Kathryn Mockler's Blog, page 18
December 17, 2024
Do you ever find yourself having an idea and shutting it down before you even begin to explore it?
You + What If?Do you ever find yourself having an idea and shutting it down before you even begin to explore it?
Writing out What ifs? can help avoid that.
I love What ifs? because they focus on the possible and help us open up our minds, which is particularly useful for writing creatively.
You + What If? is based on an exercise I did with my screenwriting students this year, and they all got terrific results.
It’s an idea generating prompt that can work well for many genres—although I find it particularly suited to longer form narrative genres like long short stories, film and TV scripts, and novels.
What You’ll NeedUse your favourite pen and a notebook or paper.
Alternatively you can use sticky notes on a blank wall or board, a word document, or a notes or brainstorming app.
You + What If?This exercise can be done in stages.
Spend as little as ten-minutes a day or as much as 30-60 minutes.
I don’t recommend spending longer than 60 minutes on it in one sitting.
You can also do this exercise over several weeks or have it as an ongoing project.
Divide your notebook into three columns.
In column one, make a list of around 10-30 worlds that you are a part of or deeply familiar with. These worlds could be school clubs, sports teams, hobbies, relationships, jobs, etc. Be as specific as possible about the world and/ or your relationship to it.
Pick one of these worlds, and in column two write out a series of details associated with that world such as lines of dialogue, images, memories, summaries, etc.
In column three, make a list of 30 to 50 What ifs? for this world. Do this quickly. Don’t worry if the What ifs? are outrageous. Just get as many down as fast as you can. They can be mundane, dramatic, speculative.
Pick one of these What ifs? and free-write for 15-30 minutes. Don’t worry about what you are writing.
Set this writing aside and come back to it on another day. Review your writing and see what you can use from this brainstorming material.
Repeat this exercise with the rest of your worlds until you come to an idea that you are excited to write about. Consider mixing and matching worlds and What ifs?
Even if you don’t get to the What if? part of the exercise, you will have a large list of topics that you can write about.
Let me know if you tried this exercise and how it went.
For InspirationMadeleine Thien Reads “The Cafeteria in the Evening and a Pool in the Rain” by Yoko Ogawa, New Yorker Fiction Podcast.
Hollay Ghadery’s “Post-Partum Ocean View” from Widow Fantasies.
Kim Fu’s “Pre-Simulation Consultation XF007867” from Lesser Known Monsters of the 21th Century.
Support Send My Love to AnyoneSupport Send My Love to Anyone by signing up for a monthly or yearly subscription, liking this post, or sharing it!
Big heartfelt thanks to all of the subscribers and contributors who make this project possible!
ConnectBluesky | Instagram | Archive | Contributors | Subscribe | About SMLTA
December 9, 2024
💬 How's your writing life?
Let’s chat about writing and cheer each other on!Tell the Send My Love to Anyone community what is going on with your writing?
Do you have a project planned for 2025?
Do you have an old project you’re trying to pull out of the drawer?
Something else?
What are your fears, troubles, stresses or joys, wins, and successes in terms of your writing?
Share in the comments!
💬 Where are you at with your writing?
Let’s chat about writing and cheer each other on!Tell the Send My Love to Anyone community where you’re at with your writing?
Do you have a project planned for 2025?
Do you have an old project you’re trying to pull out of the drawer?
Are you afraid to call yourself a writer?
What are your fears, troubles, stresses or joys, wins, and successes in terms of your writing?
Share in the comments!
📬 Send My Love to Anyone with Janis Bridger & Lara Jean Okihiro and Annick MacAskill
Hello Friends,
For Issue 42 of Send My Love to Anyone, I share an excerpt from Obasssan’s Boots by Janis Bridger & Lara Jean Okihiro and two poems from Annick MacAskill’s new poetry book Votive.
Kirby answers the question How are you? and I launch my Onion Man 2.0 podcast.
For Where Do I Start? I share a Last Person on Earth prompt in an attempt to prove that you can take any concept and make it your own.
