the view at the Outer Banks this week
Welcome to another issue of The Jiffy, a newsletter about upstate New York!
I spent last week at the Outer Banks to work on a project with my friend, Hudson Valley-based writer Olivia Muenter.
We’re producing a limited-series podcast about why creative people – but especially novelists – do what they do if they want to make a career out of their craft: When the barriers to entry are so high and rates of success so low (critically, financially), why do novelists continue the work?
Olivia’s new novel, “Little One,” is out on Feb. 3, and rather than dwell in pre-publication anxiety, she’s spending this time talking with authors, editors, bookstore owners, and some people from her past to try figure this out. To find a name for this unnameable thing.
Gee Gee Rosell talking with Olivia at Buxton Village Books
Gee Gee Rosell, owner of Buxton Village Books, offered Olivia some very keen wisdom; Gee Gee is a living legend whom Olivia would visit during childhood summers spent on Hatteras Island.
“We’re helping folks build memories,” Rosell said. “We’re helping families build traditions. And in the world today, where everything is painful, hurtful, and hateful, that is ever more important.”
“Little Pod” will come out soon, and you can find more information here.
OK, on to this issue:
two books I’m recommending to everyone I know
Two adventuresome books
This is the time of year when I really need escapist books. For me, that means history, but because so much of my work requires on-topic research, I don’t usually get to read off-topic books just for fun.
So I love when research introduces me to books that become page-turning fun. In reading about Ann Lee for my upcoming podcast episode about her (coming out next weekend!), I stumbled into the work of Richard Francis, who has written many novels and a few books on New England utopian societies.
Francis’s biography of Ann Lee – who thought of herself as the messiah in female form and who brought the Shaker movement to the colonies 250 years ago in the heat of the revolutionary war – tells of her mystifying and erratic migrant life from Manchester, England to upstate New York.
He writes in the introduction to “Ann the Word: The Story of Ann Lee, Female Messiah, Mother of the Shakers, the Woman Clothed with the Sun,” that he “realized that no satisfactory free-standing biography of Ann Lee herself had ever been written, despite her astonishing and adventurous life and the scale of her achievement. Though she could write nothing down herself, her salty, humorous, impassioned voice comes to us across the centuries from the records of her followers.”
Some of those records tell of miracles, revenge, exorcisms, and the unexplainable. And there are many stories that sketch a view of New York and New England at this time, but my favorite is Francis’s retelling of how the Shakers discovered their first home site in what was Niskeyuna in 1776 but is now Colonie, New York, right against Albany Airport:
In point of fact it was John Hocknell who found the spot. He [and a few others] went up the Hudson River to Albany to try to acquire land in that region, but found it too expensive. They then heard of cheaper land a little to the north-west and continued on their way another seven miles or so to find it. At this point Hocknell found his arm rising upward and going forward into a pointing position, a common if bizarre Shaker phenomenon that can perhaps be related to the old country tradition of water-divining. […]
What we are left with in the mind’s eye is the middle-aged Hocknell, erstwhile respectable Cheshire farmer, scuttling over the vast brooding landscape of northern New York State in pursuit of his own quivering finger.
But it worked. In Shaker terms he found himself in Wisdom’s Valley.
But the book I’m currently completely absorbed within is a forthcoming biography of Frederic Church by Victoria Johnson, out on May 5 (this year is Church’s 200th birthday), called “Glorious Country: How the Artist Frederic Church Brought the World to America and America to the World.”
Johnson sent me an advance copy, and writes how Church “raced toward adventure and danger in far-flung lands,” how he “steamed to South America to explore jaguar-filled jungles and climb smoldering volcanoes,” how he “chartered a boat off the coast of Newfoundland and chased icebergs that cracked and crashed into the sea while he sketched them.”
It’s a story about how Church ushered American painting onto the world’s cultural stage, and it’s also a story of America during another time of war on its own soil, as well as a picture of New York City when you might see P. T. Barnum, Herman Melville, Frederick Douglass, Walt Whitman, Susan B. Anthony, or Caroline Astor walking around.
Johnson writes immersively, and when she describes a work that Church painted to honor his mentor, Thomas Cole, upon Cole’s death, you feel like you’re inside the picture:
Church welcomed the public to his studio to see his new painting. “To the Memory of Cole” depicted his mentor’s favorite view of the Catskill Mountains, with Catskill Creek meandering through the valley in the middle distance; some of Cole’s works in the gallery downstairs featured the same view. At the center of Church’s canvas stood a pale stone cross, bathed in a splash of sunlight and entwined with climbing roses in full bloom. Above the mountains, Church had painted a layered, complex sky, at once mournful and celebratory. The low-slung clouds blanketing the familiar peaks were dark on their undersides but copper-colored on top. Higher still, white cumuli swelled into the blue sky, silhouetted against the pale mass of cloud that floated heavenward as if it were Cole’s spirit.
events that are all about books
Edith Wharton’s The Mount will host a winter session of its online Book Club, beginning with a discussion of “Old New York,” by Edith Wharton. The virtual gathering invites readers to dig into themes, characters, and structure across Wharton’s four interconnected novellas, which explore the social codes and quiet tensions of 19th-century New York. The book club is free to attend with advance registration required, and discussions are hosted via Zoom. Thu., Jan. 15, 4–5 p.m. (Info here)
HudCo will host Root & Ritual: A Witches’ Eve of Books & Cheese, a midwinter gathering with conversation, ritual, and sensory exploration. The evening features author Pam Grossman – described by Vulture as “the Terry Gross of witches”! – alongside artist and author Frances Denny and Jess Galen of Bloomy Cheese & Provisions, with cheese tasting, ritual elements, cocktails, and a facilitated conversation hosted by Revery. Admission includes curated food, refreshments, and a Picture Book gift card, with books available for signing. Thu., Jan. 15, 7–9 p.m., HudCo, Dobbs Ferry, N.Y. (Info here)
Booked on the Hudson returns for a winter readers’ retreat in Coxsackie, anchored by a full-day Book Fair featuring bestselling authors, panels, and a curated marketplace. The Saturday fair includes talks and signings with Katherine Center, Tessa Bailey, Tia Williams, and Edy Massih, plus time to browse vendors. A VIP option extends the weekend with early access, reserved seating, a pajama party, and farewell brunch. Sat., Jan. 17, 12–5 p.m. (VIP early access at 11 a.m.), The Wire Event Center, Coxsackie, N.Y.. (Info here)
The newly released, highly-enjoyed coffee table book “Upstate Now” will be the focus of an author talk celebrating the communities and creative lives in the Hudson Valley and Catskills. The book traces the lives of longtime locals and newer neighbors, moving from cultural institutions and art spaces to designers, farms, markets, and more, told through photo essays by Michel Arnaud, and text by Jane Creech. Sat., Jan. 24, 2–3 p.m., Germantown Library (Hover Room), Germantown, N.Y. (Info here)
Author and (sex advice columnist-turned-librarian!) Emma Tourtelot will discuss her debut novel, ”No One You Know,” in conversation with Sari Botton. The event centers on Tourtelot’s dual-voiced novel about mothers and teenage daughters, the aftermath of loss in a small town, and the ways grief reshapes relationships. Tickets are required, with options for admission only or admission bundled with a hardcover copy of the book. Tue., Jan. 27, 6:30 p.m., Morton Memorial Library, 82 Kelly St., Rhinecliff, N.Y. (Info here)
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