AUDACIOUS BOOKCLUB HAPPENINGS
Our April book club selection is Lessons for Survival by Emily Raboteau. We will be in conversation with Emily on April 30th at 8 pm EST/5 pm PST. Registration is now open. I hope you can join us!
THE NEWSLETTER WEEK IN REVIEW
PERSONAL PROFESSIONAL NEWS
On May 11th, I am hosting a novel writing bootcamp at Rutgers. The day features one-hour workshops from acclaimed novelists Jami Attenberg, Gretchen Felker-Martin, James Hannaham, and Brandon Taylor. There will also be a masterclass by Benjamin Dreyer, the chief copy editor of Random House for more than thirty years, on how to copy edit yourself and produce tight, clean prose, and a session with literary agent Johanna Castillo on what to expect when you're expecting an agent. The day ends "The ABCs of Novel Writing," a workshop led by me on taking a novel from idea to finished book. Register HERE!
On May 14th, I will be in conversation with artist Carolina Caycedo about her instillation, Spiral for Shared Dreams. The event is free.
The Masters in Branding program at the School of Visual Arts is still accepting applications for the 24-25 school year. You’ll work with an incredible faculty, talented students and have the option of hybrid or in-person learning.
New week, new work friend! Read on for questions about ethics of taking a job with your current employer’s client, inflating staff expectations unintentionally, working with a guy who has too many ideas, and what to do when your industry implodes. If you have a burning professional query, please do reach out to workfriend@nytimes.com.
June 7-9, I will be participating in The Loft’s 50th anniversary weekend, with intensive classes, a conversation with me and three Roxane Gay Books authors, and agent/editor consultations and pitches. Minneapolis is quite lovely in June.
My essay series, Roxane Gay Presents, with Everand has launched. First up: Julia Turshen with Built For This: The Quiet Strength of Powerlifting and in this video, you will learn about the queer powerlifting club she started. The second essay in this series is: You Are a Teen Mom: Instructions by Randa Jarrar. You can learn more about Randa in this video. The third essay in this series is My Year of Psychedelics: Lessons on Better Living by Gabrielle Bellot. The fourth essay in this series is Good Girls: Notes on Dog Rescue by Elaine Castillo.
Megan Pillow and I wrote a little book about power called Do The Work: A Guide About Power and Creating Change. It will be out in June of this year. Pre-order, now!
READING MATERIAL
What it costs to get out of Gaza? (Too much.) World Central Kitchen is resuming operations in Gaza.
College campuses are roiling right now as students protest the war in Gaza. At USC, they are reaping what they sow, now canceling commencement. To be clear, this is the group of students who started college during COVID and because they feared what the valedictorian might say, they decided to just skip graduation. It’s embarrassing. They also called riot police on protesting students while UCLA did not. Indiana University put snipers on campus building roofs to “police” protests. That is a real thing that happened. Columbia has been a bit all over the place but they, too, called the cops on their students, and then backtracked which is interesting given the institution’s history of protest. Barnard and Columbia alumni have made some demands of the institution. One of the students made some terrible, terrible remarks that don’t help this movement at all. Emory called the cops on their students and a couple tenured faculty were arrested, too. UT Austin arrested 57 students and also sent a militarized police force on campus to intimidate protestors. Faculty there and at most schools TBH, are incensed. At Northwestern, they changed the rules for protesting the morning of the protest. The bar is in HELL! See also, NYU. And Princeton. And Emerson. And Yale.
A really interesting interview with a food blogger in Gaza.
It’s pretty grim but you can buy restaurant reservations from resellers.
Bulk shopping is coming back!
Julia Turshen has a new cookbook forthcoming! I can’t wait to dive into it.
A profile of Virginia Sole-Smith. An interview with Jackie Sibblies Drury. An interview with Nicole Kidman. RIP, Helen Vendler. A profile of Rhiannon Giddens by the one and only John Jeremiah Sullivan. A profile of Justin Kuritzkes. A profile of Padma Lakshmi. A profile of Mehdi Hasan.
A man with Crohn’s disease shares what life is like without eating.