Thanks to Erica McKeen and Susan Sanford Blades for Including Anecdotes in their gift guides for All Lit Up.
Also Susan Sanford Blades is running a lecture/workshop course called How to Be a Writer, and I’m going to be doing a guest spot on literary newsletters.
Hope you enjoy Issue 42!
Kathryn
Thanks for reading Send My Love to Anyone! This post is public so feel free to share it.
There’s nothing left to do but pack. I can’t put it off any longer.
Haunted by the image of the Ishii family’s things being carried out of their home while they were driven away, we stuff everything into a few rooms in the house and put locks on the doors. The kitchen table and chairs and all the furniture, the lamps, our pots and pans, our gramophone and records, all Koichiro’s books, and our bed. We cram things into attic spaces and under porches. We put our dishes and valuables in cabinets built into the walls and then plaster them over to camouflage them. We pack things in sturdy trunks and bring them to the Japanese Language School or the Buddhist Church. Surely the church is safe.
Read Excerpt from Obasssan’s Boots by Janis Bridger & Lara Jean Okihiro
Light slow as honey
in its antique shell, rubber stopper
lazy at the end, snarled curl
of the lip ring silver
round glass—yes, glass, but thick,
the kind that keeps you guessing,
stretching for the other side.
The way a frenzied starling
builds her nest in May,
one clutch of twigs
at a time. The light unclaimed
through my delay, seeping in
as if from nowhere, stilted,
clotted as in the water
in the white-shelled tank I saw
one inverted summer day
in Melbourne, where a squid lay
slumped in a corner
like a pile of unwashed laundry,
her eye a steady accusation
before the rounded window
that glimpsed our own grey-glimmer world.","size":"lg","isEditorNode":true,"title":"The way a frenzied starling / builds her nest in May, / one clutch of twigs / at a time.","publishedBylines":[],"post_date":"2024-12-01T17:35:37.008Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f... ","id":151808528,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":0,"comment_count":0,"publication_name":"Send My Love to Anyone","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f...
Send My Love to Anyone got some new followers and subscribers from the above post.
Welcome! I’m glad you’re here. I’m also glad you have a sense of what this newsletter is all about!","size":"md","isEditorNode":true,"title":"Gatherings: Murray Sinclair, Francesca Albanese, Writers' Trust Speeches, Public Domain Movies, Farzana Doctor, Between the Covers, Science Fiction and the Alt-Right, Onion Man 2.0., and more","publishedBylines":[{"id":21201715,"name":"Kathryn Mockler","bio":"Kathryn Mockler is the author of five books of poetry, several experimental films, and the story collections Anecdotes, which won the Victoria Butler Book Prize and was a finalist for four other awards.","photo_url":"https://substack-post-media.s3.amazon... My Love to Anyone","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f...
I’ve never liked the question. Never trusted it. Associate it mostly with doctors, professionals who I rarely if ever go to. I mean anyone close to me (my chosen intimates) will already know because they’re close to me, but others, what exactly are they asking as if they really want to know, and if they’re just being sociable/courteous buy me a drink.","size":"md","isEditorNode":true,"title":"How are you? I’ve never liked the question. ","publishedBylines":[{"id":16955065,"name":"KIRBY","bio":"The pansy. Not the cream puff. poetryisqueer.com ","photo_url":"https://bucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-... First Time","id":151751254,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":1,"comment_count":0,"publication_name":"Send My Love to Anyone","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f...
I punch us in while Clinton puts our lunches in the cool room. The cool room is a big room beside the lunch area that’s as cold as a fridge and that stays empty during corn season. Bud, the foreman, lets us use it because in terms of a lunchroom the warehouse workers get the shaft. The rest of the factory has a kitchen, fridge, microwave, and four vending machines that we aren’t allowed to use because the management doesn’t want us walking through the factory. Bud made a makeshift lunch area consisting of two tables, two vending machines, and the cool room, which I’m convinced makes my sandwiches taste like rubber.","size":"md","isEditorNode":true,"title":"🧅 —It’s because you work in the warehouse, Clinton says. Bud’s old school; he thinks only men should work here.","publishedBylines":[{"id":21201715,"name":"Kathryn Mockler","bio":"Kathryn Mockler is the author of five books of poetry, several experimental films, and the story collections Anecdotes, which won the Victoria Butler Book Prize and was a finalist for four other awards.","photo_url":"https://substack-post-media.s3.amazon... Man 2.0","id":152815617,"type":"podcast","reaction_count":0,"comment_count":0,"publication_name":"Send My Love to Anyone","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f...
