Time to begin again

Emerging from the grief-rage hole. Part of my "Behind The Scenes of Book Writing" series.

First: New Fall Events!

You’re hearing it here first…

• Thrilled to announce that on Sept. 25, fellow teachers

  Elena Brower
  and
  Kemi Nekvapil
  will be hosting THRESHOLD in Boston, MA. For women only, limited to 40 spots. Learn more & register.

• I’ll also be at Hummingbird Books in Chestnut Hill, MA, on October 17 with author Laura Cathcart Robbins, discussing and signing our books. Free event, but you need a ticket. Register.

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Back last fall, I started a Behind-The-Scenes (BTS) Book Writing series here, where I intended to take you all along with me as I wrote my third book, a memoir about what I call my “Second Sobriety”—romantic relationships. All was well and good until my engagement ended in February, and I fell into a grief hole, which also turned out to be a rage hole. Turns out, the grief-rage hole is where many of my middle-aged counterparts are residing these days…

The week before my relationship ended, two blistering divorce books dropped: This American Ex-Wife by Lyz Lenz and Leslie Jamison’s memoir Splinters. While trying to process what the fuck was happening or going to happen, I maniacally alternated between the two. A month later, still hovering outside my body from the shock, I re-picked up Maggie Smith’s, You Could Make This Place Beautiful. I’d tried it when it came out the year before but was too ensconced in the fantasy of my happy relationship to want to read about some lady’s bad divorce. Turns out, it’s stunning. I reached out to her immediately and asked her to talk.

Last week, Sarah Manguso’s Liars, an “eviscerating novel about being a wife, a mother, and an artist, and how marriage makes liars of us all” dropped. After reading

lyz

’s interview with Sarah, I immediately ordered the book, but then couldn’t wait to start, so I ordered it on Kindle, and then also immediately ordered it on Audible because I had to take it in the car and on walks, too.