Read. Write. Cook.
Welcome to my Read. Write. Cook. Substack style!
Mailchimp was getting complicated and lowering their max number of subscribers, so I’ve migrated.
But this is still READ. WRITE. COOK! The periodic newsletter offering good things to read, prompts for writing, and things to cook!
This newsletter is FREE for all subscribers.
AND as there is room for comments now, I hope folks will share how recipes worked for them, how their writing is going, things they’d like to see more of, and good books they’ve read!
This month, I’m most excited to share the cover reveal for my new book BLEAK HOUSES coming out from Raw Dog Screaming Press August 3rd! I included the spine because Lynne Hansen who designed it was harkening back to gold embossed fabric bindings of the nineteenth century and it looks so cool! Follow this link for the whole story! https://rawdogscreaming.com/cover-reveal-bleak-houses/
The cover features Wolf’s Lair, a mansion in the Hollywood Hills that Moby restored and then sold to “Anonymous” which was half of the inspiration for the story. It’s set during lockdown in Los Angeles, that strange, quiet time when we were all cut off from each other. The book launches RDS Press’s novella line edited by the fabulous RJ Joseph! I love the concept of this series: Selected Papers from the Consortium of Anomalous Phenomena and I’m absolutely honored to have written its inaugural book! My novellas Family Solstice and Safer are inside.
I’ll be promoting this book all over this summer and fall so keep an eye out! I’ll be reading with Charlie Jane Anders at SF in SF at the end of July (fangirling hard, see below), and at The Roar Shack come September. In the beginning of October, Lisa Morton and I will kick off the Halloween season at Village Well Books along with some other horror writers. Lisa will be launching her new book The Art of the Zombie Movie. I’ll also be sharing details about the novella Safer in Bleak Houses in coming newsletters. Stay tuned!
READ.
I bought a print copy AND am listening to Charlie Jane Anders’ craft book NEVER SAY YOU CAN’T SURVIVE and I’m urgently grabbing any writer of fiction I know and telling them to read it. I wish I had this book in 2020, although it was 2020 that prompted her to write this book in the first place. It is the most writer-affirming, idea-inspiring get off your butt and do it but be gentle with yourself treatise I’ve ever encountered that’s also filled with practical hacks and ways to get out of writer or story stasis. This is one of those craft books that may get pigeonholed as being for genre fiction, but I fully intend to teach it to all writers I work with from beginners to writers of realism, from college students to freelance writers. As many times as I tell writers I work with that drafting is a process and is hard and it doesn’t ever come out perfect on the first go, the way Anders puts it just cuts through so many of the wrongheaded ideas the publishing industry puts out there about what makes a writer successful. So if you need that push to get back to work, if you fight imposter syndrome on the daily, and if you’ve told yourself you can’t write in any way shape or form, get this book! And if you want that encouragement in real time and to be energized by her telling you you can, I highly recommend the audiobook!
Write.
Character questionnaire.
In my novel class, and when I’m writing a novel, we all seem to get stuck with characters at a certain level. We’ve written a basic idea of them, but can’t seem to get as deep as we know we will be several drafts of the novel later. I put together these questions to ask of my characters when they tend to sit on a page. This is more prewriting and you don’t have to answer each and every question, but sitting with a few of them tends to jar me out of character stasis and get to know them more deeply as people. I’ve used this exercise with college students working on second drafts of stories, and it seems to open things up for them as well.
So fill it out, it’s like your character’s own cosmo quiz (remember those?). Much like when we took those quizzes at fifteen, there are questions they may not be ready to answer, but even thinking about them may show you more about your characters than you knew! Remember, humans are wonderful and weird and have untold depths. See what these questions unearth in your characters.
1. Name one bad habit your character has. One that no one else knows about.
2. Name a special food treat your character likes more than anything. Is this treat readily available to them or do they have to seek it out? If it’s unavailable, how far will they go to seek it out?
3. What is your character’s ultimate idea of comfort?
4. Does your character lie easily? Why or why not? You can use insight into their background to project—this can be a ten minute exercise.
