Hello again! As it says on the tin… I’m making some changes around here.
Some context - First of all, I’m getting serious with Substack!!! I will save you the platitudes as I don’t think any human being needs to justify why they are writing. In truth, I’ve been writing a lot but choosing not to publish because of a mixed dose of perfectionism/fear. But then I watched Vogue x Josh O’Connor’s 10 Things I Can’t Live Without video and in his scrapbooking segment (man after my own heart), he mentions the famous photo of Yves Klein leaping out of a window into the blue sky, with the idea being the artist needs to take a leap of faith/a ‘leap into the void.’ All my future success in life will be traced back to Challengers (2024). (JK!!!!)
Why am I offering a paid tier? I’m scaling back a bit on Youtube because I want to have the creative brain-space to launch this project purposefully and meaningfully. Transparently, I am also looking for ways to sustain myself w/o having to rely on one social platform forever as said platforms are precarious and algorithms can be soul-sucking. Substack might be the mistress for me! I’m still going to offer some things for free — we will not go fully paid — but if you have the ability… it would mean a lot :-)
The Book Club - For the three months of summer (June, July, August), I will be running a book club here on Substack. My aim for this book club is to promote deep engagement, to explore artist intent, to understand historical and cultural contexts, to connect with people who are also curious and in need of a slower pace, and to HAVE FUN ! Each month I will pick a book for us to read, and because I believe I’m a master vibe curator, each book will have some kind of sticky, sweaty summer energy to it. The selects will skew literary fiction (my preferred genre) and are from my personal favorites collection.
This is what the membership options will look like over the summer -
The unpaid tier includes the book introductory posts. In these posts, I will give some publishing context, information about the author, plus some reading prompts to get you started. You will also get a curated music playlist and a mood board with selected historical/cultural references.
The paid tier ($7/month) includes all of the above PLUS video diaries where I will take you through my own journals/scrapbooks, curated lists of further exploration (articles, books, movies), and access to the paid members-only chat where I will facilitate discussion of each book throughout the month. I’d love for this feature to be a more community-oriented space, where we can also chat about other things we’re reading, things we’re doing, random thoughts we’re having, etc.
If $7 is too much, I am able to gift out a limited number of paid memberships for the month. Just email me about your situation and I’ll do my best to accommodate: gremlitaa@gmail.com.
I’m committing to this book club structure for the summer only. I hope it’ll be successful! But I think it will take a few months to see what people are interested in, what’s sustainable, and what can be improved. With that said, I encourage any feedback! If you all love it, we’ll continue onwards with the club, and if not, at the very least, I’ll be more active here. <3
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