Hi there! I got an email from Seattle writer Lesley Hazleton earlier this month, which was, on its own, not an especially unusual event. I had become Lesley’s friend after I gave her a Genius Award for literature at The Stranger years ago, and she’d occasionally drop me brief emails letting me know about books or articles […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: May 2024This month, my Neighborhood Reads column at the Seattle Times—in which I profile a different Seattle-area independent bookstore every month—officially turned five years old. So I worked very hard on an article sharing the things I’ve learned from Seattle’s many successful bookstores, and on a map charting every single one of the bookstores that I’ve visited or mentioned in the […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: April 2024Hi! Seattle’s Labor-Day-weekend music and arts festival, Bumbershoot, announced their arts programming earlier this month. There’s a fashion exhibit, an animation show, performance art, kinetic sculptures, a “comedy dome,” a cat circus, wrestling, gymnastics, skateboarding, and more. You know what they didn’t announce? A single damn literary event of any kind. This is a tremendous bummer. Bumbershoot […]
Read More What i’ve been writing and reading: March 2024Hello! Lately, I’ve been thinking about writing comics again. After a year or so of slow going, three solid ideas have been banging around in my head, begging for further development. But I’ve had a hard time sitting down and writing those ideas out, and I decided that part of the problem is that it […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: February 2024Hello! I used to be obsessed with following presidential campaigns. Even in 1996, probably the most boring campaign in my lifetime, I kept close track of Bob Dole’s movements and dutifully listened to the debates. My obsession with presidential politics culminated in 2012, when I attended the Iowa caucuses and both the RNC and the […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: january 2024Hello! Here’s a dirty little secret about the December edition of my newsletter: I write it earlier in the month and schedule it to be sent on the last day of the year. I know! I know! The staggered release feels inauthentic to me, too, but here’s the thing: I’ve developed a practice of not […]
Read More what i’ve been reading and writing: December 2023Hi there! Earlier this month, AHOY Comics published my most recent comics work in Project: Cryptid #3, a story I wrote called “The Demon in the Pines.” It’s a pioneer story about the Pacific Northwest illustrated by the great Peter Krause and colored by the marvelous Pippa Bowland. Even better, my story is published in the same […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: November 2023Hi! First of all, thanks so much to those of you who sent sympathetic get-well-soon notes after last issue’s account of my first bout with Covid. You were so generous with your good wishes that I retroactively feel as though I somehow overplayed my sickness, but it was much appreciated at a time when I […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: October 2023Three and a half years after the beginning of the pandemic, I finally caught Covid for the first time. It was pretty rough! The fever completely sapped my strength, I had a grouchy and persistent stomach pain anytime I ate anything, and I was chilly and achy for five days. But my absolute least favorite […]
Read More What i’ve been writing and reading: September 2023Hello! I’m excited to let you know that the comic with my short story “The Demon in the Pines,” illustrated by the incredible Peter Krause, will be published this November, in the third issue of the Project: Cryptid miniseries. Here’s the solicitation copy from my beloved publishers at AHOY Comics: PROJECT CRYPTID #3 (OF 6) (MR)SEP231347 Bryce Ingman, […]
Read More What i’ve been reading and writing: August 2023
Paul Constant 