Highs and Lows, Ins and Outs
So I started writing a newsletter that was a meditation on the long arc of my gender transition—recounting both anniversaries (7 years since my legal name change! 5 since top surgery!) and some new milestones (taking the train out to the other side of Queens in order to change my gender marker on social security, only to be told I needed to make an appointment—no matter that the room was completely EMPTY of other people waiting), but you know what? It’s officially late December. I have three different deadlines I should be working on. I have maybe an hour and a half of sunlight left today. So that’ll be next month’s newsletter.
This one instead will be devoted to a couple mini-wrap ups for 2024. My limited executive function also means that any real reflection on the past year is also not in the cards, so were are doing the High/Low and In/Out format.
High: I had a book come out! Dead Girls Don’t Dream is IN THE WORLD.
Low: It came out a week after the US Presidential elections, when nearly everyone I know and care about was paralyzed with existential dread. lol. lmao even.
That was kind of a bummer. I don’t know how said election affected sales numbers, or how those sale numbers will affect the life of the book. Dead Girls still got great coverage – a write-up in the NY Times Books’ horror column, starred reviews in PW and Kirkus. Also the audio version slaps.
But one of the really unfortunate truths about being an author is that your books do not get published in a vacuum. I have friends whose books came out in the spring of 2020 who can vouch for that. I don’t think this book is doomed to obscurity, but I’m still feeling a little stung by the timing of it all.
However, I did succeed by the most important metric that exists: my mom and wife both loved it.
(Also hey, if you wanna go drop a rating/review for Dead Girls on Goodreads or Storygraph, that’s always appreciated.)
HIGH: I finished a draft of my next book!
LOW: Also a HIGH: I am now revising this book!
After spending three years with Dead Girls as an albatross around my neck, I worried that editing my next YA novel would feel equally onerous. That hasn’t happened, thank god. I’m crunched for time with work, travel, and freelance, but I’ve been feeling good with the revising process. Dare I say that I’m even enjoying it?
A lot of this has been aided by Matt Bell’s Refuse To Be Done, a book that helped me rethink (or maybe revise?) how I approach editing my own work. Highly recommend it for you or the writers in your life. Instead of feeling trapped in a cycle of “I need to fix this/my fix just broke it further,” I’m using this time to understand what the story is right now, and what I want it to be.
OUT: Feeling shame over the giant, sprawling pile of books I meant to read this year but didn’t.
IN: Celebrating the curatorial effort that went into this giant, sprawling pile of books. My eyes are bigger than my executive function, and certainly bigger than my organizational capacity. It also gives Nibs something to tease me about. Some highlights from this stack of books, which now reaches from floor by my desk to the window sill.
The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction by Ursula K. LeGuin. A coworker gave me her copy while culling her book shelves. We were at the bookstore and a customer asked if we had a copy, and I pulled it out of my pocket and put it on the desk between us because I couldn’t resist feeling like a magician for two seconds. But I ended up ordering a new copy for them, and putting this one in a pile, where it has since stayed.
Bad Girls by Camila Sosa Villada. My city councilperson recommended this one to me. As if I couldn’t like Tiffany Cabán more more. (As much as I will ever like any politician, at least.)
Shutter by Ramona Emerson. Definitely has the grossest AND most engrossing opening of any book I failed at reading this year. I blame the fact that I bought it in February while traveling for failing to finish it.
They’re all good books, Brent! I’ll get around to reading them all eventually. (We’re not going to talk about all the audiobooks I have saved on my phone.)
OUT: Doomscrolling social media platforms.
IN: Doomscrolling blogs, publications, and newsletters that, even if they also are feeling kinda doomed, are at least more thoughtful about it.
Some favorites/recommendations:
The Transfeminine Review, because Bethany is reading literally everything transfeminine people put out, and her reviews, lists, and essays are incredible. Start with “How Literary Prestige Works” (the most recent post) or “The Trans Literature Preservation Project: A Practical Guide to Resisting Censorship.”
Hearing Things. An actual goal for 2025 is to listen to actually seek out new music rather than just hope to catch friends talking about stuff. Start with Spotify Is Using You and 100 Songs That Define Our Decade So Far.
The Flytrap, for everyone else still mourning the era of The Toast and XO Jane. It’s new, so there aren’t many free essays to read, but Katelyn Burns’ “The US Election Cycle Is Too Damn Long” sure is timely. So is “The Most? Wonderful? Time? of the Year.”
This is probably going to be my last newsletter of 2024, unless I get really inspired. The days are short and full of tasks, the nights are cold, and I’m sleepy. I’ll end by saying this: I love you, even if I don’t know you. You read this whole scatterbrained newsletter, in which I said nothing very important, and I love that. I love this world, even when it’s hostile and full of disappointment. I love being trans, and queer, and a writer, even when it’s so much effort. I think the best thing we can do is to choose to love, over and over.
OUT: Retreating into yourself because the world is scary and you think this is the best way to survive.
IN: Choosing to care. Choosing to believe it matters. Choosing generosity and abundance and solidarity. Choosing to love.
Take care of yourself, and take care of each other. Happy solstice/winter holiday of choice/new year. <3