By Jessica Woodbury — Jul 19, 2022

Best So Far

I have not been writing much. Sorry about that.

This newsletter was a way to feel like I did not always have to Do Book Stuff All the Time, where I could just get kind of messy and honest instead of putting on the good face you tend to need to put on publicly because the book world is not all that big and you don't like to say you hated someone's book when that person follows you on Twitter and will see you say it. This was going to be a downgrade, part of doing less and stepping back.

But then I got a little sidetracked. Because I started writing a new thing. And it went great. Suspiciously great. I am not saying the THING is great, I am saying the doing of it was great. It felt good to sit down and work. I could pass hours. I was feeling like I was doing what I wanted to do. It was super weird but it was pretty wonderful. I am assuming it will never happen again and this is as good as it gets.

When the writing is going well, you just don't want to write other things. At least I don't. I wrote less in my journal. I think my Goodreads reviews haven't been as sharp. You could make the argument that even my emails suffered. It was like I could only do one thing.

So that is what I have been doing and why I have not been emailing you. The thing is currently between drafts so I am not writing it and I honestly feel kind of empty and I miss it. On Sunday morning I sat in my bed and thought of the long day before me where I had nothing at all to do and felt sad. From here I don't know exactly when it will get picked back up or if it will become an even better thing or if this will be as good as it gets. But I am pretty grateful for what I've gotten.

Anyway. I have still been reading. This week I decided to get back in the groove for a little bit and make a Best of the Year So Far list.

And because this is not Twitter I will divide it up into the Favorites and the Honorable Mentions because here everyone does not have to get that cleaned up version of everything. I have mentioned most of these here already even if I have been not that great about posting because they were good enough to deserve it.