March-ing Through My TBR

I don’t post here much about my reading habits, but I think I’m going to change that, if only because — as Stephen King says — reading is such a crucial foundation for writing.

I read a lot, although not as much as I’d like sometimes.  I usually set a goal in Goodreads (and now Fable) to read 52 books throughout the year, which is an average of a book a week, which seems pretty reasonable.  Most years I read significantly more than that, but I keep my goal at that every year since that’s my minimum.

My reading is all over the map (which probably explains why my writing is too).  I read classics and literary fiction, sci fi and fantasy, historical fiction and popular fiction, even a fair amount of children’s and young adult.  And I read a lot more than just fiction, too — according to my stats in Fable, last year about half of what I read was nonfiction.  Lately I’ve been reading a lot of political books, and in the past couple years I’ve started listening to audiobooks during times when I can’t physically read (in the car, in the shower, while brushing my teeth, while cleaning).

I used to use Goodreads to track my reading, and I guess I still do a little, but I decided a little over a year ago to find an alternative due to how disgusted I was with Amazon kissing up to the current administration.  I wasn’t sure whether I’d like Fable or Storygraph better, so I just created accounts and started updating both — and then I ended up still updating Goodreads too, since I feel like as a future author, I should keep that active even if I don’t care for its parent company.

Anyway, Fable ended up being my favorite for its blend of tracking, statistics, and social features.  One of the things they do is the “reading wrap” images you can generate at the end of each month, and a reel you can create at the end of the year.

Over the past month, I’ve been plugging along through Lucky Loser, which is a long and detailed book and totally worth reading, but has been taking most of my attention.  All of the books I finished in March except for Wizard of Oz were audiobooks that I was listening to on the side while reading Lucky Loser.

I should be finished with Lucky Loser in the next day or two, though, so I’ll be able to move on to something else soon!

On Writing, Health Care, and Why Writing Is Political

We need to talk about health care.

Specifically, we need to talk about politics and health care, and how it affects us writers.

Health care has been in the news a lot under the new administration.  First there was the One Big Beautiful Bill, which made significant cuts to health care.  Then there was the fight in Congress over extending the expanded Affordable Care Act subsidies, which actually shut down the government for over a month until six cowardly senators caved under pressure and traded our health care for a promise.

Now, we’re in an illegal war in the Middle East that Congress won’t fund, so the administration is looking for pots of money to steal from — and of course their sights fell on health care, because what else would they cut?  They’re using the standard excuse, of course, claiming they’re going after “waste and fraud and abuse.”

Even if you try to avoid following politics on a normal basis, as a writer you should care about health care, particularly if writing is your main job.  For those who don’t remember what it was like to buy individual health insurance before the ACA, health insurance companies could refuse to cover you at all if you had a preexisting condition, or they could refuse to cover anything relating to the preexisting condition (the primary reason you needed health care, usually) for a period of time such as a year.

The ACA was revolutionary for writers and, really, all entrepreneurs.  Suddenly we could get not only health insurance — regardless of preexisting conditions — but also, policies now offered standardized coverage, so you knew what you were getting for that money.

So when the administration talks about cutting health care, you know that is going to affect people like you and me — writers, entrepreneurs, small business owners, those who don’t have health insurance offered through a traditional job.  Even if it doesn’t affect you right at this moment — maybe you have health insurance through your spouse’s job, or maybe you have another part-time or full-time job that provides coverage — but it’s important to remember that you can’t count on that always being the case.  I’ve been through a divorce, my husband being laid off, and other mishaps that have resulted in us losing health insurance under our group plans.

In fact, you may have been affected by the cuts to health care already.  In the past year cuts have been made not just to Medicaid, but also to funding for the ACA tax credits.  The expanded tax credits were not renewed, and the projected number of people dropping their coverage as a result led to an additional increase in premiums.

And now they want to make even more cuts to federal spending on health care?  For a war that the president promised on the campaign trail that he wouldn’t start, that his voters didn’t want, and that the American people overwhelmingly oppose?

Even if you don’t follow politics on a regular basis, this is a moment — and an issue — that writers and entrepreneurs everywhere need to speak up about.  Make sure your elected officials know that health care is more than just political for you — it’s personal.