"when I, with my supposed iron stomach for sadness, try to think of the saddest song I've ever heard, my mind goes to that CD that Sam gave Jennifer, and the one song I couldn’t believe was on it." Chris Ritter on Journey's "Separate Ways": marchxness.com/the-essays#/...

This is solid work

Every location has a picket line in front of it. Don’t cross the line.

oh yeahhhhh kool aid man break into itttt

Reminder that the @marchxness.bsky.social anthology is available for preorder...right now... www.splitlippress.com/product-page...

I got an early Christmas gift from my husband & I am just showing it off:

I reviewed Ben Mangrum’s new book, on the surprising range of American comedies about computers, for ASAP:

"I like things that are imperfect. They are real. Institutions and families put waaaaaayyyyy too much pressure creating 'perfect' events. I don’t like that. That’s not my thing." A conversation with Allie Leach about potlucks and recipe books: open.substack.com/pub/tucsones...

Thank you @bookriot.bsky.social for featuring Cactus Country on this list of books to read for Genderfluid Visibility Week! bookriot.com/genderfluid-...

Are you scared of the ocean? Do you wonder what is up with men? Ever wish you could talk to dolphins? If you answered yes to any of these, then my fifth novel Man Overboard! is for you. It now has a cover! And is available for pre-order from Gallery Books! bit.ly/ManOverboard...

October book #1: The Unicorn is Iris Murdoch's take on the 1960s dimestore gothic romance. This is a book about about a bunch of weirdos trapped in a stately home between a sea cliff & a deadly bog. If that isn't enough to sell you, everyone is secretly gay & constantly chugging whisky 5/5

Join us Fri & Sun for 2 Tucson Essay Club events this weekend: 10/24 KATE BRAVERMAN DEATH DAY @ 7pm; RSVP requested here: docs.google.com/document/d/1... . And 10/26 @ 8pm, Casa Video, TUCSON ESSAY MOVIE CLUB feat. Angel Heart and @meganc.bsky.social.

Friday Oct 24 7pm, a slightly spooky event for Kate Braverman's Death Day. Details/RSVP info: open.substack.com/pub/tucsones...

Marcella Hazan! Everyone makes an all-day tomato sauce & homemade pasta to celebrate!

Hey there, so I'm doing a project called What Happened On Oct 9th today, an outgrowth of the @essaydaily.bsky.social What Happened projects, in which we just write down/about what happens today. Join me if you want privately or on the public collaborative doc? docs.google.com/document/d/1...

but will Angel Heart appear on this list; find out at Tucson Essay Movie Club 10/26 at Casa Video (or possibly before)

More October horror recs! I have a pretty firm list of my 15 favorite horror movies & I've decided that I get to add another movie each year from here on out. But let's start with the OGs:

If you're in Phoenix/Tempe today, come out to the Rift for the first Desert Grit Reading Series, with me, @shipraagarwal.bsky.social, @jonathanin2k.bsky.social, @sabrinahicks.bsky.social, @haydenmcasey13.bsky.social, and @stephanieaustin.bsky.social!

It's my birthday and I want another round of "Trump is secretly dead" discourse, come on bsky you're my only hope

Next Tuesday I'm giving a Work Talk for @tucsonessayclub.bsky.social at 7pm at Wave Archive with @leahmensch.bsky.social and Katie Jean Shinkle. I'm talking about a Michigan 1995 Simulator, Leah's doing Braverman impersonations, and KJS is dishing on Bad Men. Deets: open.substack.com/pub/tucsones...

"What does it mean that Jane Austen was hanging out with groups of radicals, and radical politicians and the women in their lives?" ASU English professor @devoney.bsky.social visited with @kjzz.org’s Lauren Gilger about the "real" Jane Austen. Listen: ow.ly/BhPc50X6jPP #ASUHumanities

"You commit to something, and you just become the incubator for the work." My conversation with Yuts / @geographyofrobots.bsky.social (maker of the great game NORCO) is up on @graywolfpress.bsky.social's Games Lab today: graywolflab.org/2025/10/03/e...

My mom took too much Tylenol when she was pregnant with me and accidentally created the worlds foremost Kate Braverman scholar

A little sneak peek of our substack post going up tomorrow featuring photos by Tucsonan Steve Renzi of Downtown Tucson in the 1980s

I love richard siken and calling things essays even if the publishers says they are not (claudia rankine)

New feature on @richard-siken.bsky.social's newest book which is arguably essays! open.substack.com/pub/tucsones...

Mighta did a thing : thediagram.com/merch/produc...

So maybe 14 years ago I spent several weeks in Lithuania & talked to many Lithuanians, several of whom told me a story I keep think about: during the Soviet era there was a sort of USSR Olympics, in which the different regions of the Soviet bloc would compete against each other. (1/4)

Which Robert Redford movie should I make my kid watch tonight? Sneakers, right? It's Sneakers.

My dad loved Robert Redford, especially in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. During my dad's last year, we watched it together, and I learned dad only remembered the first half of the film: for him, the movie ended not in death but in escape, via a shared leap of faith. If only, if only, if only.

oh dude I just made one for @tucsonessayclub.bsky.social

An original Tucson essay by Dorian Rolston on teaching Peggy Shumaker's "Moving Water, Tucson": open.substack.com/pub/tucsones...

Good work @housleydave.bsky.social and @tmcallister.bsky.social

spooky

I just found out that REFUSE TO BE DONE is going into its 8th printing! I've heard so many stories from writers whose projects have been helped along by this little yellow book over the past three years. Nothing makes me happier!

Come and join us on our new chat thread about the movie from last night, 1975's Dog Day Afternoon, for our Tucson Essay Movie Club members: substack.com/chat/5666207

Come join us and Manuel Muñoz tonight at Casa Video 8pm for Tucson Essay Movie Club, featuring 1975's Dog Day Afternoon. These events are primarily social, a writer introducing a movie that excites them with a brief essay, and we all watch it together.

Two new Tucson Essay Club stickers for you in the shop: tucsonessayclub.org/store/

Ran across Tucson and Casa Video in another Thomas Dai essay from Take My Name But Say It Slow

Featuring Thomas Dai's "A Borderlands Transect" in this week's substack: tucsonessayclub.substack.com/p/a-borderla...

⭐🐚 "you could be a cookie lying there, / photographed not on a beach but in a pastry case" From "Die-off Off Vancouver" by ASU English professor Sally Ball. Read the whole poem online or in the September print issue @thenation.com: ow.ly/ICsz50WHzVf #ASUHumanities

DAMN THIS ANNA VON HAUSSWOLFF IS HITTING: www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpMH...

Ever made or was given a mixtape? Check this project out.

Coming up on the Substack, a feature with @richard-siken.bsky.social and his new book of poems...or are some of them essays: I DO KNOW SOME THINGS from @coppercanyonpress.bsky.social. Book drops next week, so you will want to get your copy ordered NOW: antigonebooks.com/book/9781556...

New Substack post: Mixtape Manifesto 02 is all about the human voice. mixtapemanifesto.substack.com/p/vocal-music

Mixtape Manifesto — My Substack where I excavate old mixtapes, write about them, and re-create them as Spotify playlists: mixtapemanifesto.substack.com

TUCSON ESSAY ALERT

only one cat can possess The Box

Tucson friends! There's a public meeting tomorrow on the Project Blue proposal aka Amazon's attempt to drain our aquifer for a data center. It's 5-7pm at the Tucson Convention Center & everyone is welcome, please make a sign & bring everyone you know!