First off, my latest travel column, about the holiday season we spent sailing in SF Bay a few years back, was published in Womancake Magazine this week, so I hope you’ll take a look at that soon. Thanks to Alicia Dara, EIC of Womancake, for her hard work and endless patience in dealing with the myriad technical glitches that have abounded on Substack this week. Let’s hope we all get a holiday gift of glitch-free ‘stacks soon!

I had another essay accepted by the hard-working Sari Botton of Oldster Magazine and Memoir Land to run in her occasional series about NYC, Goodbye to All That (GTAT). I had a previous GTAT essay published in November which was a thrill, because her Substacks all set a very high bar, as far as essay-writing talent. That essay was about the 4th of July in Long Island City in 1984, and this one’s set the week before Christmas back in 1982, the first time I spent the holidays in NYC. I will let you know when the new essay runs, right around Christmas.

And…I had another essay published in a book called In The Garden, an anthology about gardens and gardening; my essay was about mothers and daughters, and even about being a daughter-in-law. The new anthology is the seventh published by the Story Circle Network, who I have taught for a few times, and I’m very excited to have had my essay accepted. It should be a fine collection for gardeners and writers. I love digging in the dirt and raising plants, but that isn’t something I get to do much any more as you can well imagine…I have a tiny branch of evergreen needles in a vase by our Xmas decor but that’s the full extent of our garden on board Watchfire.

That makes three anthologies I have been published in this year, including the third edition of Sunshine Noir which came out this spring (with an essay about my mom) and the SDWEG anthology, Good Luck with That that came out in summer with a short story of mine that was originally crafted in 1990 but never published until now. I love getting my writing out there, and meeting new writers and editors, which is what happens when I get something accepted in an anthology or on a site. In fact, I just started reading BODY: My Life in Parts by Nina B. Lichtenstein who edited my essay for In a Flash, as one of the perceptive and insightful In a Flash Editors.

Speaking of making new literary friends, I’ll be teaching a couple of workshops (pitching your book and POV and more) in San Diego at the Southern California Writers Conference on Martin Luther King, Jr. Weekend, January 16-18, 2026. of course, many of my old friends will be there too, so it is guaranteed to be a great weekend. Check out the discounts currently being offered that can save you up to $75 off the full conference fee, here on their website.

After the angst of compiling my Best Indie Books of the year last week, with the tough choices that sort of thing always entails, the next step was coming up with three of the ten books to highlight forever on my Shepherd pages. For those who don’t know about it yet, Shepherd.com is the brilliant successor to the abysmal, confusing, and soul-less monstrosity that is Goodreads (I know, how do I really feel, right?).

On Shepherd, every list of 5 book recommendations comes from a published author, and authors can join the site and submit a book list for free. Readers can not only find great books, but they can find out about each of the authors on their book list pages or by searching for their name and going to their author page, which lists their current books and links to their book lists.

It feels like being in a reading group with hundreds of talented, well-read authors, who are all recommending great books to you, based on your specific interests. And now readers and writers can select 3 books to recommend, so feel free to go to Shepherd and click on Best Books of 2025 at the top of the landing page right now.

As to my own 3 Best Book choices for the year, I was able to easily winnow my list of ten books down by choosing the three books that were written by authors I knew were already participating on the Shepherd site: Jennifer Coburn, Leslie Johansen Nack, and Barbara Conrey. That vote helps each of the three authors to market their books to new readers themselves, and of course my 3 book list might help the site to grow.

It is no secret that I am also a founding member of Shepherd ($50 a year), which I think is a great deal, because the site recommends my book to people by the dozens every month, and some click through to see my book on Amazon. I have the book stats to prove it. That’s right—they send me a monthly list of my book stats! For those who are intrigued, there’s also a Substack called Building Shepherd by Ben Fox.

I love supporting new and inventive ways for people to find more actual “good reads,” not the crappy books (often edited very poorly, if at all) that get pushed on us through so many internet sites and via the new book emails that land in my inbox every day.

Flat and lifeless covers tip me off to which books I won’t even be sampling; and if that sounds heartless, remember that as a reviewer I read many pre-publication galleys from NetGalley and other publisher sources every year, as well as getting many ARCs sent to me by authors I meet online. And that’s not even counting the many manuscripts that I receive as an editor.

I get to read plenty of books, is what I’m saying—about 100 a year, good, bad and in-between—so I don’t need to select those that come with red flags all over their covers. (It makes me feel bad when I see terrible book covers, since all the work that went into writing that book is effectively wasted when it is published with a terrible cover.)

I almost forgot to mention that an “encore” publication of one of my travel essays about visiting Palm Springs for the holidays came out the other day on Pillar to Post, written/curated by the talented Thomas Shess. Check that column out on P to P here.

I hope you enjoyed at least one of the many links included today. I’ll be back with more book reviews next week.

hasta pronto!