5. What is your character’s most strongly held belief?
6. What does your character declare to others is her/his most strongly held belief? Is it different from the belief they hold close to their heart?
7. Who or what does your character love most in the world? What is the thing most dear to them?
8. Who or what does your character hate most in the world?
9. Does your character feel like they have power and agency in their own life? What is keeping them from that power or when did they first get that power?
10. And, ask again, what is it your character most wants in the context of this story?
11. What does your character most NEED in this story. Are those two different things? How is one at odds with the other?
12. And what is preventing them from getting what they most want/need?
Cook.
Homemade spaghetti sauce.
Or a a good red sauce.
Or some in the northeast might call it “gravy.”
This is actually a recipe my husband taught me. His grandmother was a Maello, second generation Italian, so it’s in the blood. When we first shacked up, I was basically using my mom’s recipe which was sauté onions and garlic in olive oil and add a jarred sauce and some oregano (a tasty hack, so put that one in your pocket). I imagine it must have been horrifying for my husband to see me do this. He taught me how one properly builds a red sauce. Now we don’t do it any other way. He has a variation he uses for pizza, but this sauce is good for everyone.
If you have vegetarians living with meat eaters, you can sauté the sausages separately and add them after, but really it’s part of the amazing flavor, so if everyone eats meat, build it accordingly.
3 cloves garlic chopped
1 yellow onion minced
one red bell pepper, minced
1 tbsp oregano
olive oil
1 can tomato paste
1 can roma tomatoes crushed or whole (see blending section)
1 package italian sausages (5)—sweet or hot, up to your taste
1 cup red wine
Sauté onions in 3tbs olive oil until translucent, add garlic and bell pepper and sauté until soft. Clear a spot in the bottom of the pan, add a little olive oil if necessary, add can of tomato paste.
Sizzle the tomato paste for a spell, stir it, sizzle it again. you’re taking that raw paste taste out of it. Once you feel you’ve cooked it a bit, add the red wine and stir to deglaze the pan. (for the meat version, deglaze after browning meat and straining fat, see below). Add tomato sauce. Put oregano in the palm of one hand and rub your hands together over the pot to add the rest (it releases the flavors of the dried herb).
At this point, to make it smoother, I tend to use an immersion blender, (actual blender works but be careful blending hot liquids) but this isn’t necessary if you like it chunky. Simmer on low for at least an hour or pour the whole mess in a slow cooker and cook four hours on low.
In a separate pan you can fry up the sausage but honestly if everyone likes sausage, you can fry up the sausage FIRST in the sauce pot. Once it’s browned, cut into bits or slices and continue cooking until all pieces are brown. pull sausage out using slotted spoon and put aside. pour oil into empty tomato paste can and chill to dispose of (at least that’s a trick I found to keep grease in one place). If making meat sauce for everybody start at paragraph one at this point.
AFTER the sauce has simmered an hour or so (you will need to watch it and stir a lot if it’s stove top but feel free to ignore it if it’s in a slow cooker in which case slow cook three hours to all day on low) add sausage back in and let simmer for half an hour. around the time you want to serve you may want to skim the oil that’s come from the sausage from the top. If you’re serving the veggie variety you won’t have to worry about it.
In my experience the sausage and tinned tomatoes have plenty of salt, but you can salt to taste if you feel you need it.
Boil pasta according to instructions. We like spaghetti, but also rotini for maximum sauce impact. It’s seen below (clockwise) with gluten free corn pasta, tortellini, and ravioli. The tortellini is for the veggie, the GF for me and the very cheesy ravioli for our son.
Serve with a nice green salad with a bright dressing (we use balsamic) and sprinkle with parmesan as wanted.
Some flavor bombs: when we’re barbecuing in the summer, we’ll barbecue red bell peppers, peel them and store them in the freezer for a rich carmelized flavor. sometimes I roast garlic and do the same, it adds a greater depth to the sauce.
Books!
