So We Read On
On bad dates, the power of Gatsby and writer's therapy
I have two things that I need to talk about.
One is the film Drop. A movie about a woman who receives a series of anonymous airdropped instructions to kill her date.
Drop is the reason I have AMC A-list. This movie has three brain cells, and I mean that absolutely as a complement. Drop asked nothing of me but to lock in and enjoy the ride. I squirmed in my seat. I laughed. I questioned every single decision both Meghan Fehy and Brandon Sklenar made.
This was the worst date in the history of dates. Though maybe tied with my date where the man told me he’s often typecast as a Nazi, starred in a Chinese propaganda film and made a plan to sneak into North Korea with his buddies (tho i have been dining out on this story for years and this is only half of it).
The wildest thing about Drop though is that I recognized Meghan Fehy’s child from Instagram, but I gaslit myself into thinking it could not possibly be him because the Instagram child is Irish.
Come to find out, the movie was shot in Ireland… for CHICAGO ??? Someone who can do something about this should really start improving film tax credits in the US. We have to stop this (like i liked the brutalist but it felt european because! it was filmed! in hungary!).
The other thing I need to talk about–
The hardest thing about being single is that it’s expensive. I am single handedly paying all my bills, which on one hand is like go-off independent queen, but on the other hand, I finally FINALLY ordered a new bookshelf and had to get real with myself about needing to pay extra for a task rabbit to assemble this thing because I am physically too small to maneuver it. And that fucking! sucks! (also, just as an aside, everything in this world was built for someone taller than me and i feel that every day).
Some Things—
1923 season 1 had me HIGH (the adventure, the love story), but then season 2 brought me…. real l o w. i will never watch another taylor sheridan show again, i can tell you that much. like, what was the POINT? the fucking journey??? k, bro (i begged my friend’s parents at passover dinner to save themselves and not watch the rest of it. i fear my fevered insistence only made them want to watch it more).
speaking of brandon sklenar, he is getting the roles that used to go to garrett hedlund (garrett hedlund, where you at? according to imdb he’s been working non stop but… why haven’t i seen him then? also, brandon sklenar is my new god, for better and worse… see above)
i made pesto with carrot tops and it was, in a word, delicious (i ate it on toast and in a bean salad)
i walked by a girl sitting on a bench in front of a boxing gym reading sweetbitter and if she would have made eye contact with me, i would have gushed about it to her (it’s a big fave)
i saw mr. big (chris noth) at a very normie bar on melrose, and i’m like does this mean anything? am i supposed to be heeding a message here?
we had a mini heatwave in LA, and i’m now obsessed with making my own iced green tea (even tho it’s cold and cloudy again)
i’m confused by kerry washington’s recent roles, like why is she doing these nothing action movies? i guess sometimes a girl just wants to have fun and get a paycheck but… she can do better
sometimes you don’t know what your horoscope means until the end of the day (see drop)
it’s absolutely cuckoo bananas that in the city of los angeles, hollywoodland itself, premieres for feature films are taking place at the amc theatres at the grove (worse still — the amc theatres at century city)
carrie sotto is back is in development with serena williams producing, praise be! (it’s hard to rank this series of taylor jenkins reid novels bc i love them so much but boy did i love carrie sotto!)
three people in the last two weeks have asked me for london recs and i love that i have lots to give! (it doesn’t look like i’m taking another trip to london this year but never say never…)
What I’m Reading
Ann Patchett’s Friday “if you haven’t read this book, it’s new to you” post last week was about The Great Gatsby, a book you would think everyone on the planet has read but you would be wrong! The reason she picked it is because it was published one hundred years ago last week and just hearing her talk about it… I teared up. It’s one of the most perfect books ever written, and I feel less cliche saying that now that I know Ann Patchett feels the same way.
It’s also national poetry month, so I requested a couple poetry books from the library, including a collection by Jimmy Stewart that the library system recommended for me — their algorithm is extremely on point.
Mayluna by Kelley McNeil - I’ve started yet another rock star romance. This one is set in the 90s but framed by the rock star telling the story of the relationship to a journalist while his former flame tells the story to her children. Why aren’t they together now??? All the usual reasons I’m sure, but I’m always down for the ride.
So We Read On: How The Great Gatsby Came to Be and Why It Endures by Maureen Corrigan - In talking about Gatsby’s anniversary, Ann Patchett also recommended this book, which was already on my shelf. I immediately pulled it down and started reading. Well, consuming is probably more accurate. I’m flying through this in a way I have with a nonfiction book before (excluding memoirs).
I’ve been obsessed with the Fitzgeralds for…. I don’t know, my whole life? Or since Sophomore year of highschool when I read Gatsby for the first time. I’ve read all of Fitzgerald’s other books (including the not finished the last tycoon) except for his first and have read Gatsby two or three more times.
On a line level, Gatsby goes so hard. Like—
No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart.
I mean… Jesus Christ. Punch me in the stomach why don’t you.
Anyway, I’ve never noticed there was an epigraph at the beginning of Gatsby—
Then wear the gold hat, if that will help move her;
If you can bounce high, bounce for her too,
Till she cry “Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover,
I must have you!”
As I was learning that it existed, I also learned that this is not a real poem! And is attributed to a character from Fitzgerald’s first book, This Side of Paradise. Making up your own epigraph… what a little stinker.
Also apparently Fitzgerald was a notoriously bad speller. It’s so nice to know that I am in very good company on this one.
Books I recently added to my Want to Read list on Goodreads:
Maggie; or, A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar by Katie Yee - First of all, how great is this title? It's about a woman who learns her husband is having an affair and then learns she has a tumor – she names it after the other woman, Maggie, and starts talking to it. (out in july)
The Wilderness by Angela Flournoy - A friendship story about five women figuring out adulthood, following them from the early 2000s to the 2020s. Extremely for me! (out in september)
What I’m Writing
I’ve started listening to a new podcast called Pen Pals, hosted by two women in the throes of writing their novels. The podcast started at the beginning of the year so I’ve been listening to their backlog, and it’s become a sort of writer’s therapy for me. Just a couple of gals who get IT, yapping about what they’re writing and why they’re not writing and what goals they have for their writing — relatable!
In the first episode they talk about how patronizing it feels when someone who isn’t a writer asks them, “how is the novel going?” because it makes it seem like it’s some dumb little hobby and not actually their entire life’s ambition (lol!!! big mood!!!).
In another episode, they talked about the inevitability of writing about people you know – and in So We Read On, Maureen Corrigan talks a lot about this with Gatsby and Fitzgerald, who heavily drew inspiration from the people around him. On the podcast they wonder, do you have to tell them ahead of time? Do you have to give them a warning? — “This maybe seems like you, but it isn’t actually you!”
Anyway, I personally have yet to give anyone a heads up. If they think they appear in my work, it’s not wholly them. Only one person has ever said, “I’m in this and I don’t like it,” and they play a small part and come off well so I ignored this feedback entirely.
Dispatches from Novel land:
the voice of the second main character in novel 3 popped into my head on the way to work last week and i wrote a scene for them in my notes app at stoplights (not safe, do not recommend — but i had to get it down!!!)
i received yet another query rejection on novel 2 (tho on the pen pals podcast they pointed out that it’s not a real rejection unless they actually read the novel, and i’m gonna hang on to that to make myself feel better)
i had an idea for a novel 1 rewrite and rewrote the first scene in the notebook i thought i’d be writing novel 3 in. the brain works in mysterious ways! am i actually going to rewrite novel 1??? MAYBE! idk. it might just be a writing exercise
That’s all from me this week! Stay tuned.
