Complaint Letters Live! at The Bird
Plus Sally Rooney's Intermezzo & other recommendations
My next Complaint Letters Live! event is next Wednesday, November 13th at The Bird, William Street, Northbridge with a fantastic lineup including poet Scott-Patrick Mitchell, and local authors Meg McKinlay and AJ Betts.
Tickets are $28/$15 concession. The last event sold out so book as soon as you can to avoid disappointment!
Overcoming Self-Doubt & Procrastination Workshop
I had a wonderful time exploring blocks to creativity with a lively group of writers and visual artists at Clarkson Library in October. Here they are, sharing how they felt at the end of the workshop. Empowered, challenged, inspired, hopeful, kinder to myself…I think my work here is done!
Other things that have intrigued or entertained me lately
Book Intermezzo by Sally Rooney. After a bumpy start as I adjusted to the style, I loved everything about this novel. Rooney writes with such compassion and insight about the complexities of human relationships.
Book All Fours by Miranda July. Hilarious, incredibly original and surprisingly moving. July loves to explore taboo subjects and I find it delightfully refreshing.
TV Succession I’m late to this, because I didn’t want to watch another show about rich white people behaving badly, but when the writing and performances are this good, it makes for incredible TV.
Substack The Sit Spot by Maggie McKellar. For me, these posts are almost like reading poems. There is a dreamy, musing quality to them which is soothing and beautiful.
Op Ed Elif Shafak on The Power of Literature and Being a Writer in the “Age of Angst (see the quote below for a taster of this thought-provoking read).
Snippets of information rain on us every single day…we have no time to process what we see. No time to absorb or reflect or feel…For true knowledge we need to slow down. We need cultural spaces, literary festivals, an open and honest intellectual exchange. We need slow journalism. We need books. And then there is wisdom. For wisdom we need to bring the heart into our work and into our conversations. We need to build emotional intelligence. We need empathy. We need literature.
I would love to hear from you! Any little thought that pops into your head would be so welcome in my inbox.