial. I'm glad Max is OK, as I read his car hit the wall with a force of 51G (!!!). No concussion, no broken ribs, no nothing. Those cars are an engineering marvel. Are you a racing fan? What did you think of the first-lap penalty?
News about The Other Women hasn't been very encouraging, but I'm keeping up the faith. Here in the next few weeks I'll need to begin approaching agents beyond the first handful I queried. To do that might mean rewriting the beginning of the book (again) which will be painful. It is nigh impossible for me to finish things - so when I finished The Other Women I felt incredibly accomplished. The idea of having to work on it after I've already closed the book (pun intended) is unpalatable. But I'll do it if it's needed.
Something super cool did happen this week, though. I ordered a single copy of the book. I did it for a lot of reasons - to see the book in real life, words on page; to have a copy to give to someone special so they can read it; to just have something to show from three years of toil. And today, it arrived. I can't show you the cover yet - cover reveals are kind of a thing in the book world - but here are some sneak peeks to tide you over until I can. What do you think? I, for one, am in love. 🥰
That's it for today. See you next time,
