March 2024: Q&A with Amy Eskind, Author of Vote! ☀️
Plus, Paul Murray's novel Bee Sting, and Leslie Jamison and Saluika Jaouad's memoirs
Dear Writers,
The sun is shining longer, the air is getting warmer and spring is almost here. Yay!
My friend, the journalist and photographer Amy Eskind, just published a book, Vote! A Guide for Young Adults. Amy was interviewed on a local NPR station; you can listen to the interview here. We also have a great Q&A with Amy below.
I just finished Paul Murray’s novel, The Bee Sting, shortlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize. The novel is 656 (!) pages long. It initially felt like a long haul and then accelerated at a fast and furious pace. The story is about an affluent Irish family on the verge of losing everything and the secrets they keep. The book is told from the points of view of preteen PJ, teenage Cass, mother Imelda and father Dickie. Dickie and Imelda’s stories are gripping. The story covers infidelity, homophobia, blackmail, running a car business, life at Trinity College Dublin, and reconciling the challenges of love, lust, marriage and parenting. The ending is unnervingly ambiguous. Like the endings of many great stories, you’ll want to discuss it. If you liked Lauren Groff’s Fates and Furies and Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, you may love Bee Sting. Review here.
I’m toggling between reading Leslie Jamison’s memoir, Splinters: Another Kind of Love Story (excerpt here), a story about the breakdown of Jamison’s marriage as she stays sober, goes on a book tour, and nurses her baby, and listening to Suleika Jaouad’s memoir, Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life Interrupted. I have mixed feelings about Splinters—this territory was covered more poetically by Mary Karr in Lit, but Splinters is an addictive read, with lean, luscious insights into writing and parenting.
I love Suleika Jaouad’s Substack, The Isolation Journals, but struggled to finish her memoir. A friend suggested listening to it instead. Jaouad narrates and it is wonderful to hear her read her sad, funny, beautifully-written story about her battle with acute myeloid leukemia. Jaouad’s husband is musician Jon Batiste.
Why did you write this book?
The 2016 presidential election really surprised me. I had a hard time believing that 40 percent of the electorate didn’t participate and help choose the next president of the United States. They just didn’t vote. I am a journalist and curious by nature. In 2017, I drove across the country to talk to non-voters about why they didn’t vote. I learned a great deal, but one outsized takeaway was that the younger generation was turned off not just by particular candidates and campaign vitriol but by the whole political climate. They were bombarded with misinformation and conspiracy theories, and more importantly, they generally believed that their vote didn’t matter. They also believed that government doesn’t work for them, that nobody cares about their issues and solutions they favor, particularly about student loan debt, climate action, and reproductive healthcare. I wish they knew how much each individual vote does matter and that they can sway elections if they come out in large numbers. Turnout for the 2020 election was higher, but still half of young adults did not vote. I thought about what I could tell them that would inspire them to participate. For one thing, their votes absolutely do matter, and even in so-called “red” states and “blue” states, margins are slim enough that the election can go in an unforeseen direction – if more people vote.
Your book is just 31 pages long. Why write such a short book? What was your process?
I kept it short and inexpensive hoping young adults would actually read it. I have written op-Eds on the subject of non-voting ever since I made that trip. And yet, I had more things to say to young adults to encourage them to vote. (In 2020, half of young adults didn’t vote, and that was considered record turnout for that age demographic.) I kept saying that I would write a book aimed at young adults, but I didn’t make time to write it.
Then I had to have some painful oral surgery. I was home nursing my mouth and not in the mood to talk to anybody. Over the course of two days, I sat down at my computer and wrote the book with everything I had learned since 2016. I didn’t have an outline - all of my ideas just came pouring out. It’s a short book with 26 subheadings such as “Why does it matter so much if I vote? I’m only one person,” “I’ve heard my vote doesn’t matter because I live in a red state or I live in a blue state,” and “What if I don’t like any of the choices in an election?”
Of course, I had several additions and deletions and edits over the next several weeks. I gave a digital copy to some young adults to read and comment on it. (They said I was too preachy and I adjusted accordingly!)
What was your process?
I have been a freelance journalist for almost 40 years, most recently for People, and so I write regularly. I write op-Eds frequently and send them to large newspapers around the country. It’s very competitive and most of my work doesn’t see the light of day, but when I do get an op-Ed published I feel like I’ve made a real impact. I know people read op-Eds because they comment.
I don’t have a specific time of day that I write and I don’t journal. I read the news every day from several sources, I listen to political podcasts, and I listen to audiobooks. I’m always thinking of new angles to address issues.
I self-published this book because I wanted to get it out fast. I hired a book designer who was also responsible for getting it up on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Walmart online, as well as Ingram Spark for libraries and schools.
It was a significant investment, and so far I have not recouped the expense but I’m just getting started. Since I have to market the book myself, I have been writing op-Eds (Young Wisconsin Voters Can Sway Elections and Young Tennesseans are Discouraged by Politics, But They Need to Engage to Make Change) pertaining to specific states where young adults are least likely to vote or where young adults could make the most difference if they turn out this year. I was recently interviewed by a local NPR (KPCW) program. I hope to reach more young adults with live events and appear as a guest on a wide range of podcasts as the election season draws more attention.
Jennifer Dorr-Moon has an essay coming out in Herstry in March.
Lisa Greene’s essay Where’s My Knife? (Eat, Darling, Eat) was the most popular story on the site in January.
Elissa Caterfino Mandel has an essay coming out in Kveller in June.
Judith Rabinor is performing at Generation Women April 30 and in the Long Beach Short Play Festival May 4.
Laura Weiss read her story, Healthy Smiles is the Place to Go, at Wayne Kral’s First Floor Walk Up reading series on February 26.
Our spring workshops start up again in April. Read about and register for them here.
We’re planning a 4-day, 3-night writing retreat on Long Beach Island (LBI)/the Jersey Shore this summer. Writers will stay at Daddy O’s in Brant Beach and the Sandcastle in Barnegat Light. We’ll meet for 3-hour workshops in the mornings, then spend the afternoons paddleboarding, kayaking, sunbathing, bike riding, walking the jetties, and writing. We’ll meet for dinner each night. What dates work for you?
Making Their Mark: Works from the Shah Garg Collection. Huge, glorious, multi-floor exhibit of women artists, collected by tech entrepreneur Komal Shah. (Through March 23, 548 West 22nd Street.)
Sarah Sze, Crisscross 2021
Tschabalala Self, Sisters, 2021
Vija Celmins, Winter, Matthew Marks Gallery. Gorgeous collection of paintings, so meticulously detailed they resemble photographs. (Through April 6, 522 West 22nd Street.)
Vija Celmins, Falling Star, 2016
Anatomy of a Fall: Fabulous thriller about the death of a man who falls from the attic of his chalet in the Alps. This is also a quietly explosive story about the marriage of two writers. Extraordinary performance by Sandra Hüller as the widow and more successful writer. Review here.
