Kristine Langley Mahler

I have been always the Awkward Queen in Training, no need to feel alone

Chelsea, I wish you were here at AWP so much so we could all give you hugs at the Xness event tonight--love you + your essay, and marveling at the incredible strength of the love and sadness you're letting us witness ❤️

massive AWP Author Residency schedule; we'll repost this every day with the pertinent author residencies in the text of the post

Happy AWP Day 1! We'll see you in like an hour at booth #644: make sure to stop by during one of today's Author Residencies, because we'll have @seanseanclan.bsky.social from 11-12, @marylynnreed.bsky.social from 1-2, and Shanda McManus from 3:30-4:30!

just doing a lil wake-and-scroll here before heading to the bookfair--come see me at Split/Lip Press (booth #644) pretty much ALL DAY LONG!

I am happy to pass along the goodwill--someone recommended this one to ME after AWP23, I think, when I was bemoaning the gross coffee-water coming out of my hotel room machine as I tried to make tea! www.amazon.com/dp/B07YRT7WJ...

and I spy @sfmontgomery.bsky.social for sale at Powell's too! 😍

I brought my electric kettle! Do not be ashamed to join our ranks!!!

TARGET!!! Whom I have BOYCOTTED SINCE LAST YEAR but is the ONLY PLACE I CAN GET TO TONIGHT TO BUY A NEW READER!!! I AM SO MAD!

This is so goddamn Mercury Retrograde I could scream—off to buy a new Square to take payments for tomorrow’s AWP booth sales, enjoy your Wed night offsites while I take a Lyft to TARGET 🫠

If I see any of y’all opening Twitter to check on the AWP offsites it’s over

you capture the aimless teenage drive at night EXACTLY (right down to the arguably-stalkerish circling back to one specific house and imagining what life would be like if you lived there; eerie bc I know it well, but comforting bc it means I wasn't the only one!)

thank YOU!!!

@marchxness.bsky.social some ALL-TIMERS today from old-timers Faliveno, Moulton and Oliu, let me just say, DAMN!!!

I finished reading @kjmoulton.bsky.social's essay on Let Her Cry and had to step away from my laptop to pace around this hotel room, holy shit

At AWP especially, it helps presses not have to ship a bunch of books back home (an additional cost). And there are usually sweet sales.

Authors, link to your PRESS website for sales, not Amazon. I see the numbers and it truly makes a difference. 👏

I assume it's like this for all indies?

As y'all head off to #awp26, I am calculating our author royalties. I cannot stress this enough - buy small press books directly from publishers. It's the way everyone makes the most money and art can continue to happen!

I have wondered this so many times.

It was SO GOOD! And I loved the Lilith ticket stub at the start!!!

I have already voted against my bracket like 3x this tourney too!

Guys I'm sitting here in my hotel room and I'm so bored I made one of those cursed "where I am at AWP" graphics so maybe I should just go to the hotel bar

oh you know I did; they were playing with THE CRANBERRIES (which was what got me to go)

It was literally never going to not be REM and Country Feedback, a song stuffed with sad-quotable lyrics and performed by my major high school crush (was I pining for Michael or pining for some bro at my high school when I cried to this song? uhhhh both), but I'm v. into the essay too ❤️

Ay yi yi, one of my fave Xness essayists with a gorgeous essay on Vince Gill (I'm talking abt @mossyair.bsky.social), vs an all-time SAD FAVORITE of mine, Everlong, argued masterfully by Kay Keegan ("it captured that unexplainable feeling of straddling a beginning and an ending at the same time")!!!

I'm so glad @erindorney.bsky.social dug into what I hadn't been able to put my finger on FOR YEARS about that Paula Cole song--it's performing heteronormativity and THE SADNESS FOR THE LIFE SHE SINGS ABOUT "WANTING" is also performative, therefore, which is so damn brilliant

My pal @jamcharlesworth.bsky.social has given us another classic with this essay on Collective Soul--a show to which I was given FREE TICKETS upon arriving at Lilith Fair '99 (CS was the next weekend and I think they hadn't sold enough, lol). Hope still lingers on and SO SHOULD "The World I Know"!

You realize by ID-ing your location rn you’re going to get APPROACHED 😆

Had four (4) different people on my flights/the light rail ask me if I was headed to AWP. I didn’t know I looked like such an easily identifiable lit-person cliche!!!

THAT’S WHAT I’M SCREAMING!!!

It’s the flight times for me—I could be arriving mid afternoon tomorrow and darting to the convention center to get registered and get the booth set up before 7pm, or arriving today and getting a leisurely morning’s sleep before moseying over from the hotel

😆 yes exactly!