If you are feeling hopeless,
then give up hope. I won’t
tell anyone. I won’t tell you
to put on a brave face or feel
better about yourself. ","size":"md","isEditorNode":true,"title":"If you are feeling hopeless, then give up hope. I won’t tell anyone. I won’t tell you to put on a brave face or feel better about yourself.","publishedBylines":[{"id":21201715,"name":"Kathryn Mockler","bio":"Kathryn Mockler is the author of five books of poetry, several experimental films, and the story collections Anecdotes, which won the Victoria Butler Book Prize and was a finalist for four other awards.","photo_url":"https://substack-post-media.s3.amazon... Me","id":152781419,"type":"podcast","reaction_count":4,"comment_count":1,"publication_name":"Send My Love to Anyone","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f...
A friend of mine is a dear friend to Yousef in Gaza, and she has been trying to help him come to Canada so he can study at the University of Ottawa. Please consider donating if you are able.
Send My Love to Anyone is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support this project, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
December 8, 2024
🧅 It’s because you work in the warehouse, Clinton says. Bud’s old school; he thinks only men should work here.
I punch us in while Clinton puts our lunches in the cool room. The cool room is a big room beside the lunch area that’s as cold as a fridge and that stays empty during corn season. Bud, the foreman, lets us use it because in terms of a lunchroom the warehouse workers get the shaft. The rest of the factory has a kitchen, fridge, microwave, and four vending machines that we aren’t allowed to use because the management doesn’t want us walking through the factory. Bud made a makeshift lunch area consisting of two tables, two vending machines, and the cool room, which I’m convinced makes my sandwiches taste like rubber.
*
There are four big machines in the warehouse. Usually only three are going at a time. All I know about the process is what I see here. The cans come down the conveyor belt like stubby tin soldiers and march onto the Britestack where they form a square of a thousand cans. If they are out of place or fall down, I take an L-shaped iron rod to straighten them up. That’s it. It’s that boring.
*
The warehouse is better to work in than the rest of the factory—less pressure. My job may be boring, but at least I don’t have any responsibility. My job isn’t important. Clinton’s is, but I wouldn’t want his job for anything. I don’t have to worry though—they never let women run the big machines. Working in the lab would be good. The room is tiny and soundproof, and they have a little fan going and a radio. I peeked in the lab a couple of days ago. Brenda offered me corn to eat right out of the can, and I did, and it tasted really good. I’ve never eaten canned corn before. My mother always buys frozen, but now I think canned tastes better. It’s sweeter and has a better consistency. I ate it cold but imagine it’s good warm with butter and salt and pepper. Clinton says you can buy a case wholesale from the factory for ten bucks. Maybe I’ll do that.
*
The lights and no windows trick me into thinking it’s day. Except when
I take my break and slip out the side door for a cigarette. The air is cool compared to the air inside. The sky is clear because we’re outside city limits, and there are no clouds, few lights. I hear crickets the way I imagine my mother did growing up on my grandparents’ dairy farm. Corncobs are piled in pyramids ready to be husked, de-cobbed, and sealed in cans. Before we leave tonight, Clinton and I will stash an A&P bag full of fresh corn to eat when we get home. We’ll have garlic bread with cheese and fall asleep in front of the TV—the window fan blowing our hair on and off our faces like wind and weeds.
*
On my first day I walked through the factory without my hardhat: Bud Richards hollered at me in front of everybody. Now I never forget.
