A READING, progress on book

I've been a participant (audience or reader) at the Rolling Writers series for years now. When the pandemic hit, the series moved from the Rolling Out Cafe to Jon Sindell's beautiful garden backyard in San Francisco by invitation only (still a large audience). I read there last weekend, on  Father's Day, the first day of summer, an unexpectedly cold day.

I've been testing out various readings from THE LUNATICS' BALL, wondering what I'll read once it comes out, and I found it surprisingly depressing to read "My Mother's Suitcases." I like the essay, but revisiting the period in my life when my mother was always angry at me,  and I had to deal with her dementia and medical care, left me feeling down.

I'm hoping to return to working on my essay collection DO-IT-YOURSELF NIGHT and that may be a problem there too.

The musician Lil Nas X came out as bipolar and I wrote a short Substack newsletter about that.

Mad Creek Books sent me the cover (which I'll wait to reveal when preorders are possible) and I'm wracked with doubt about choosing the right one of two possibilities. Both are really arresting, though, and I love how they've used the collage from James Diaz. Maybe I'll share the collage here later.

I'm thrilled by the three writers who've agreed to do blurbs: Jayne Anne Phillips, Jill Talbot, and Sonja Livingston. All relate to my subject (Phillips, a novelist who's written about lunatic asylums, a recent memoirist, Talbot and Livingston, both memoirists and essayists). Worried: should I solicit more than three in case they don't all come through by August 1? The Press will include 2-3 on the back cover, and it looks like most of their authors don't have more than that in their catalog, so I don't want to ask people whose blurbs won't appear anywhere but my author website. 

Working on my short story collection, because why not. Moon City Press said it "made it to the later stages of consideration," not one of twelve finalists but still encouraging when I'm not really a fiction writer.

Finally up to date on my CRAFT reading, CRAFT editing, and Black Lawrence Press reading (my once-a-year reading of 50 chapbook submissions). Steve and are finally going to get away to the coast for a couple of nights, a mini-vacation that we cancelled in May. And Ben will be visiting from Borneo next month!