Gone Fishing, Or At Least That's What it Feels like (A Love Letter)
Life does not compute.
Thank you for reading my Substack and thank you for choosing to subscribe. I value every single one of my readers! If you like my work, please hit the heart button at the bottom of the post. It really does help others find me. And feel free to share as well!
(Full transparency to all fisherpeople: there is nothing about actual fishing in this newsletter.)
Hello lovies,
That does not compute.1
This saying has been in my mind this week. Because life does not compute at the moment. And when life does not compute, I have a hard time thinking up topics for this newsletter. It feels like my brain has gone fishing.
This is actually a rarity. Most often I write these love letters on Friday, but usually I have a good idea of what I’m going to write about well before that. And often the letters pretty much write themselves. But today (it is Friday afternoon as I type) nothing computes.
Maybe it is because:
—Last night was Halloween. Living in a multi-generational household as I do, the job of handing out candy to trick-or-treaters falls to me and the hub so that the grands can go out candy-hunting. Here are photos of the cutest shark you ever did see (note the wet shoes—it poured last night) and his candy haul.
—Or because the election is drawing nigh. ‘Nough said.
—Or perhaps it is the fault of Nanowrimo starting today. Don’t tell anybody, but I’m goofing around with a project I’m choosing to keep secret because I just want to have fun. (FYI, the storytelling in the below video is so creative.)
—Or maybe it’s because it’s peak autumn here, with the most gorgeous fall colors you’ve ever seen and me playing full-on domestic goddess, roasting chickens, making broth with the carcasses, and turning it into soup so that the whole house smells like the home you never want to leave.
—Then again, it could be this: I’ve not been as busy with clients as usual (if you are in need of a book or writing coach, hit reply to this newsletter) and they are often the source of my inspiration.
And the truth of the matter is, all I can think about in terms of imparting brilliant writing information to you is this: keep writing. Or start writing if you haven’t been. It’s where you’ll find everything you’re looking for. But I hesitate to write about that because it’s pretty much what I wrote about last week. And the week before. And many times before that. (See here and here.)
But maybe that’s okay. Maybe it’s what you need to hear again and again in order for it to land just write and compel you to the page. I know I need to hear things over and over. So if you’re stressed or worried or sad or even happy, I’ll say it again: go write. It’s the cure you’re seeking.
Love, light, and good writing,
Charlotte
P.S. Please leave a comment or reply to this email and tell me how you’re doing.
Articles and Resources
The best career novelist coach on the planet, Camille Pagán, has opened up her Bestselling Bootcamp program. Highly recommend! Take it with me, and sign up November 4 to get her office hours bonus.
This latest missive from writer Heather Demetrios seems pertinent, given we’ve just passed Halloween and the election is Tuesday.
Susan DeFreitas’s posts on character always inspire me.
Almost forgot—I now have two people who have indicated interest in doing an Artist’s Way group so I’ll be starting that up in January. Hit reply if you’re interested—I’ll be running it through this site so all you’ll have to do is become a paid subscriber.
Books
Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett. I got a huge stack of books from the library last weekend, ones I’d been eagerly anticipating, and none of them thrilled me. Sigh. So I turned to my Kindle and restarted this book that I’d begun in Italy but abandoned. Now I’m loving it.
Seven Secrets to the Perfect Personal Essay: Crafting the Story Only You Can Write, by Nancy Slonim Aronie. The lovely people at New World Library have been sending me books to review for years, and this one came in the mail recently. I’ll have more on it soon, but it definitely looks like a valuable addition to the essay writer’s library.
Workshops in England and France
Information, including dates and cost, for our 2025 England workshops is now listed on our website. And heads up! The deadline for early-bird discount was November 1 (but if you beg and grovel we might give you an extension to the 15th). We’ve had several writers indicate strong interest in joining and a couple of sign-ups already, so we recommend registering soon.
We’ll also be returning to France, and though we don’t have exact info for 2025 up yet, you can read about 2024 here.
And if you want a taste of the adventure that awaits, you can read my posts about this year here, and here, here, here, and here.
Other places to connect with me:
My website (badly in need of an upgrade)
Our workshop website
My original blog (now for archive purposes only, no longer updated)
Ways I can help you:
Curious about the origins of this phrase, I consulte wikipedia, who tells me, “it is a phrase often uttered by computers, robots, and other artificial intelligences in popular culture. The phrase indicates a type of cognitive dissonance on the part of the machine in question.”
I'm trying!