Raja Feather Kelly’s The Fires is running at Soho Rep from May 8 to June 16th. Get your tickets now for this incredible show.
I’ve always wondered about what it would be like to be an art framer…
About the blogger/lawyer behind the gossip site Crazy Days and Nights. The truth is, heh, underwhelming.
Cults are terrifying and this is the story of a Kenyan cult where the leader told his followers to stop eating and, so, they did. Why don’t cult leaders ever ask their acolytes to do something cool or interesting?
Girls soccer team in a boys soccer league kick ass. Undefeated, even!
Some difficult truths about Caitlin Clark’s shoe deal.
The PEN World Voices Festival has been cancelled for this year. This, on the heels of canceling their annual awards. It’s a shame to see how things have come apart. It’s a bigger shame that the organization has allowed this to happen. I withdrew from the festival earlier in the week because I hoped PEN would listen to the criticisms and protests and course correct. Alas, they did not. I hope they are finally able to rise to the occasion. The world would not be a better place without PEN’s advocacy for writers and free speech. On May 7th, there will be a Freedom to Write for Palestine event, counter-programming if you will.
On art and comfort/discomfort…
Challengers is out. Sexy sports movie! Zendaya!
Petty shenanigans.
Brooke Baldwin writes about why she left CNN.
Seeing Pitbull after being in prison, but really this is an essay about learning how to be free.
Kristi Noem killed her puppy. Total freakshow over there.
New York is making broadband accessible to more lower income people. May the rest of the country follow.
Andrew Tate is going to spend some time in a Romanian courtroom answering for at least some of his crimes.
Ilana Masad on Mary Shelley’s The Last Man.
Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 rape conviction was overturned but don’t worry, he is still in prison because of another conviction. Ronan Farrow explains what this could mean for Trump.
Sophia Bush is queer! And talking about it.
We all have our GMAIL archives and a few writers share some gems from therein.
Is there a feud between Biden and the New York Times? Maybe?
A brief history of my favorite drink, the gin and tonic.
New fiction from Christian Lorentzen. New poetry from Kelly Stacy.
Apparently, no one buys books… (THEY DO!)
Look…. Diddy’s bad behavior was an open secret for a long time. People allow wealthy men their bad behavior, until they don’t.
A small measure of… justice, for lack of a better word. And here is a fine example of voting against your own interests.
Sometimes, people regret having children. Parenting can be a rough road to hoe.
Denzel sighting.
Lesbian soccer TV!
New vacation trend: literary travel.
You can eat rattlesnakes, or so I read.
Have you ever wondered where the idea of conspiracy theories originated?
The man who would have been the first Black astronaut in space is going to go to fake space on Jeff Bezos’s little rocket. Happy for him, though.
Ummm… sure. Okay.
The Onion has been sold to people who, I think, will do right by the magazine’s legacy.
Justin Taylor writes about why it took him so long to write his latest novel.
Some findings about women in academia that speak to what many of us already know.
Why are people so obsessed with non-monogamy?
Did you know that FL charges inmates for their incarceration? Every time you think that state has demonstrated the breadth of its cruelty, it shows you a little something more.
The AZ House is trying to undo some of the damage they’ve allowed to happen re: abortion. I would say you reap what you so but the people paying the price for this aren’t those who hath wrought it.
McKinsey is under investigation for how they may have contributed to the opioid crisis.
Famous vegan chef, big asshole, bad with money.
GUYS! Voyager is working again!!!!
Roxane, Thank you for withdrawing from the PEN event this week. Please also remove your books from the RAINN website bookstore. The self-described "nation's largest sexual violence organization" promotes police-based responses to sexual violence and stifles alternative community-aligned responses. It refuses to represent the diversity of victim-survivors and the types of violations they experience, and it provides misinformation. (Its only web story about abortion is about a rape survivor who chose not to have one.) Its dominance hurts other worthier organizations. And it treats its employees terribly. See @rainnsurvivor on IG https://linktr.ee/rainnsurvivor for more info.
A Life Without Eating is absolutely gut-wrenching!! I have a friend with Crohns who's ALWAYS in the hospital, now I fear about his future.