Dear friends,

Fair warning, I'm going to keep telling you how much is going on for the rest of the year. I was updating one of my cousins on my plans and finished with, "And in November maybe I'll have a chance to take a breath!" She texted back, "You're not fooling anyone. In November you'll start getting ready for the holidays." It's like she's met me before, and also is existing in 2026 as we're all experiencing it.

This month's new publication is a poem called Evolution in Not One Of Us magazine issue 87! It's…let's say the evolution in it is entirely metaphorical. It's a fairy tale poem. Title are hard, okay? You'll get it if you read it.

Coming up in July, I'll have another story in Sunday Morning Transport! Mine will be free to read, but the others require a subscription--and the nice people at SMT have given me a free temporary subscription (60 days! quite a lot of temporary when you think about it!) to hand out to you nice people so you can enjoy the sort of stories they're publishing. Give it a try while you’re waiting for mine to show up.

Also in my July plans is a trip to Boston for Readercon. If you're going to be there, come find me! You can especially come to my kaffeeklatsch, which is an opportunity to just hang out for an hour, or to my reading, where I will give you a preview of A Dubious Clamor and maybe even a sneak-peak at something else that's just barely visible over the horizon. I love Boston. I have missed Boston and my Boston friends. (Will I read on the T: yes, that is my plan. I do not have the same emotions about it as I do about reading on the Montreal Metro, but…I still really like reading on other people's public transit. Apples. Dogs. Reading on other people's public transit. I remain a fundamentally fairly simple person.)

I'm really happy with the blurbs I've been getting for A Dubious Clamor, I just want to say. "Everyone is being so nice," I said. "Or maybe you've written a book they like," said a loved one. Both, though. Why not both. I'll share some of those blurbs with you in the August newsletter. Meanwhile I am just so filled with joy and gratitude. And plans. Joy, gratitude, and plans: not a bad mix.

No recipe this month, it's been very much an avocado toast or quick stir-fry kind of time for me. I have hopes of July despite my Boston trip, though! And we have gotten three blueberries from our tiny blueberry bush already, and the red oak leaf lettuce is in. Summer in the north arrives at its own pace, but it does eventually arrive.

Excelsior,

Marissa