Quickie

I’m sitting in the Brookline library, laptop fan whirring, children whispering in the adjacent cubicle. I should be finishing a chapter, but an update seems more important. And easier.

So a few items. Cover art is almost finished, interior layout looks good–very good–and we’re working on a west coast sponsor for my Seattle/Malibu/Los Angeles tour leg. Touring is never as productive as one hopes, but it still serves a function. What is that function? I don’t know. Maybe it’s only purpose is to make the writer feel connected, and if that’s the case, how can I complain?

I’m translating an Isaac Singer story this summer, from the original Yiddish. Why? Because it will be incredibly difficult. And I’m stubborn. And I have to fulfill a foreign language requirement for my MFA. I cling to the belief that incredibly difficult things often lead somewhere important. That mantra is what gets me through the next book. I don’t care if it’s true–I just have to believe it.

Back to work. A podcast may happen this summer. Details to come, if at all.