Beating on
A few changes to let you know about
“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
Hi everyone. That’s the final sentence of The Great Gatsby, and I’d argue it’s the best ‘last sentence’ of a novel anyone’s ever written? Let me know in the comments if you can think of a better one. That aside, I want to start with some housekeeping - and some changes! I hope you are all ok with them!
Firstly, I’ve decided to go back to calling my substack The Mule. As some of you know, this was the original name of my blog that I started writing in 2010 (yes really, that long ago!), and when I started writing here on substack, I revived it. Then, when I had the idea for writing a substack that followed me through the process of writing book 4, I changed it to The Book Forge. But over the past 8 months of writing the Book Forge, I’ve come to realise that I want the freedom to write about any topic, and I feel that The Mule, and everything it has stood for right from the start (parenting, motherhood, therapy, birth, feminism, humour, the female body, etc!), still feels like a better name to me. The whole point of having a substack is that it gives you complete autonomy and editorial control - so - I changed it back! And here we are.
I am also making some other changes in order to be fairer to those of you who are paid subscribers.
Firstly, I’ve moved the entire archive behind a paywall. Most fresh posts will still be available to all (although some will have paywalls or early access for subscribers), but all posts will automatically move behind a paywall 2 weeks after publication. Only paid subscribers will have full access to this archive.
Secondly, commenting on most posts and responses on Notes will only be available to paying subscribers.
Just for fun, I’ve also brought lots of my old Mule posts over to the substack, so if you are a paid subscriber, you can have a look through some of the highlights of well over a decade of my waffling. It was quite an interesting process to go back over them all. At times, a bit cringe, like reading an old diary - 13 years is a long time in terms of the development of a person’s ideas. At other times, it was lovely to have a window back into the person I was then, a mum with very small children and clearly lots of passion about changing and improving the world - some of which I feel I’ve lost.
In my post last week, Not My First Rodeo, I wrote about the despair I was feeling about the publishing industry, and my struggle to get this 4th book written whilst all of that was going on. There have been major problems with the publication of the Positive Birth Book, which have led to it being widely unavailable. I’m hoping these are soon to be resolved, but in the mean time it’s been absolutely devastating to think that not just my livelihood but also a big part of my personal sense of achievement, could so easily just ‘pop’, like a bubble. It’s also made me the curious business position of an author - you are somehow self-employed, whilst at the same time the success or failure of your business, and the ups and downs of your income, are potentially completely out of your hands. Just in the space of the last year, I feel I have learnt so much more about the business side of life as a writer. The industry is a mess, would be a brief conclusion.
Book 4 nevertheless must be written. I’ve got to ‘beat on’. Currently at about 45 thousand words, I’ve reached a point of no return now, and am still mildly optimistic about meeting my end of June deadline. This is another reason to tidy up this substack, because I really need to focus on the book and this might mean longer periods between posts. I do hope you can bear with me. Once I get past that deadline, I should have more exciting things to share, once the book is formally announced and I can talk about it more freely.
For now, I’ll leave you with another podcast recommendation. This week I’ve been listening to Subject to Power, and I highly recommend this episode, with Kajsa Ekis Ekman, who also has a book out that I really want to get my mits on, called ‘On the Meaning of Sex: Thoughts about the New Definition of Woman’.
I also really enjoyed the episode ‘Endless Enclosures’, and can’t wait to listen to more.
For now, I must get back to the writing. Let me know how you are and how you feel about the changes I’ve made, in the comments. F.Scott says, ‘Just keep rowing’. Love to all, Milli x
