My life belongs to the whole community
Hello, friends! A brief newsletter today, as I'm behind on several projects and generally a little scattered right now. Felicia shared something with me last...
🚀The Dark Age: Let us make haste!
Hello, friends! In the last two Dark Age letters, I shared parts one and two of the ongoing manuscript's prologue. Today, the third and final part. As with...
🚀The Dark Age: We all jumped
Hello, friends! Hope that you enjoyed last week's excerpt from my ongoing work-in-progress. I mentioned that it was the first of a three-part prologue, and...
Where the writing begins
Hi, friends! As I write this, we're emerging from a snowstorm that socked us in for the better part of a week. It's gray and misty outside, finally warm...
🚀The Dark Age: Apple-cheeked and ferocious
Hello, friends! This week our family was snowed-in during a bit of a storm. As we live at the top of a steep hill, we were unable to leave the house even as...
Laying the bricks for a good year
Hello, friends — Welcome to 2024! Naturally, I'm starting the year by being a bit late with this week's newsletter. But: The newsletter is here. So maybe...
🚀The Dark Age: Little baby robots
Hello, friends! Well, look at that, would you? It's a new year. In past years I've thrown resolutions at the wall to see what sticks; this year I'm just...
2023: Favorite reads of the year
Hello, friends! In 2022, I read 98 books. 2023, for so many reasons, has been a speedbump and roller coaster of a year, resulting in far fewer books...
🚀The Dark Age: Good paper and a solid pencil
Hello, friends! I'm a couple of days late with this letter. I hope you don't mind! I've been preparing all week for a short vacation, making sure things are...
Leave it all on the page
Hi, friends! Last August, I shared a bit about the notes James Salter left himself when writing a book. (You can find that newsletter here.) One of those...
🚀The Dark Age: The original middle English
Hello, friends! One of my favorite scenes in The West Wing is an innocuous little moment with Donna Moss. If you've seen the show, you know Donna: She's...
🚀The Dark Age: The original middle English
Hello, friends! One of my favorite scenes in The West Wing is an innocuous little moment with Donna Moss. If you've seen the show, you know Donna: She's...
🚀The Dark Age: The original middle English
Hello, friends! One of my favorite scenes in The West Wing is an innocuous little moment with Donna Moss. If you've seen the show, you know Donna: She's...
Hope is hard
Hello, friends! I am a little behind this week. That's what happens, I think, when I'm on vacation from my job. All the schedules get wonky. I don't think...
🚀The Dark Age: Philip wakes up
Hello, friends! A little treat today: An excerpt from the currently-in-progress fourth draft of The Dark Age! This is Philip's first log entry after waking...
Fresh coat of paint
Hello, friends! While recuperating this weekend from a minor (but totally scary, in that I-know-I-know-this-is-totally-harmless-but-STILL!!! kind of way),...
🚀The Dark Age: Shining it up
Hello, friends! Once upon a time, some of you may know, I did quite a lot of book cover design. All of my independently-published books bear my own designs...
A flight of waffles
Hello, friends! I'm bringing back the illustrated newsletter today (mostly so I can thoroughly experiment with the dip pens and ink Felicia recently gave...
🚀The Dark Age: The business of not writing
Hello, friends. Little progress on the book during the past two weeks. Just as our home was recovering from its first bout with COVID, I came down with a...
Writers and their little essentials
Hello, friends! Once again, time is at a premium around here, so this week I'm running another one from the archives. This is one of my favorites, Letters...
🚀The Dark Age: Peaks and valleys
Hello, friends! Though I've kept up with the newsletters, it feels a little like I'm emerging from a dark age of my own right now. Time after time this year,...
A golden bubble of light
Hello, friends. Something a little different this week. Sickness has descended upon Hill House, and as a result I just haven't had the energy to sit and...
🚀The Dark Age: Dying on television
Hello, friends! The Dark Age is moving again. Often times, after a big draft, it's good to take time away from the project; upon returning, you come to it...
What the money is for
Hello, friends! I've just had a wonderful weekend, and I think it was almost entirely accidental that it was so terrific. Maybe that isn't what I mean; maybe...
🚀The Dark Age: Simplify, simplify
Hello, friends! I've said it before: Publishing is hard. Publishing is hard, and bears very little relation to the act of writing. It's messy, too; things...
