Monday Miscellany: Pretending to be a chatbot who writes erotica for some guy named Dave
Notes from June 29 - July 5
Hello and happy July, friends! I’m writing from the library today, because (trumpet fanfare) a carpenter came to the house this afternoon to begin reconstruction work on our dining room and office!! Everybody pour one out for this gaping hole,1 because hopefully it won’t be around too much longer.
In other news, it’s been quite hot here. I recently started a 5k training program on my Garmin watch and let me tell you, I’m feeling awesome about that decision right now. Thank goodness for days off, when I can get up early and get my run in before the heat gets too bad, but also a humid 85 degrees at 8am is still pretty brutal.
Quick reminder: for a couple more days, until July 8, I’m offering $1 off per month for your first year of paid subscription! If this newsletter brings you joy each week and you would like to help tangibly support it, now’s your time.
The week in books
Bone Horn by Prudence Bussey-Chamberlain (June 30, 2026)
I was hoping to talk about this one last week ahead of its release, but I didn’t quite finish it in time. On the plus side, it’s out now!2 The research fixation and literary investigation angle was what initially drew me in—the description sounded like a fictional spin on My Autobiography of Carson McCullers by Jenn Shapland, a memoir-slash-biography that I loved a few years ago. And while Bone Horn has much more of a noir energy to it, that comparison is not totally off base.
When the story opens, our unnamed narrator is grieving the sudden death of her partner and raising her young child alone, having recently left a toxic job in academia to open her own detective agency. The first call she receives as a new private investigator is from an anonymous client who offers a nice payout if she can definitively prove that Gertrude Stein’s partner, Alice B. Toklas, had a horn. (Yes, a literal horn, protruding from her forehead.) So the book is about that quest, which takes the narrator from Paris to San Francisco and back again, with some steamy encounters along the way,3 but we’re also following her internal journey through grief and early motherhood. There is eventually an answer to the horn question, but the pace is slow and the focus more on vibes than plot. I enjoyed the writing, which occasionally caught me off-guard with its aptness and poetry:
She talked like bagpipes, a murmuring back note continuously sounding against the melody of words. (88)
Canon by Paige Lewis (May 19, 2026)
I picked up this debut novel because it’s the July selection for Gretagram book club, but reluctantly, because (sorry!) it sounded boring to me: an epic tale, in which God reveals himself to one of our main characters, Yara, and instructs them to find and kill Dominic, leader of the Bad Guys. A hero’s journey, to assassinate an anonymously evil war criminal? Not my normal lane! Snooze!
But you guys, I was wrong. This is a modern, and funny, and self-aware story, completely unlike anything I’ve read before. It’s loosely set in the 1990s,4 but in some ways it feels fully and refreshingly outside of time. And pay no attention to how thick the book is—it goes by fast and is so much fun.
The writing is insightful:
They were suddenly giddy and full of dread. It was like teetering between the delight of finding a single blue jay feather and the dismay of stumbling upon a clump of blue jay feathers. (4)
It would be nice, she thought, to stay in this moment for a lifetime. By wishing it to expand into infinity, Adrena prevented herself from enjoying the actual moment. (347)
And there are so many excellent facts, many of which are about animals:
When happy, rats also do something called boggling, which is hard to describe, but it involves wiggling—yes wiggling—their eyes. (180)
The Greek words for camel and rope were nearly indistinguishable. Knowing this made that thing in the Bible—about how a rich man getting into heaven was as likely as a camel fitting through the eye of a needle—make a lot more sense. A mistranslation. A rope through the eye. (380)
I haven’t even mentioned the giant talking whale, or the island of garbage, or the prophet Adrena, who can make things disappear by singing about them. Or the chapter written completely in haiku form, which you know I ate right up. The fighting you’d expect from a classic epic indeed shows toward the end, but it has an almost video game feeling to it that makes the gore easier to bear, and the battle scene doesn’t last too long.5 All in all I was really pleasantly surprised by this novel and I can’t wait to discuss it in book club later this month.
Perverts by Mac Crane (July 7, 2026)
I requested this short story collection on NetGalley6 because I’ve been meaning to read this author for quite some time—both of their previous books, I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself (2023) and A Sharp Endless Need (2025), were well-reviewed by friends whose reading taste I trust. Concept-wise, these pieces run the gamut. A few characters work atypical jobs, like purposely getting injured at an interactive theme park for homophobes, or selling used panties online, or pretending to be a chatbot who writes erotica for some guy named Dave, or sleeping in bed with a married couple and the next morning convincing the hungover husband that they had a threesome. There are also some unexpected magical details sprinkled in, like a child born after the protagonist finds an egg in their underwear drawer and sits on it for thirty days. The narrative voice doesn’t always feel super distinct from story to story, but I enjoyed the collection all the same. It’s queer and dark and strange, with some Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah and George Saunders flavor, not necessarily horror in itself, but perfect for fans of that genre.
