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Hi, Jenn. These recent children's imprints closings have been really sad. Is there anything we, as authors and readers, can do, aside from buying more children's/YA books?

No, and yes. No, you aren't going to stop corporate mergers. Yes, you CAN help the book industry more generally!

While some books are just straight up bestsellers that do not need your help to thrive, I'd say 90% of books and authors are hurting for attention, tbh -- and that probably includes some of your favorites. Media is so fractured / silo'ed and people are so distracted, discoverability is a huge challenge for authors.

So yes by all means please DO buy books! Give them as gifts! Pass them out to your friends! And enemies! But also: TALK ABOUT THEM! Start a book club! If you are on a budget? Use your library! Request titles they don't have! (For ebooks and audiobooks, too! Check out OverDrive and Libby!) Write reviews of books you love, or talk them up on social media!

(To paraphrase RuPaul: If we bookworms don't buy and read and talk about books, how in the hell can we expect anyone else to? CAN I GET AN AMEN UP IN HERE?)

ALL THAT BEING SAID: Imprints being bought/sold/closed etc has little to do with individual readers. Your buying three extra copies of your fav book is not going to affect an international multi-million/BILLION dollar corporation merging or divesting assets or whatever -- those kinds of decisions are above our pay grade as authors / readers / the general public! (Anyway, a publisher may be sold not because it ISN'T doing well and the owner is trying to get rid of it -- but because it is doing VERY well and a larger company wants it! Or for some other reason, something something shareholders, who knows!)

Think about it this way: You throwing your water bottle in the correct bin is good, but it's not going to stop climate change. CORPORATIONS need to stop it, GOVERNMENTS need to stop it -- your individual contribution is nice, by all means keep reducing, reusing, recycling, but it isn't YOU that is the real problem or the solution, actually. You can help not make it worse! You can rally for change and join groups and encourage corporations to make that change with your voice, your votes, etc. You can bring attention to it in whatever ways you are able! But it's not up to you as an individual to actually do the heavy part of the world-saving.

In much the same way: Getting more people to buy more books is actually a much bigger problem than your buying an extra paperback or tweeting alone can solve. It has to do in part with changing the CULTURE, with figuring out how to get all of our attention spans back, with getting kids to pick up books for fun instead of their phones, with valuing education, etc.

MOST IMPORTANTLY, IMO, the publishing industry and authors and everyone else in the country, quite frankly, would be greatly helped by investing more in teachers and libraries rather than de-funding and criminalizing them, with stopping the book banning madness that is happening, and with PLEASE GOD not letting "Project 2025" become a reality! So if you are concerned with any of these issues, do make the changes in your own life, and do use your voice, your VOTES, whatever you can do to bring attention to the issues -- join and support advocacy groups like Authors Against Book Bans, donate, yell about it! But ultimately it's going to have to be the government, and monied and powerful major entities (including corporations... like publishers!) that are going to have to step up to REALLY enact change. What you can do is show them by word and deed that you WANT that change.

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Lemme tell you a gay little story about an eagle.

Our town (~9,000 people) has a couple garages, but there's a big one on the main drag. My family has been going there for decades. I drive past it every day.

There used to be a huge pine tree on the corner of their lot, but last year it became a hazard and had to be taken down.

Shortly thereafter I drive by and see they've hired a guy to chainsaw sculpt the stump into a bald eagle.

Birds own my heart, but nationalism makes me twitchy. I withhold outright condemnation of the eagle, but I'm skeptical. (The original owner—an objectively Good Dude—sold the business to a younger couple a few years ago, and I don't have any knowledge of their whole deal.)

Then it turns out someone on staff is really into making costumes for the eagle. Every holiday. Every month. Stuffed turkey, witch costume, menorah headpiece, bunny ears. These people love to dress their bird.

The changing of the eagle suit becomes a source of joy every time I drive through town.

Until June, when the eagle is bare.

Now look, maybe I'm expecting too much asking my garage to celebrate Pride. But this is a small town. Every time I drive by that stupid eagle—this thing that has previously brought me so much joy—I feel hurt. I feel reminded that there are plenty of people in my liberal bubble who don't consider my community worthy of celebration. I drive to work, I feel bad. I drive home, I feel bad. The eagle is mocking me.

Then my A/C quits working.

So I book an appointent to bring my car in—and realize what I have to do.

