Have you discovered the Shepherd book recommendation site yet? There you can find curated lists of books recommended by authors in an astonishing range of categories: mystery novels with a strong sense of place; books about women who went on adventures and changed their lives; detective novels that keep you laughing. If there's a very specific kind of book you love to read, there is probably a list on the site to match! I was invited to put together a list of books that shared something in common with my book, Uphill Both Ways, and I came up with the category of "the best books about women in the wild." It was fun and challenging to narrow it down to five books--I ended up choosing four that have been pivotal in my development as a reader, a writer, and a person, plus one that I only read recently but which I think will prove to be equally life-changing. You can check out my list and why I chose each of the books here.

Last fall I taught a workshop called Starting with Place for the Waterville Writes series held through Waterville Creates at the lovely new arts center in downtown. My workshop was about grounding a piece of writing (fiction, nonfiction, or poetry) in the location where it takes place. Because our workshop was held indoors after dark, we used photos I took of the area around Waterville's River Walk and Ticonic Bridge, and, using all of our senses, our previous knowledge, and our imaginations we generated writing about this spot in the heart of downtown.

​Participants of this and the other three workshops were invited to submit writing begun during or inspired by any one of the workshops to be published in a chapbook. My flash fiction story "Two Cent Bridge" is included in the collection.

The chapbook is coming out in May and will be launched at the Writing Waterville Workshops Story Share and Launch Party to be held on Sunday May 5th from 4:30 to 6:00 p.m. at the Paul J. Schupf Art Center on Main Street in Waterville. The event is free and open to the public, and refreshments will be provided. I'd love to see you there!

Thanks to the efforts of a good friend, Uphill Both Ways is now available in a large print edition, which you can order directly from the publisher, Center Point Large Print. It's really fun to see my words in such big letters!

Like many writers, I love to talk and write about writing as much as I like to actually write, so I was delighted to contribute a post to the Literary Mama blog series about writing my essay "Fledging Season" for Labor of Love: A Literary Mama Staff Anthology. In the post, I share a bit about how and why I turn to nature for inspiration in both parenting and writing. You can read it here.

I had a wonderful time talking to Brianna Avenia-Tapper of the Writing Stories Podcast about the ups and downs of writing Uphill Both Ways and getting it out into the world. You can listen to the episode here or on your favorite pod player app.

Today is pub day for Labor of Love: A Literary Mama Staff Anthology. The collections includes work from Literary Mama editors going back over the journal's first 20 years online. I'm delighted to have been a member of that staff, as both Literary Reflections Editor and Senior Editor, for almost half that time, until I stepped down last March, and I'm honored to have an essay included in this anthology.

It's easy to imagine—or project—a degree of tenderness in the way an adult osprey peels off flakes of fish with its hooked bill and deposits them in the gaping maws of its downy fledglings, the way I once spooned applesauce or mashed sweet potatoes into the toothless mouths of my infants. It's equally easy to detect a note of resignation, if not outright irritation, in the way the osprey drops a fish at the feet of its giant, ungrateful fledglings.

This is an excerpt from my essay "Fledging Season" which appears in Labor of Love. There will be a book launch event held via Facebook Live here on February 1 at 8 p.m. eastern time.
I'll be reading a little bit of my piece, along with many other fantastic contributors.

Hope to see you on February 1 for the reading!

​Other I Did Its!

• Got my older kid graduated from college and the younger two from high school. (Is this really my accomplishment? I don't care--I'm taking credit for it!)
• Got the younger two kids off to college.
• Hosted my parents for a couple of weeks in the spring (around those grads) and my sister for a few days in the fall.
• Created a true space of my own in the vacated bedroom.
• Maintained pretty regular yoga and walking routines (not-quite-daily).
• Kept a daily journal and a fairly regular morning pages routine.

I have some ideas about what I want to accomplish in 2024, writing-wise, and otherwise. But for now I'll just bask in the glow of self-congratulation for having written a novel and traveled to Europe and learned a new craft.
Cross-posted at ​http://remainsofday.blogspot.com/2023/12/i-did-it-2023-edition.html.

Every January for the last several years, I've made an annual I Did It! list, inspired by Lisa Romeo. Below is the list for 2017.

Writing I Did Its!
I finished a draft of the narrative part of The Book and put that narrative though one full round of revision. I still have a lot of research to do to fill in a lot of holes, but clearing that hurdle of getting those first round edits into the document felt good!