—It seems like Bud always picks on me, I say to Clinton.
—It’s because you work in the warehouse, Clinton says. Bud’s old school; he thinks only men should work here.
Playlist» Continue to Episode 3 (coming soon)
« Return to Episode 1
All Episodes
ExtrasWhere was that damn factory?The factory that this book is based on was a corn canning factory where I worked just outside London, Ontario in 1989. I’ve tried to find information about this factory for years and have come up empty.
I remembered that it was a Green Giant factory and that it had, at the time, recently been purchased by Pillsbury. No one was happy about this change of ownership because the Pillsbury wages were much less than the Green Giant wages. I believe that the Pillsbury seasonal workers were not unionized which was another source of contention.
My boyfriend’s mother worked there every summer and got us both jobs, but I couldn’t remember where the factory was located because I have a habit of not paying attention to such things—especially as a teenager and even more so if I am being driven somewhere. My boyfriend’s mother drove us for awhile until my boyfriend got his motorcycle.
How could I remember all these details from the book and not know where the factory was located? Shrug.
I decided to check in with a Facebook Group called If You Grew Up in London, Ontario, You Will Remember When… because I thought that someone might have worked there or known someone who worked there, and sure enough I got many responses.
People were sharing about when they worked there, the jobs they had, getting paid well, lasting only a day, lack of safety precautions, never wanting to eat canned corn again—someone even met their husband there.
Although the commenters referenced a couple of canning factories in London at the time, I believe that I worked at the one just south of the 401 outside of London on Green Valley Road. That rings a bell for me, and I remember that the factory was surrounded by farm land. Very grateful to that Facebook group for answering my question.
Become a free or paid subscriber of Send My Love to Anyone.
Description of Onion ManOnion Man follows an eighteen-year-old girl working for the summer at a corn-canning factory in London, Ontario in the 1980s as she navigates her relationships with her factory job, her boyfriend, her alcoholic mother, her terminally ill grandfather, and the man who every night “peels an onion and eats it as if it were an apple.
© Copyright 2011 and 2024 | Kathryn Mockler | All rights reserved.
Illustration by David PoolmanThanks for reading Send My Love to Anyone! This post is public so feel free to share it.
If you like Onion Man, you might like Anecdotes by Kathryn Mockler, winner of the Victoria Butler Book Prize and was a finalist for the 2024 Trillium Book Award, 2023 Danuta Gleed Literary Award, 2024 Fred Kerner Award, and 2024 VMI Besty Warland Between Genres Award.
🧅 —It’s because you work in the warehouse, Clinton says. Bud’s old school; he thinks only men should work here.
I punch us in while Clinton puts our lunches in the cool room. The cool room is a big room beside the lunch area that’s as cold as a fridge and that stays empty during corn season. Bud, the foreman, lets us use it because in terms of a lunchroom the warehouse workers get the shaft. The rest of the factory has a kitchen, fridge, microwave, and four vending machines that we aren’t allowed to use because the management doesn’t want us walking through the factory. Bud made a makeshift lunch area consisting of two tables, two vending machines, and the cool room, which I’m convinced makes my sandwiches taste like rubber.
*
There are four big machines in the warehouse. Usually only three are going at a time. All I know about the process is what I see here. The cans come down the conveyor belt like stubby tin soldiers and march onto the Britestack where they form a square of a thousand cans. If they are out of place or fall down, I take an L-shaped iron rod to straighten them up. That’s it. It’s that boring.
*
The warehouse is better to work in than the rest of the factory—less pressure. My job may be boring, but at least I don’t have any responsibility. My job isn’t important. Clinton’s is, but I wouldn’t want his job for anything. I don’t have to worry though—they never let women run the big machines. Working in the lab would be good. The room is tiny and soundproof, and they have a little fan going and a radio. I peeked in the lab a couple of days ago. Brenda offered me corn to eat right out of the can, and I did, and it tasted really good. I’ve never eaten canned corn before. My mother always buys frozen, but now I think canned tastes better. It’s sweeter and has a better consistency. I ate it cold but imagine it’s good warm with butter and salt and pepper. Clinton says you can buy a case wholesale from the factory for ten bucks. Maybe I’ll do that.
