Elizabeth Ellsworth's Blog, page 2
April 27, 2020
What Readers are Saying!
I am both an avid reader and environmentalist, and I have long been searching for a book that truly explores the plights of living in this time of global warming…
I really identified with the thoughts and struggles of the characters, especially those of your main character, Kally. Her thought process and transformation over the plot of the book reflects what I think many people around the world are feeling in this day and age…
I also appreciated how everyone supported each other in your story, which shows that we can all depend on one another in times of crisis. That theme is also reflected right now with whole communities supporting one another during this pandemic.
This was a good read, and I think others would love reading it as well.
M.A.S., a reader in the Bronx, New York:
Climate change is a big anxiety trigger for me, but I felt like I was able to somehow absorb the super harsh realities of what the characters (and we) are facing… I was totally transported. The mixture of anxiety, excitement and adventure was really gripping. And even though it is so intense, there is so much hope and positivity…
I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed it. And how much I needed it! I seriously didn’t put it down. I hope there is a sequel coming.
February 20, 2020
Writing Solid, Broken, Changing
photo by smudge studio, from Conveyance I was inspired to write Solid, Broken, Changing by 15 years of collaborative art-making with Jamie Kruse, as smudge studio.
When I first started writing the book, I saw it as a way to give voice to smudge’s lived experiences of field-researching and responding to the Anthropocene as artists. The book was in rough outline form seven years ago, when journalists first began to explain the word “Anthropocene” to their readers. Anthropocene events ramified. And as they did, the book project felt more urgent and relevant. I was editing its print proof when Greta Thunberg crossed the Atlantic and as the 2019-20 fires raged in Australia. And now, Solid, Broken, Changing feels less like a fiction and more like an artifact of the contemporary moment.
Staging a story about living the Anthropocene on the threshold of adulthood felt appropriate. It’s a time when self and self-in-the-world undergo radical transformations. The ways we humans envision the future as we cross the threshold into adulthood trigger outcomes that are long term, and far from knowable.
Like smudge’s ongoing projects, Solid, Broken, Changing connects the intimacy of daily experience to the vast, generative forces of deep time and geological change.
As each new day turns the world and the future more strange and uncertain, Kally and her unexpected ally, Stuart, dare to confront the fact that they are enmeshed with, and in, the Anthropocene. It is a courageous, generative act—even if it doesn’t always feel that way. New realizations about the immensity of the changes taking place come fast and furious, and Kally and Stuart are buffeted by their emotional force. Growing new skills and inventively adapting old ones, they dead reckon into undreamt of futures that are suddenly theirs.
Ways of meeting and living the Anthropocene; emotional resiliency in the wake of massive change; dangers, challenges and wonders of co-existence; what it means to realize that we are of the Anthropocene and it is of us—these are several of the contemporary conditions of daily life that Solid, Broken, Changing explores through narrative fiction.
Solid, Broken, Changing is available in paperback and as an Ebook.
February 19, 2020
It’s in the Provincetown Library
I’m thrilled to say that Tom, one the hero-of-the-planet librarians and cataloguer at the Provincetown MA public library, is at this moment cataloguing and shelving copies of Solid, Broken, Changing in the Young Adult and Cape Cod Collections!
Tom and the Ptown library were indispensable to the writing of the book. They gave me a great YA collection to research, and access to millions of books from universities and public libraries through the MA Commonwealth Catalogue. Plus, those evening screenings of classic and offbeat movies made for welcome breaks from editing.
It couldn’t have been a more perfect day to drop off copies.
Provincetown has one of the best public libraries in the nation at a time when we need them more than ever. It’s a center of the community with free year-round public programming is a lifeblood of the town.
I’m beyond honored to have the book on their shelves.
Provincetown, MA
I’m thrilled to report that Tom, one the hero-of-the-planet librarians and cataloguer at the Provincetown MA public library, is at this moment cataloguing and shelving copies of Solid, Broken, Changing in the Young Adult and Cape Cod Collections!
Tom and the Ptown library were indispensable to the writing of the book. They gave me a great YA collection to research and access to millions of books from universities and public libraries through the MA Commonwealth Catalogue. Plus, those evening screenings of classic and offbeat movies made for perfect breaks from editing.
It couldn’t have been a more perfect day to drop off the copies.
Provincetown has one of the best public libraries in the nation at a time when we need them more than ever. It’s a center of the community with free year-round public programming is a lifeblood of the town.
I’m beyond honored to have the book on their shelves.
2/19/20
I’m thrilled to report that Tom, one the hero-of-the-planet librarians and cataloguer at the Provincetown MA public library, is at this moment cataloguing and shelving copies of Solid, Broken, Changing in the Young Adult and Cape Cod Collections!
Tom and the Ptown library were indispensable to the writing of the book. They gave me a great YA collection to research and access to millions of books from universities and public libraries through the MA Commonwealth Catalogue. Plus, those evening screenings of classic and offbeat movies made for perfect breaks from editing.
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It couldn’t have been a more perfect day to drop off the copies.
Provincetown has one of the best public libraries in the nation at a time when we need them more than ever. It’s a center of the community with free year-round public programming is a lifeblood of the town.
I’m beyond honored to have the book on their shelves.
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December 11, 2019
books
Kally, aka the human antenna, sensed it coming. Planet Earth was shifting under her feet. So was her family. But she never imagined their tipping points would let go this soon–or this fast. [image error]A Young Adult Novel
Now, Kally and her father are sheltering in place with strangers on an island off of Maine. As each new wave of planetary change sweeps the tiny enclave, she fears that she will never get the chance to realize her dreams.
In her urgent search for bearings, Kally discovers a surprising ally in Stuart, a champion freerunner who believes he can vault and spin beyond whatever gets in his way. But, when they pool their skills, they soon realize that no map exists for what they and the earth are becoming.
Setting out to find her way in a future that promises nothing but upheaval, Kally dares to steer by the only pole star she has left–her unbreakable creativity.
Solid, Broken, Changing is available in paperback and as an Ebook.