I pick all this up at a thrift store for under ten bucks. I print the shirt with some weird heat-transfer fabric crayons I find in a cupboard. I loop gold elastic around the sunglasses and pray they'll fit on the eagle's head. (It is also important to draw your attention to the price of the feather boa.)

(Nice.)

My reasoning is thus: if I show up with a complete costume ready to go, someone will have to look me in the eye and say "We don't believe in that," at which point I'll be finding a new garage. But if they let me dress the eagle, then people in town get to have the joy I've been missing since the start of the month.

I listen to a lot of hype-up jams on my way over. I hate confrontation. I also don't wanna have to find another garage. I want to believe that this decision isn't actively antagonistic, but I'm not particularly hopeful.

I talk through the A/C issue with the guy at the desk, hand over my keys, then take a deep breath.

"Who's in charge of the eagle?"

"Oh, that's all Dylan. Second bay from the end."

I walk down the row of hydraulic lifts and find a disarmingly smiley middle-aged man pouring fluid through a funnel. I introduce myself and explain that, since the Pride parade is this Sunday and the eagle seems to be missing a costume, I have taken the liberty of making one myself, and can I get his blessing to go put it on?

Dylan grins this absolutely giant grin and goes

"Oh hell yeah."

So that's what's up now.

Happy Pride.

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The Bayocean Comic is up

Summer reading alert! The Town That Fell into the Sea is available to read on Lastwater!

In 2017, Justin Hocking and I went out to Tillamook to walk Bayocean Spit. Justin had read the Webber’s 1999 book on Bayocean about the washed away resort. He was struck hard. Being from Western Colorado, nothing motivates us like a tale of developers totally screwing up.

He started writing a script and I happily agreed to draw it when I had a moment. He also wrote, and we received, early in 2020, a project grant from RACC (the better to afford me a moment). The pandemic hit. Our expected publisher passed on the comic. Between 2020 and 2024, with no outlet or clear format, I restarted the comic eight times in eight different media combinations.

As I finished the show, Overlands, I swore I’d get TTTFITS done before anything else took me out. I settled on dark graphite, scanned to read in high contrast, both for ease in printing someday, plus also it felt the most Ashcan School.

In the meantime, Jerry Sutherland had been sharing research from his new book, Bayocean, The Atlantis of Oregon. His work uncovered many more reference images, and a darker truth to resonate against our make-believe story arc.

Maybe someday we will publish it in hard copy, but for now, no more delays. Here it is on Lastwater. Happy summer beach reading! Thank you RACC! Thank you Jerry!

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Sometimes you open up an old sketchbook and

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The Crane Wife by CJ Hauser

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Water infrastructure systems are best infrastructure systems.

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Before actual darkness hits, the light in the greenhouse becomes completely uncooperative. My numb little toesies think this is for the best. #studioshot #greenhouse

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Lucid dreaming? I drew on my arm during a dream to catch a quote from some guy in snow pants. We were in an airport. I can’t recall why he overheard me mention #intothinair Apparently drawing on my arm in a dream is a good way to fix a memory. . . #everest #nophotosplease #luciddreaming

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#beginnersarethebest #wildroseofthemountain #fiddler @cathedralparkmusic

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Printing cards during the @ateliermeridian Holiday print party. #reliefprint #newf #rabbit #christmastree (at Atelier Meridian)

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Hattie, Thanksgiving (charcoal on topographic map)

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The Tenderfeet Never Learn, #tbt #Colorado c. 2002, oil on sealed book (probably Jack London), 5” x 4” #englemannspruce

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Another patron postcard to go out. N Chataqua Ave, Portland, Oregon, morning, October. . . #portlandautumn

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Mark Andres talks about an etching by Tom Prochaska in the drawing show at Gallery 114 this month. Yes, an etching in a drawing show; it works, it makes sense, just go to there (through Dec 2). (at Gallery 114)

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Wrist Rocket, a portrait for a friend . . . #oilonlinen #portraitpainting #wristrocket (at Ona Beach State Park)

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@jenny_forrester grills authors Jay Ponteri, Chelsea Martin and Kerry Cohen on their familiarity with famous rejection letters during Hawthorne Books’ Authors v. Audience Trivia Challlenge. It regarded some silly book about pigs. I think the authors choked and the audience stole this one, though please correct me if I’m wrong. @literaryarts

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I don’t understand football quite this way, but I understand this sort of understanding. Chuck Klosterman was talking with Aaron Scott about football, life and the artifice of the celebrity interview. #wordstockpdx #opb @literaryarts @opbwonder (at Portland Art Museum)