*
The lights and no windows trick me into thinking it’s day. Except when
I take my break and slip out the side door for a cigarette. The air is cool compared to the air inside. The sky is clear because we’re outside city limits, and there are no clouds, few lights. I hear crickets the way I imagine my mother did growing up on my grandparents’ dairy farm. Corncobs are piled in pyramids ready to be husked, de-cobbed, and sealed in cans. Before we leave tonight, Clinton and I will stash an A&P bag full of fresh corn to eat when we get home. We’ll have garlic bread with cheese and fall asleep in front of the TV—the window fan blowing our hair on and off our faces like wind and weeds.
*
On my first day I walked through the factory without my hardhat: Bud Richards hollered at me in front of everybody. Now I never forget.
—It seems like Bud always picks on me, I say to Clinton.
—It’s because you work in the warehouse, Clinton says. Bud’s old school; he thinks only men should work here.
Playlist» Continue to Episode 3 (coming soon)
« Return to Episode 1
All Episodes
ExtrasWhere was that damn factory?The factory that this book is based on was a corn canning factory where I worked just outside London, Ontario in 1989. I’ve tried to find information about this factory for years and have come up empty.
I remembered that it was a Green Giant factory and that it had, at the time, recently been purchased by Pillsbury. No one was happy about this change of ownership because the Pillsbury wages were much less than the Green Giant wages. I believe that the Pillsbury seasonal workers were not unionized which was another source of contention.
My boyfriend’s mother worked there every summer and got us both jobs, but I couldn’t remember where the factory was located because I have a habit of not paying attention to such things—especially as a teenager and even more so if I am being driven somewhere. My boyfriend’s mother drove us for awhile until my boyfriend got his motorcycle.
How could I remember all these details from the book and not know where the factory was located? Shrug.
I decided to check in with a Facebook Group called If You Grew Up in London, Ontario, You Will Remember When… because I thought that someone might have worked there or known someone who worked there, and sure enough I got many responses.
People were sharing about when they worked there, the jobs they had, getting paid well, lasting only a day, lack of safety precautions, never wanting to eat canned corn again—someone even met their husband there.
Although the commenters referenced a couple of canning factories in London at the time, I believe that I worked at the one just south of the 401 outside of London on Green Valley Road. That rings a bell for me, and I remember that the factory was surrounded by farm land. Very grateful to that Facebook group for answering my question.
Become a free or paid subscriber of Send My Love to Anyone.
Description of Onion ManOnion Man follows an eighteen-year-old girl working for the summer at a corn-canning factory in London, Ontario in the 1980s as she navigates her relationships with her factory job, her boyfriend, her alcoholic mother, her terminally ill grandfather, and the man who every night “peels an onion and eats it as if it were an apple.
© Copyright 2011 and 2024 | Kathryn Mockler | All rights reserved.
Illustration by David PoolmanThanks for reading Send My Love to Anyone! This post is public so feel free to share it.
If you like Onion Man, you might like Anecdotes by Kathryn Mockler, winner of the Victoria Butler Book Prize and was a finalist for the 2024 Trillium Book Award, 2023 Danuta Gleed Literary Award, 2024 Fred Kerner Award, and 2024 VMI Besty Warland Between Genres Award.
Happy 20th Anniversary to my publisher Book*hug Press!
Book*hug Press who published my debut story collection Anecdotes is celebrating 20 years of publishing!
and Hazel Millar are not only my publishers but also friends whose books I’ve been buying and supporting long before I became one of their authors.
They invited me to do an interview where I reflect on my publishing experience with them and my love for independent (aka small press) publishing.
One thing I try to do on Send My Love to Anyone is support independent/small presses and their authors including Book*hug!
