Reading time: 4.25 1,050 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, Humans are weird. The things humans do are weird. Here are some of them:* Gathering around a person whose birthday it is and aggressively singing happy birthday at them. What is one supposed to do while this is going on? Asking for me. Clapping. Such a weird thing to do, when you think about it. Clapping when a plane lands. (Should be an immediate flying ban imhbco.) Working 40 hours per week. WHY? Why is this normal?...
5 days ago • 5 min read
Reading time: 7.06 1,688 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, I’ve stopped and started a book I’m writing so many times I’m sick of myself. Do you ever get so sick of yourself you just want to scream and scream and scream until you’re hoarse? Yes, well. Just because I’m a writing coach, doesn’t mean I’m immune from the brain nonsense that flattens us all at some point. I’m the proverbial cobbler with holes in her shoes. The physician who needs to heal thyself. I was, in short,...
7 days ago • 8 min read
Reading time: 2.12 519 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, “Aaaaaauuuurrrrrghhhhhhh I feel so old,” laments my friend who is — and this is important — just turning 30. I have a lot of friends who are younger than me — side-effect of being a) immature and b) obsessed with doing things like trapeze, pole, and gymnastics — and the number of times I feel like getting out my walking cane and giving them a good spanking… Sheesh. You’ve been alive for 3 decades. You’ve not been allowed...
9 days ago • 2 min read
Reading time: 2.32 601 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, I’ve started and stopped this damn email so many times today I’m sick of myself. Do you ever get so sick of yourself you just want to scream and scream and scream until you’re hoarse? Yes, well. Anyway, I decided to stop overthinking it and instead tell you about a tiny experiment I’ve started, because perhaps it’ll help you too. I am going to write a few words of my cosy fantasy story every day for 100 days. That’s it....
12 days ago • 3 min read
Reading time: 5.19 1,263 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, A really, really good tomato is worth the wait and the effort and, sometimes, the travelling. It’s why my greenhouse is full of tomato plants of different varieties. I’m excited about all of them, but particularly the Wlàdecks, which is a heritage tomato. Big, beefy, and red. The kind of tomato you see in old-timey children’s books, perhaps drawn by Beatrix Potter. A client sent me some seeds a few years ago, and I...
14 days ago • 6 min read
Reading time: 1.47 421 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, ➡️ 1. They allow (at least elements of) the writing process to be fun. Why so serious? ➡️ 2. They burrow through their discomfort and elbow their ego out of the way to get to the substance underneath. People don’t want a surface level book; they want depth. They don’t want our “ooh what will people think of me” prose; they want our down-and-dirty truths. The secret? 🔥Write the stuff you’re not sure you ever want anyone...
16 days ago • 2 min read
Reading time: 4.20 1,030 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, Okay, I’ll join in the weather commentary. IT’S HOT. So when I went to gymnastics this week, my plan was mostly to stretch and not move around too much because that room was approximately the same temperature as the surface of the Sun. But I did want to do a couple of somersaults into the foam pit because I’d been away for a couple of weeks. You need to keep doing them otherwise it gets scary again. Taking a run-up...
19 days ago • 5 min read
Reading time: 2.03 406 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, Terrifying things I have done: 🧯 Starting a business after getting fired. (And letting go of that shame.) 😷 Swerving my business and going ALL IN on the thing that makes my heart sing… during a global pandemic. 💍 Saying YES to Joe after I’d already failed at marriage once. 👻 Saying YES to a client who asked if I could ghostwrite a book for them, when I had never done that before (and now it’s what I do!) 📚 Writing every...
21 days ago • 2 min read
Reading time: 2.02 482 words Read this email in your browser Hey Reader, There’s this picture of me I found. I was about 14 years old, I guess, wearing my uniform of denim jacket, tassled skirt, purple Doc Martens, baggy top, and “am I doing this right” smile. I was also sporting the remnants of an unfortunate curly perm. GOD, WHAT WAS I THINKING! Then, as now, I was wishing for hair I did not have and would never be able to achieve. Some things never change. Other stuff does, though, like my...
22 days ago • 2 min read