Hi, internet pals. I don’t know where you live, but I live in Nashville, and let me tell you, I am not live-laugh-loving right now. This is a city in both mourning and cautious celebration. It’s been a lot to take in these past few weeks. I’ve tried to keep it fairly light in the links this week, although my heart is anything but. As always, thank you for being here and making space for me to air things out.
Xoxo,
Kim
• I’m new-ish to working with a personal stylist, so I was excited to profile Kina Monet for the Nashville Scene. We talk about Kina’s work, the origins of her love of vintage and her favorite places to shop. P.S. Kina can work with you virtually if you live outside Nashville.
• “I keep my eyes on the South for a lot of reasons. This is my home. It is the region of this nation’s original sin. Nothing about the future of this country can be resolved unless it is first resolved here,” writes Tressie McMillan Cottom for The New York Times.
• Good news for those of you who like to wait on the paperback release of your favorite books. Mary Laura Philpott’s latest book, Bomb Shelter, is now in paperback! (Bookshop.org)
• “For the past 10 days, following the Covenant School shooting here in Nashville, whenever I’ve noticed a small child—perhaps holding a parent’s hand, skipping happily—I’ve thought: There’s a kid who is not dead,” Susannah Felts writes in Silent Screams. (Substack)
• I’m late to the game, but I’m watching Shrinking on Apple TV+. I love it and it reminded me of this recent episode of Keep It where the guest is Jessica Williams. (Crooked)
• I’ve long been impressed by food writers and restaurant critics. What a fun and highly skilled job! I absolutely am not one, but I recently had the opportunity to write about one of my favorite appetizers at one of my favorite restaurants: 615 Chutney: Frankies 615. (Nashville Scene)
• Roxane Gay’s Audacious Book Club is reading Matthew Desmond’s new book, Poverty, by America. I love Roxane’s summary of why she chose this book and why she hopes more people will read it. (Bookshop.org, Substack)
• I have never been good at making cocktails, but I took a cooking class with Julia Turshen where we made key lime margaritas and now I can’t stop making them. You can rent the class here. (Momence)
• In Nashville, there is an Asian American Pacific Islanders (AAPI) writers meetup hosted by Yurina Yoshikawa. In her latest newsletter Yurina talks about window books vs. mirror books, how for much of her life, most of the stories she consumed, “have either been Japanese or White,” and her concerns about the lack of AAPI diversity in publishing. (Substack)
• An argument for being a little critter. (TikTok)
12 Responses
Thanks as always for a beautiful mix of reading, Kim. Sending you lots of light
Thinking of you and the Nashville community a lot these past few weeks. As a teacher of young children, my heart aches. Sending my love, and thank you always for your thoughtful Sunday posts.
Thank you for this list, Kim. Amazin article for sunday.
I love that Roxanne Gay has a book club! I didn’t know that. I look forward to checking it out.
I cannot afford to pay that much$ for a recipe. Sad.
Julia Turshen does so many great things for so many people. It’s fine that you aren’t willing to pay that price for a Margarita recipe (I think you can find a free one on the internet if you try), but that price is for a cooking class with shopping lists and recipe pdf’s. She deserves to be paid for her time and work. Just don’t take the class. No need to comment about it.
We love to support of friend Julia around here!
Thank you for this list, Kim. I attended this class that Julia put together and I must add that the rest of the meal really complimented the cocktails.
Thanks for sharing!
After Sandy Hook there should not have been another school shooting. That should have been a huge wake-up to the parents and politicians in America. The fact that assault weapons are still being sold without background checks or oversight means school shootings will continue. Our children need to be more important than someone wanting to buy an assault weapon.
Thank you for amplifying these Nashville stories this week, Kim. It’s been a wild rollercoaster none of asked to ride. I’m right there with Susanna, spotting a child and marveling at the fact that they are alive, walking, talking, laughing. It’s a bit of a liability, working in an elementary school, as you can imagine.
It’s been an exercise in holding two simultaneous but slightly opposite beliefs: I love you and might one day have to die to protect you because we live in a society that values guns more than human life; and GOOD LORD you’re not following directions, you’re making a mess, we keep our hands to ourselves, NO we don’t have Squid Game books in this library…
I love this column and I wanted to see the Keylime recipe but I’m not gonna pay $43 to do that. Sorry thanks Laura.
I was sad to see that price too.