Our 20th-anniversary celebrations continue with another Author Spotlight interview. Today, we’re shining a light on Kathryn Mockler. Last year we had the pleasure of publishing Kathryn’s brilliant hybrid collection Anecdotes. It has been so lovely developing a friendship with Kathryn while witnessing the well-deserved acclaim her book has garnered from prizes like the Trillium and Betsy Warland Awards.
In our Q&A with Kathryn, she shares what it means to be part of the Book*hug author family, highlights a title by fellow Book*hug author Jacob Wren that has left a lasting impression on her, and reflects on independent publishing vs publishing conglomerates. Happy reading!
What does being part of the Book*hug author family mean to you? Feel free to share an anecdote, reflection, or backstory about your publishing experience.
I love the writing that Book*hug publishes, and I respect their willingness to select work that takes creative risks—particularly translations, hybrid works, and political writing. I’m thinking of Céline Huyghebaert’s hybrid book Remnants (translated into English by Aleshia Jensen); Catherine Fatima’s raw and edgy novel Sludge Utopia; and Shani Mootoo’s innovative approaches to poetic style and form in Oh Witness Day!
Visit Book*hug Press to read more about my experience with them and see all the amazing books they publish.
Although Jacob Wren’s book Rich and Poor was written in 2016, the subject matter is incredibly timely:
Rich and Poor is a novel of a man who washes dishes for a living and decides to kill a billionaire as a political act. It is literature as political theory and theory as pure literary pleasure—a spiralling, fast-paced parable of joyous, overly self-aware, mischievous class warfare.
As his plan proceeds and becomes more feasible, the story cuts back and forth between his and the billionaire’s perspectives, gradually revealing how easily the poisons of ambition, wealth and revolutionary violence can become entangled. A fable of not knowing how to change the world and perhaps learning how to do so in the process.
Book*hug Holiday Sale: 20% off orders until December 24, 2024.
Anecdotes by Kathryn Mockler
Winner of the 2024 City of Victoria Butler Book Prize
Finalist for the 2024 VMI Betsy Warland Between Genres Award
Finalist for the 2024 Fred Kerner Book Award
Finalist for the 2024 Trillium Book Award
Finalist for the 2023 Danuta Gleed Literary Award
With dreamlike stories and dark humour, Anecdotes is a hybrid collection in four parts examining the pressing realities of sexual violence, abuse, and environmental collapse.
Absurdist flash fictions in “The Boy is Dead” depict characters such as a park that hates hippies, squirrels, and unhappy parents; a woman lamenting a stolen laptop the day the world ends; and birds slamming into glass buildings.
“We’re Not Here to Talk About Aliens” gathers autofictions that follow a young protagonist from childhood to early 20s, through the murky undercurrent of potential violence amidst sexual awakening, from first periods to flashers, sticker books to maxi pad art, acid trips to blackouts, and creepy professors to close calls.
“This Isn’t a Conversation” shares one-liners from overheard conversations, found texts, diary entries, and random thoughts: many are responses to the absurdity and pain of the current political and environmental climate.
In “My Dream House,” the past and the future are personified as various incarnations in relationships to one another (lovers, a parent and child, siblings, friends), all engaged in ongoing conflict.
These varied, immersive works bristle with truth in the face of unprecedented change. They are playful forms for serious times.
Support Send My Love to AnyoneSupport Send My Love to Anyone by signing up for a monthly or yearly subscription, liking this post, or sharing it!
Big heartfelt thanks to all of the subscribers and contributors who make this project possible!
ConnectBluesky | Instagram | Archive | Contributors | Subscribe | About SMLTA
December 7, 2024
If you are feeling hopeless, then give up hope. I won’t tell anyone. I won’t tell you to put on a brave face or feel better about yourself.
Support Send My Love to Anyone by signing up for a monthly or yearly subscription, liking this post, or sharing it!
Big heartfelt thanks to all of the subscribers and contributors who make this project possible!
ConnectBluesky | Instagram | Archive | Contributors | Subscribe | About SMLTA
December 1, 2024
I like proving that you can take any concept—even a familiar one—and make it your own.
