Volume 4, No. 23: Queer Love & Queer Grief in New Zealand, China, & Spain

Three recent queer novels I can't stop thinking about

Greetings, book and treat people! Two things up front. First, I have not had the time or bandwidth to draw winners for the Bookshop.org gift card raffle yet. I will do so when things calm down later in June. Thanks for your patience. Second, the Queer Palestine Readathon starts today! Check out all the details here.

I’ve been struggling to write this newsletter for days. Partly it’s because I’m swamped with work. I have a million deadlines. My bookkeeping boss is taking two weeks vacation starting Friday, which means we’ve both been busy getting everything squared away before he leaves.

This is also the first newsletter that will be for paying subscribers only since I made my announcement about the future of Books & Bakes a little over a month ago. As I pondered what to write about this week, I found myself thinking, over and over again, “this one has to be the best newsletter you’ve ever written.” I couldn’t stop imagining that if I wrote the most perfect newsletter, with the most perfect words, about the most perfect books—then people would subscribe. I couldn’t shake the belief that not only is it in my power to convince folks to pay for the work I do (it’s not), but that the thing that would finally do the convincing would be this newsletter—just one out of the 150+ I’ve written in the last 3 years.

That’s a lot of unnecessary pressure to put on myself.

I honestly haven’t known how to write about any of this since I made the ask. Do I sound like I’m begging? Do I sound desperate? Angry? Who wants to listen to someone ask for money over and over again for weeks? I’ve been so careful about what I’ve written. I’ve tried to express my optimism, my belief in the work I do, my deep gratitude for everyone who reads my words. I’ve tried not to fall apart in public because, in a thousand ways, my life is sweet and and good and full and safe and stable.

The truth is that I have poured my whole self into every newsletter I’ve written since the very first one. The truth is that some weeks I have not had the time or energy to write at my best, but even then, I have written with everything I have. The truth is that this is one of those weeks. The truth is that I am going to be fine, and the truth is also that asking for something you want, something scary, and not receiving it—well, it hurts. I have done everything in my power to pretend it doesn’t hurt but—surprise!—that is not how risk-taking works.

Recently I’ve noticed that the books I love most are books that make me feel a little less alone. They do not always make me feel good, or seen (whatever that means), or happy. Sometimes books that make me feel less alone also make me feel uncomfortable, distraught, enraged. When I see another person feeling and hurting and trying and failing and loving and getting their heart broken and grieving and caring—on the outside—that’s what makes me feel less alone. That’s what I felt reading Martry! and There’s Always This Year and Greta & Valdin and Another Word for Love and Arrow and Blessings.

I’m writing all of this down, the real sometimes-I’m-on-the-floor-crying and sometimes-I’m-falling-apart-in-private mess of this transition—because I want to be a writer who makes other people feel less alone. A lot of us are out here feeling big feelings about a lot of things. These are mine. Maybe knowing I have them will make you feel less alone.

Not much is actually in my control, but the words I choose to put out into the world are. Thank you for reading these ones.

The Books