Summer 2021 update, Beloved book discussion and leading a Clarion West workshop WHAAAAAAAA—-

Dang, it’s been forever, haven’t it?

I sometimes forget I have a blog because I do a lot of stuff on Twitter and Facebook. Or rather, I did. The past decade year has made it really hard to continue doing that. Nowadays, I do mostly lurking.

Over the past few months, I’ve been trying to figure out how to communicate with people. Social media has become dumpster fires. I thought about going the newsletter route, or maybe even doing Patreon. But right now, the thought of setting those up and then getting people to subscribe felt absolutely exhausting.

And then I got a notice from someone replying to a post I made about Omni magazine on the blog. Which told me that people are still reading the blog. Which is kind of nice.

So here I am, dipping my toes back into it.

I think there’s a certain exhaustion that comes when it feels like everyone on the internet is shouting and yelling and no one is really listening to what anyone is saying. So when I post something, I have to wonder is this really getting through to people or am I contributing to the shouting and yelling?

When I chose the title for this Blog, The Café in the Woods, I wanted it to be a quiet place where people could sit down, have a cup of tea or coffee or cocoa or whatever have you. A place of peace among the craziness.

Maybe it’s time to start thinking about that again.

While I mull over that, let me give a brief update on what’s been going on with the writing career.

• I’m still writing, first of all. Thanks for asking 🙂
• I finished Willow’s novel edits for my agent last year and it’s currently on submission (yay!)
• I am now working on a SUPER SECRET PROJECT that I hope to give more details about by the end of this year. It’s big. I mean BIG. And it’s been so much fun.
• With the project, I took a break from writing short stories. I’ll go into another post about that at some point (huh, look at me. Already planning to write another blog post already. Hopefully it’ll stick.) But now, I’m somewhat back to it and working on a piece that I hope to finish this fall.
• I’m also beginning to think and gather info about my next project, which I’m hoping to be a novella.

In addition to the above, I have two events to announce that are happening in the next couple of months.

Creative Windows: Ghosts of the Past

Beginning September 6, 2021, I will be leading a 6-week book discussion of Beloved by Toni Morrison for Dream Foundry’s Creative Windows: Ghosts of the Past program. The discussion will take place in Dream Foundry’s Discord server, culminating at the end of the six weeks with an hour-long video chat. If you ever wanted to do a deep dive into Beloved, this is a great opportunity, and best of all, it’s FREE.

To join, access the Discord link on Dream Foundry’s About page here.

The other event is that in January 2022, I will be leading a 3-session online workshop on revision called, appropriately enough, Breaking out of Revision Hell. It’s a workshop for those who feel stuck in the never-ending revision grind and wish to explore revision methods, organization tools, and practices for well-being. The full description can be found on the Clarion West’s website.

That’s it for now. Let’s see if I start doing more updates here.

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