Newsletter

I’ve been thinking about the stories our families never told us — the ones hidden in attics, in locked drawers, in the silences at dinner tables.

There is a particular kind of clarity that only comes when reading by the window as the rain falls. These are the books I return to when my own writing feels impossible.

I used to believe a good ending should feel like a door closing. I no longer think that’s true. The best endings feel like a door left slightly ajar.

This month I rearranged my writing desk for the seventh time this year. Some writers need order. I seem to need beautiful chaos.

It took me forty-three drafts to write the opening sentence of New Haven. Forty-three. Here is what it finally became.

There is something about the scratch of pen on paper that slows the mind just enough for the real words to arrive.