I continued to write and submit short pieces, especially during the first half of the year. My results:

Submissions: 24
Rejections: 26
Withdrawals (due to acceptance elsewhere): 2
Short-listed: 1
Acceptances: 7
Pending Publication: 2
Publications: 14

• “Monarch Summers” Nature Writing (republished), October 2017
• "Pugnacious Beasts" Zoomorphic, October 2017
• "Thru-Hiking en Famille" TrailGroove, September 2017
• “Individuality, Mutuality, and a Game of Twister” Multiples Illuminated, Vol. II, August 2017
• “The World in Their Hands” The Maine Review, June 2017
• "Jargon: Mountain Pass" TrailGroove, June 2017
• “A Conversation with Tomas Moniz" Literary Mama, June 2017
• “Toy Story” If Mom's Happy, May 2017
• “Five Hundred Miles” Mothers Always Write, March 25, 2017
• “How to Write with (or Despite) Kids” WOW! Women on Writing, March 16, 2017
• “How Being a Mom Helped Me Hike 500 Miles” Parent Co., March 2017
• “Post-Twin Stress Disorder” Multiples Illuminated, March 2017
• “No Fun” The Manifest Station, March 2017
• “I'll Be There For You” Grown and Flown, January 2017

The reason these numbers don't add up is because rejections, acceptances, etc. include a number of pieces submitted in 2016. Even though my submission rate was almost half what it was last year (24 versus 45), my rejection rate was higher (26 versus 20) and so was my publication rate (14 versus 8), but my acceptance numbers were down (7 versus 9). What does all this mean? I have no idea.

The low submission number has to do with me focusing on writing short pieces and getting them out in the world during the first half of the year and turning my attention to The Book during the second half (only two submissions since May!). I would like to find more of a balance between The Book and keeping short pieces flowing next year. 

Right now I only have two essays that are finished and making the rounds of literary journals. They're two of the best pieces I've ever written, I believe, and they're having a hard time finding a home. Probably because I insist on sending them only to paying journals. I've got a bunch of partially written essays on hold in the files and numerous short stories on hiatus. At some point I have to address the gap between essay and short story—why am I having more success with the former than the latter? Which stories in the queue truly have merit and which need to be retired? I also want to write more fiction, despite the challenges it poses.

Other writing activity:

• I applied—and was accepted—for a week at an artist colony (and it was amazing).
• I applied—and was rejected—for a writing grant.
• I entered—and have not yet heard from—a writing contest (not counted in submission #s)

I also continued to co-edit the Literary Reflections department at Literary Mama, wrote 90 blog posts (my lowest number since the first two years of the blog), started a monthly-ish newsletter, and created a new website. I attended a poetry festival in Augusta and an alumni weekend at my MFA alma mater, each of which was as good as a writing conference and much more affordable.

On the financial front, my writing balance is in the black! It's not much, in terms of trying to survive (or even buy the occasional cup of chai), but my income from publications and teaching workshops exceeded my expenses of buying books and office supplies and paying submission fees and alumni weekend registration, Duotrope and Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance membership fees, and cloud storage costs. I've reached my goal of not spending more money on writing than I earn. Now I just need to earn enough to live on.

Travel I Did Its!
I took the boys on a road trip to Colorado and back home (via Utah, Wyoming, and South Dakota). This was the first time I went on a road trip as the only adult (though I had some driving help from M), and I think I did pretty great (we never ran out of gas and we never succumbed to a hotel room, camping the whole way there and back). We even survived a rare Utah Hurricane which threatened to float our tent away. And my kids had fun!

Crafty I Did Its!
Making things by hand has taken a bit of a backseat to writing this past year, but I still appreciate the satisfaction of creating a tangible and usable object—a different and often more immediate satisfaction than writing. A few things I made:

• Holiday placemats
• A quilt (top) for E 
• A quilt for Z
• An Egyptian skirt 
• Duvets for boys
• Pussyhats (recycled and fleece)

Art I Did Its!
I taught myself to watercolor by painting every day for 100 days over the spring and summer (and continuing not quite as religiously since then), following some online tutorials and attending a couple of painting classes at my friend's studio. Watercolor painting is something I've wanted to learn for years and this project not only got me started painting, but also taught me the value of doing something every single day—you actually get better!

Nature I Did Its!
I  taught a couple of nature journaling workshops and have been volunteering at a local nature center, helping lead groups of fourth graders through the woods and trails. I've also put my newly acquired watercolor skills to work in my nature journals. I compiled my birding Life List and went on several bird-watching expeditions, each of which added a few more birds to said list. C, E, Z, and I again did our Christmas Bird Count route. In general, I paid a lot more attention to birds.

Phew! That's a lot for one year! Can't wait to see what 2018 has in store, and I'm a little worried about how I'll keep track of it all if I'm not blogging next year.

Cross-posted at https://remainsofday.blogspot.com/2018/01/i-did-it-2017.html. 

...to my new blog! After ten years at www.remainsofday.blogspot.com, I'm moving into this new home and also changing things up a bit. I'll use the blog feature on this site mainly to post writing news and updates as The Book makes its way down the long road to publication. But, knowing how I never stuck to a single theme or topic on my other blog, don't be surprised if I veer off into other lanes once in a while.

I'll have moved in fully by January 2018. In the meantime, I'll share posts both here and at Remains of the Day. So please bookmark this page (but don't delete the other one yet), take a look around the site, and let me know what you think of my new digs.