It’s a paycheck AND an opportunity to live more intentionally — Let’s talk about this cultural obsession with “quitting your day job.” There is an attitude—propagated by those perky millennial solopreneurs who pay to insert themselves into your Instagram and Facebook feeds—that any creative person still working a day job isn’t ambitious or savvy enough to “make it.” This may be…

Jazz chanteuse Risa Branch on animal-rights activism, switching genres, and the healing power of music — “I don’t know any jazz singers apart from you,” I tell Risa Branch as we peruse the dinner menu at Farmacy Kitchen, a pop-up vegan restaurant in SoHo. “You’re a kind of time traveler.” She may look like a 21st-century New Yorker — hair in long locs, an intricate silver…

A closer look at the cognitive dissonance encoded in Charlotte’s Web — Last year one of my favorite librarians took on the “Newbery challenge”: reading, in order, every children’s novel that has won the John Newbery Medal since its inception in 1922. I lingered at the circulation desk, curious to hear how well the older prizewinners had aged. Juli Anna pulled a…

Thanks for your interest in joining our community! What we are looking for: cultural criticism (particularly literary, extra-particularly #kidlit, which inspired the name of this publication), “white learning” and vegan-oriented social justice, reflections and experiments on personal growth and creativity through a vegan lens, interviews with vegan artists, veganized heirloom…

A cautionary tale from a novelist who shouldn’t be writing full time — While I was living in New York in my early 20s — still a few years before Facebook and Twitter and Meetup — I’d sometimes browse the Craigslist activity-partner listings hoping to connect with other aspiring writers. The interactions that followed essentially amounted to platonic first dates, which could feel…

Connecting with readers by sharing snapshots from real life — It’s been more than a decade since social media became an essential part of an author’s job description, and after all this time I still feel like I’m doing it wrong — except on those days when a reader reaches out and the unavoidable time-suck momentarily feels worthwhile. Is it…

Hint: it’s a very good sign that this question has occurred to you — “I’m feeling generous today, so I’m going to give you a copy of my book,” the woman told us. “I’ll even sign it for you.” My colleague and I squirmed on our metal folding chairs as she autographed two copies of her self-published “novel,” which was only thirty pages long…

Try this hybrid novel-writing method and enjoy the benefits of careful planning AND creative euphoria — Now that the novelists among us are beginning to think about NaNoWriMo, posts on either side of the plotting-versus-“pantsing” debate are showing up more frequently in my social media feeds. Plotters are meant to be methodical, mapping out each scene of their narrative beforehand, while pantsers — from the expression…

A lesson in perseverance—and kindness—from one of my favorite authors — We were well into the new year, but my father’s Christmas tree was still standing in the family room. Home from New York for the weekend, I sat on the couch, maybe reading or maybe journaling — I just remember that I was moping. I was twenty-three years old and…