Right now and upcoming
I’ve just started reading my early copy of a favorite author’s new novel whose release date passed me by last month (oops), and then I have a soon-to-be released nonfiction lined up, and maybe some poetry from my unread shelf after that.
How about you? What are you reading?
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This week on screen
I Love Boosters (2026)
Based on the trailer, I went in thinking this would be a brightly-colored comedy with some heist energy, and it definitely is that—but also oops, suddenly I’m trying to wrap my head around the specifics of teleportation, and tearing up about global unions and worker solidarity?! How unexpected, how interesting! I Love Boosters is ridiculous and funny, a visual feast, and a scathing takedown of capitalism and the rich. Oh yeah, and there are stop-motion animated people with no skin. In the end I felt kinda like I did after Everything Everywhere All at Once: overwhelmed, confused, and emotional, but very here for it.
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (2026)
Come for the continuation of the 28 Years Later story, stay for the morphine-fueled bromance between Dr. Kelson (Ralph Fiennes) and Samson the alpha zombie (Chi Lewis-Parry)! This installment mostly follows a tiny cult of blond wig-wearing agents of Satan who all go by the name Jimmy, so things get pretty violent and gory at times. I definitely watched a few of the gnarliest moments through a hard squint. But ultimately it’s worth it for the one scene where Fiennes performs Iron Maiden’s “The Number of the Beast” while cosplaying as the literal devil. Cinema. 🤌🏼
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
I’m back on my blu-ray watching grind!7 The recent heatwave had me hiding out inside with the lights low for several days, so what better to do than play a movie and slug it up on the couch? This is an all-timer, possibly my favorite of Wes Anderson’s efforts if I absolutely had to choose (but please don’t make me choose). There’s something about the squandered potential of the Tenenbaum children, all too relatable for a former “academically gifted” student such as myself. And the quirkiness, the messy family dynamics, the iconic soundtrack, the bittersweet yet hopeful ending, the infinitely quotable lines… it’s all truly chef’s kiss.
Call Me By Your Name (2017)
Okay, we are for sure out on Armie Hammer, and Timothee Chalamet hasn’t been the most likeable public figure lately either, BUT I’d argue that this film remains incredible. It was my selection for day two of heatwave because in my mind it just feels like summer—long days in Italy, riding bikes and swimming and reading tattered paperbacks on chaise longues in the heat. Oh, the light-colored fabrics! The early-80s analog vibes! The sexual awakening! The absolute Sufjan Stevens heartbreak! The way Elio’s dad talks to him after Oliver is gone and he’s realized the depth of their relationship is truly parenting done right. So sad, so tender. It gets me every time.
Haiku round-up
This poetic form, containing seventeen syllables in a five-seven-five pattern, originated in Japan. I’ve been writing one each day since the beginning of 2024 as an exercise in structured creativity. Here are this week’s poems:
Monday, June 29
Head to toe yellow a monochromatic room like swimming in light
Tuesday, June 30
We bid you farewell Sunset for a day, a month, a friend moving on
Wednesday, July 1
Our sushi lunch date, improved by a chance meeting Raw fish and friendship
Thursday, July 2
Turn discouragement into absurd comedy That’s how we survive
Friday, July 3
Radiohead’s wrong Nothing is in its right place I long for normal
Saturday, July 4
We will celebrate veggie dogs and sauerkraut and time together
Sunday, July 5
Sports commentary consisting of such gems as “I hate that guy’s hair”
Until next time
I’ll leave you with the view from my spot at the library overlooking our downtown. A summer storm rolled through as I was sitting here writing, and the soft patter of raindrops on the window was truly next-level ASMR. I wouldn’t be mad if the distant rumbling and the drizzle continued into the evening…
See you next week, and until then, do ya wanna talk about parallel parking??
♥︎ Emily
P.S. If you especially enjoyed today’s newsletter but a paid subscription isn’t possible:
This is a sentence I don’t think I’ve ever said before.
Thank you, Soft Skull Press, for my finished copy!
Prepare yourself for at least one surprisingly poignant description of fisting. (Another sentence I’ve definitely never uttered.)
One scene takes place in a shopping mall. 🥲
Am I the only one who FULLY doesn’t care about fight scenes in literature or film? I literally fall asleep at that point in the Marvel movie every time, with the single exception of Black Panther.
Thanks to The Dial Press / Penguin Random House for granting me access! Find it wherever you get your books starting tomorrow, July 7.
As with books, my gathering instinct has outpaced my rate of consumption, so there’s quite an accumulated stack to watch through at this point.