Back, Slightly Dazed

Notes from book tour, a few spots left in Scotland, and what comes next

I came home from book tour with a suitcase full of dirty clothes, a camera roll of faces — some familiar, some new — and the strange disorientation that follows weeks of being both very public and very alone: onstage under bright lights one hour, eating a room-service salad with a plastic fork the next.

A book begins in solitude. Notebooks filled with marginalia, research rabbit holes, long stretches of silence. But once it goes out into the world, it starts to belong to other people. That’s one of the shocks and pleasures of publication. A novel may be written by one person (or, in my thriller life, two), but it becomes fully itself in conversation. Readers absorb it, argue with it, bring their own histories to it, and sometimes find meanings the writer didn’t know were there.

This tour reminded me that literary culture isn’t an abstraction. It’s alive in bookstores, libraries, restaurants, community rooms, wineries, historic houses, museums, and 55+ communities. Readers show up before the event starts and are soon deep in conversation with the people around them. They bring marked-up copies, family stories, hard questions, and branded tote bags. Every audience has its own personality — some literary and analytical, some warm and confessional, some there for the history, some with questions about character and plot.

All over the country and back to NYC

What struck me most were the book clubs. They’re proliferating: neighborhood clubs, genre clubs, one-night-only clubs built around a visiting author. They’re more serious than the publishing industry gives them credit for. Not peripheral to literary culture. They are literary culture.

Independent booksellers and librarians are cultural bellwethers. They know their communities in ways publishing cannot. Publishers are in the business of selling what they have; booksellers and librarians are in the business of learning what people actually want. They see what people read and talk about with conviction. They see what’s shifting before the larger machinery swings into gear.

A Good Friend, a Wonderful Book

One pleasure of the past few years has been my growing friendship with John Searles, who makes the literary world feel funnier and more generous. His new novel, Single Girls, set in the world of women's magazines in the 1960s, has everything I've come to expect from his work: wit, sharp social observation, and a keen eye for the bargains people make in order to become who they want to be. Preorder here.

Celebrating our spring/summer books together (with Thomas Caruso, Marlon James and Nicholas Boggs!)

It’s a Go! Scotland 2027

Next June I’m leading a writing retreat in Scotland with UpTrek retreats, and only a few spots remain.

UpTrek curates artist-led experiences in extraordinary locations, crafting intimate creative retreats that invite writers and artists to deepen their practice, explore new ideas, and return home with skills that last a lifetime. During our time together, we’ll write, walk, talk about craft, and allow space for the kinds of connections (in our work, with the landscape, with each other) that daily life so rarely permits.

When I’m preparing to teach, I often return to Katherine Chen’s observation that a workshop is not really about what has already been written, but about what comes next: “In every workshop, there is an element of futurity. It’s an open question, a story without an ending. What will happen next?”

Scotland is one of my favorite places. Stone, water, fog, heather: the stark beauty of a landscape that refuses to soften its sharp edges. My father’s ancestors are from there; every time I return I feel connected to some old, half-known part of myself.

My husband, David, and I exploring Scotland's wild and ancient beauty

If you have questions about the June 2027 retreat, there are a few ways to learn more about UpTrek and what they’re all about: (here)

• Email: contact@uptrek.com
• Through their website contact form: https://uptrek.com/contact
• Instagram DM: @uptrekcom

And, of course, you’re always welcome to email me directly with any questions!

I’m keeping the group small—just 16 writers—and reserving your spot is simple: once you claim your place, you’re in. In the meantime, may this poem by Scottish artist Ian A. Olson inspire you, as it does me:

The Scribe Under the Trees

In the trees above me
The blackbird sings
As I sit here at my table
With my books and my writing things.

A cuckoo cries out to me
From his bush, with a grey hood.
Oh, dear God, how happy I am,
Writing here, under the great wood.

from Facing the Persians (Tellforth Publishing, 2017)

A Smoothie for Summer

This spring my husband, David, and I moved to a new neighborhood on the Upper West Side with the best sidewalk fruit-and-vegetable vendor I’ve ever met. One day this week, David came home with a whole assortment of fruit — more than the two of us could eat. So I peeled and cut a lot of it and froze the pieces in a single layer on parchment, and we’ve had smoothies ever since. Here’s my favorite:

1 frozen banana, sliced
½ cup frozen mango
½ cup frozen papaya
½ frozen pear, cored and sliced
¼ to ⅓ cup cherry juice
½ to ¾ cup water, coconut water, or milk
Optional: a squeeze of lime or lemon
Optional: a spoonful of Greek yogurt — I like unsweetened, but flavored works too

Blend until smooth. No ice needed; the frozen fruit does the work. Cherry juice adds sweetness, and lime keeps it tart.

From chunky to smoothie!

Upcoming Events through 2026

I have a week of events in Maine this summer, followed by festivals, conferences, bookstore visits, and book clubs across the country. I’d love to see you somewhere along the way. You can find the full schedule with details (through June 2027, updated weekly) on my website.

July 8 — Springvale Public Library x Nasson Little Theatre, Springvale, ME
July 9 — Book signings in Portland; Left Bank Books, Belfast, ME
July 10 — Bangor Public Library, Bangor, ME
July 13 — Barnswallow Books, Rockport, ME
July 21 — Mount Desert Island High School, Bar Harbor, ME
August 11 — College of the Atlantic “Coffee & Conversation” w Cynthia Baker (ME)
September 10 — The Headliners Club, Austin, TX (virtual)
September 25–28 — Aspen Literary Festival
September 28 — #YeahYouWrite Reading Series, Brooklyn
September 30 — Roots & Wings Annual Luncheon
September 30 — Montclair Golf Club book dinner
October 4 — The Mount “Writers & Readers Forum,” Lenox, MA
October 8–10 — SheWrites Keynote, Palm Springs, CA
October 14 — Auburn Oil Co., AL (two events)
October 15–18 — Southern Festival of Books
November 1–8 — Kaua’i Writers Conference
November 10 — Books on Third book club, Naples, FL (virtual)
November 24 — Killer Author Club (virtual)

What I’m Reading

Two books currently on my nightstand are The Wedding People, which is quirkier than I expected (in the most delightful way), and Melvin Patrick Ely’s A Terrible Intimacy, a rigorous, unsettling history of interracial life in the slaveholding South. Ely’s central argument cuts close to something I explored in The Foursome: one of the most appalling truths about American slavery is that white slaveholders could recognize, on an intimate level, the humanity of the people they enslaved and still remain willing, even eager, participants in the system.

I’m gathering my midsummer reading material now. What are you reading now and loving? Let me know in the comments.

xo Christina