I’ve been working on a last person on Earth story, and it reminded me of one of my favourite Twilight Zone episodes, “Time Enough at Last”.
This is the final three minutes of the Twilight Zone episode “Time Enough at Last” (1959).
There is something fun about imagining what you would do if you were the last person on Earth. It’s a horror I wouldn’t wish on anyone.
I love familiar concepts and then seeing what happens when writers juxtapose them with unexpected elements.
I also like proving that you can take any concept—even a familiar one—and make it your own.
So much writing advice I got when I was a new writer involved all the things you couldn’t or shouldn’t write about because they had “been done before”.
Think of all the stories that we’ve missed out on because someone believed that a topic was “overdone” or “too familiar” to write about.
It may have been done before but not by you!
Writing PromptThis prompt is simple.
Set a timer for seven minutes and brainstorm ideas for a last person on Earth premise.
Imagine yourself in this scenario. How would it feel? What would you do? What would you reflect on?
Write a poem, story, or play with this material.
Share you story or your process below.
For InspirationTwo stories I enjoy that follow this premise is Carleigh Baker’s “Last Woman” in which a narrator plays a last woman on Earth video game while alone at a remote cabin, and Francine Cunningham’s story “Last” from her debut collection God Isn’t Here Today (Invisible Publishing)
Support Send My Love to AnyoneSupport Send My Love to Anyone by signing up for a monthly or yearly subscription, liking this post, or sharing it!
Big heartfelt thanks to all of the subscribers and contributors who make this project possible!
ConnectBluesky | Instagram | Archive | Contributors | Subscribe | About SMLTA
All Lit Up Gift Guides
Thanks so much to and for including Anecdotes (Book*hug Press) on their gift guides for All Lit Up!
For that busy person on your list who might not have time for long-form fiction, Anecdotes is the perfect pick. Whip-smart and brutally funny, these bite-sized bits of poetry and prose blend flat-faced reportage with sardonic absurdism to dig into difficult contemporary topics: political apathy, climate disaster, sexual violence, and the stickiness of the female body. They also provide useful life advice, like how to invoke imaginary children in order to win an argument, how to find a good psychic after your cat runs away, or how to avoid being murdered at your job interview. Part of the surprise and delight of Mockler’s writing is that it resolutely defies genre. Short stories give way to autofiction, which in turn gives way to found poetry and a chain of scenes linked by their recurring protagonists, Past and Future: strange and poignant personifications. Equal parts blunt and rambling, abrasive and comically healing, Anecdotes peels back the gummy layers of reality, revelling in its ludicrous inner core.
—Erica McKeen (author of Cicada Summer and Tear )
For your friend who wants to laugh their way to the climate apocalypse:Anecdotes by Kathryn Mockler (Book*hug Press)
This is a book of short fiction, one-act plays, and poetry, all with an eye to the climate crisis, the misogyny, and the capitalist apathy that plague our world and populate our nightmares. It is not a depressing read, though! Mockler writes with a vulnerability and tongue-in-cheek humour that will draw you in and allow her message to land with a loud, self-aware thud. The content of this book ranges from auto-fictive short stories based on Mockler’s childhood and young adulthood, to climate grief–based found poems, to parables featuring The Past, The Present, and The Future. Throughout, Mockler’s voice is unsentimental and nonchalant, which makes the content—she covers childhood bullying, sexual violence, shame, loneliness, climate change, the meaning of the universe—resonate all the more deeply. This book is totally inventive and irreverent, displaying humanity at its vilest, but in the most fun way possible.
—Susan Sanford Blades, All Lit Up (author of Fake It So Real )
Check out the rest of the All Lit Up Gift Guides on the All Lit Up Blog!
Share your own gift guide in the comments:Support Send My Love to AnyoneSupport Send My Love to Anyone by signing up for a monthly or yearly subscription, liking this post, or sharing it!
Big heartfelt thanks to all of the subscribers and contributors who make this project possible!
ConnectBluesky | Instagram | Archive | Contributors | Subscribe | About SMLTA