Sound and fury and hubbub
Hello, friends! Felicia and I have been, like some of you, I think, watching the new season of Only Murders in the Building. We have been delighted by Steve...
🚀The Dark Age: Little pirate ghosts
🚀The Dark Age: Little pirate ghosts Hello, friends! I have no idea what's up with The Dark Age this week, I swear to god I don't. It's out there, in an inbox...
Pressure and movement
Hello, friends! I don't know about you, but I have found these little illustrated newsletters to be quite a lot of fun. I haven't doodled seriously in years,...
🚀The Dark Age: Softie by the sea
Hello, friends! This newsletter sneaked up on me a little. Since the middle of last week I've been on the mend from some long-overdue oral surgery. (You...
We are all Kenough
Hello, friends! I looked up and suddenly half the year has gone by. This has been a strange one, somehow both the best year and most challenging one I've had...
🚀The Dark Age: Moving in a new direction
Hello, friends! I wish I could say more about The Dark Age, but we are firmly in that quiet period between finishing a draft and learning what the next move...
Just be love
Just be love Hello, friends! Many of you wrote to say you enjoyed the hand-drawn newsletter I sent last time, so here we go again! (I apologize in advance...
🚀The Dark Age: The writer you need to be
👋 Hello, friends! I've been thinking a lot about how challenging writing books can be. How every time I sit down to work on one, I feel like I'm the least...
Egg perfection, among other things
Hello, friends! A little something different this week. I, uh, drew the newsletter. (If you have difficulty reading these, reply and let me know and I'll...
🚀The Dark Age: Squish's favorite author
Good morning, friends! A huge thank you to every one of you who follows along with these Dark Age letters. It means a lot to me that you’re interested in...
The Edge of Sleep is here!
Hi, friends! Today, I'm thrilled to announce, is publication day for The Edge of Sleep! I'm pretty proud of this novel, and it's unlike anything I've been a...
🚀The Dark Age: Half of me is ocean
Hello, friends! Yesterday, while heading home from an unplanned trip to Portland, an old Tom Petty song, “Walls,” came up in rotation. I think it’s from the...
Moving towards better
Well, hello, there. I’ve had a lot on my mind the past few weeks. I mentioned in a previous newsletter that I’ve been in the midst of a sort of season of...
🚀The Dark Age: A finished draft
Hello, friends! In the last Dark Age letter, I confessed that I hadn’t been writing very much. I wrote that letter in anticipation of breaking out of the...
A more fun way to be
Hello, friends! I have happily been gorging on books. Don't you just love when that happens? Everything you read is interesting, and before you know it,...
🚀The Dark Age: Exiting the doldrums
🚀The Dark Age: Exiting the doldrums Hello, friend. I have not been writing. It’s strange how much it sucks to say that so plainly. It’s true, however. Until...
You are enough
Hi, friends! Every so often—I’m sure you can relate—our lives enter a season of setback. Maybe it starts with one thing; maybe it’s only one thing. Maybe it...
🚀The Dark Age: An unknown and solitary sea
Hello, friends! My daughter has been studying astronomy this school year. Every Tuesday is astronomy day, and when she's finished with school, we watch an...
If you build it
Hello, friends! Last night Squish stayed up a bit past her bedtime, watching baseball with me. She's settled on a favorite team—the Los Angeles Angels—and...
🚀The Dark Age: Reading with a pencil
Hello, friends! Here’s how I’m spending my time lately: I’ve given The Dark Age time enough to rest, I think, so I recently returned to it with a pencil at...
The last game of the season
Hello, friends! I've been in a baseball mood lately. No surprises there; it's the start of a new season, all possibilities and fairy tales waiting to be...
🚀The Dark Age: The perils of downtime
Hello, friends! I’ve been a little out-of-sorts for the past week. As I mentioned in a recent newsletter, I completed the major work of rewriting The Dark...
Wherever you wanna go
Hello, friends! If you visited my study, you’d notice there are Post-it notes everywhere. They’re hanging off of my computer displays. Good writing is just...
🚀The Dark Age: Let it breathe
Hello, friends! I recently had a little vacation from work, and while I spent a lot of that time hanging out with Squish, and watching monster movies, and...
All writing is revision
Hello, friends! As I write this it is Sunday, March 12, and my brief spring vacation has come to an end. It was simultaneously very productive (I finished a...