🇨🇦 Janet Somerville

black lab and yellow lab curl up at opposite ends of a blue loveseat

TL cleanse with #PuckAndMartha

“The process of history repeating itself becomes pretty untenable when only men make history (and cretinous men at that).” ~Martha #Gellhorn

#InternationalWomensDay

black lab and yellow lab curl up at opposite ends of a blue loveseat

TL cleanse with #PuckAndMartha

“The process of history repeating itself becomes pretty untenable when only men make history (and cretinous men at that).” ~Martha #Gellhorn

#InternationalWomensDay

Abortion is healthcare. #InternationalWomensDay

On Bloody Sunday, John Lewis and the giants of the civil rights movement crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma to peacefully demand voting rights.

61 years later, we march in their footsteps to honor their legacy and celebrate the power of continuing the fight.

Wow, this looks like a cool job for the right person!

We do remember

2026 Shields Prize Jury Announcement YouTube video by The Carol Shields Prize for Fiction

Get to know the 2026 Shields Prize Jury.

Thank you Carmen Maria Machado (Jury chair), @ivancoyote.bsky.social , Cherie Dimaline, Chitra Divakaruni, and @deeshaphilyaw.bsky.social.

The longlist will be revealed on March 20!

youtu.be/x5KB_aFqSo4

It would be only fair to the reader to say frankly in advance that the attitude of any person toward this story will be distinctly influenced by his theories of the Negro race. If he believes that the Negro in America and in general is an average and ordinary human being, who under given environment develops like other human beings, then he will read this story and judge it by the facts adduced. If, however, he regards the Negro as a distinctly inferior creation, who can never successfully take part in modern civilization and whose emancipation and enfranchisement were gestures against nature, then he will need something more than the sort of facts that I have set down. But this latter person, I am not trying to convince. I am simply pointing out these two points of view, so obvious to Americans, and then without further ado, I am assuming the truth of the first. In fine, I am going to tell this story as though Negroes were ordinary human beings, realizing that this attitude will from the first seriously curtail my audience. W. E. BURGHARDT DU BOIS Atlanta, December, 1934

I'd forgotten how hard the preface to DuBois's "Black Reconstruction" (1934) went...and am saddened by how contemporary it still feels.

Everyone should not have to have a direct line to elected officials in order to ensure that we are not kidnapped by the government.

Once at a diner on the Upper West Side I overheard a French woman telling her friend that she only slept with married men, because the unmarried ones were too needy. Most French possible conversation. I swear I could hear La Marseillaise playing faintly in the distance …

A double daffodil—white back petals and frilly yellow cups with a second set of ruffles at the center. Glorious.

#FlowerReport The plum trees and the early magnolias are in full swing here in PDX along with the daffodils and the camellias and my heart leaps up to see it in spite of my longstanding quarrel with Wordsworth. Picked these out of the florist trash and put them in my buttonhole. They’re fragrant!

black lab & yellow lab swim in wavy lake on an overcast day

Puck & Martha love a windy, wavy day.

We could not produce TWFest without our dedicated volunteers, and we'd love for you to join us!

Volunteer benefits include a FULL WEEKEND LitPass ($100 value) and other event perks. Shifts are flexible, as are locations.

Learn more here: tennesseewilliams.net/support/beco...

Joyce Carol Oates tweet reading: Harold Bloom said lots of silly things. No need to make a movie out of any of them — in response to a tweet reading: Hamlet is not about grief, it's about what Harold Bloom called the invention of the human" — they should make a movie about that

okay we just need to get JCO on Bluesky and our journey to the dark side will be complete

Rob Reiner would have turned 79 today. He is missed.

This conversation with Rich Eisen — talking about directing Nicholson in “A Few Good Men” — is always a delight.

@richeisenshow.bsky.social

Drop everything and read this. You’ll thank me. It is a wonder — and why we read novels. @tayari.bsky.social @aaknopf.bsky.social

The reason she SHOULD have been fired.

How beautiful, Saeed. ♥️

A picture of me smiling with Tayari Jones, wearing a gorgeous brown leather dress and Jayne Anne Phillips wearing a black winter coat.

When I was an undergrad, I went to AWP for the first time. The book fair was a sea of white people. I was so lonely. But Jayne Anne Phillips — the director of a new MFA program at Rutgers-Newark — spotted me and sent Tayari Jones over to talk to me. Changed my life. Reunited with them last night.

Guardian US opinion: Good riddance to Kristi Noem. Her replacement won’t be an improvement.

I wrote about Kristi Noem’s exit from DHS. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

This simply doesn't seem all that far-fetched and needs to be investigated.

I'm only on chapter 3 and it's already heartbreaking. It's really interesting (especially bc I grew up in SoCal around the same time), but sad af & made me want to hurt the adults in her childhood. Not all memoirs should be read by the author, but Christina is an exceptional narrator.

Firing Kristi Noem is a late but necessary step in the work to hold ICE and CBP accountable for the damage they’ve done to our communities, and the lives lost and harmed because of their brutal tactics. Our fight isn’t over.

My profile of CHRISTINA APPLEGATE is the Culture cover in today's Toronto Star print edition.

YOU WITH THE SAD EYES is an extraordinary #memoir & Applegate is a remarkable person.

I hope you'll read her honesty missile-of-a-book.
@littlebrown.bsky.social

#ReadWomen #WorldBookDay

@justinevdl.bsky.social just joined Bluesky. Give her a follow and preorder UNREASONABLE WOMEN immediately. An extraordinary book everyone will be talking about this year.

Screenshot of an X post by Ounka reacting to a viral thread. The thread shows a photo of Donald Trump in profile with a red rash visible on his neck, with one commenter jokingly claiming the rash indicates something. The post includes social media engagement numbers beneath the comments.

Oh myyy! 😅

Democrats may not be able to prevent Mullin's confirmation, but they can certainly turn his track record of offense and stupidity into two days of televised humiliation so spectacular that he is wounded in Trump's eyes from day 1. That is the job.

black and white photo of woman with long blonde hair in a white t-shirt, hands tucked in jeans pockets

several colour photos of 1) Applegate with husband Martyn in Paris 2) Applegate with Will Ferrell in ANCHORMAN 3) Applegate at 6 or 7 years old in a handsewn lime green dance costume 4) Applegate with MARRIED... WITH CHILDREN co-stars 5) Applegate seated outside a house with her mother and daughter

My profile of CHRISTINA APPLEGATE is the Culture cover in today's Toronto Star print edition.

YOU WITH THE SAD EYES is an extraordinary #memoir & Applegate is a remarkable person.

I hope you'll read her honesty missile-of-a-book. @littlebrown.bsky.social #ReadWomen