I'm SO excited to announce...!

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I’ve been pretty cagey with most of you about what I do with my time when I’m not running the Inn… “Oh we travel and I read and— what have you been reading lately?” I’ll say as I pour you another beer and hope you don’t prod me any further.

But here’s the rest of the honest answer: I’ve been writing a novel… and IT’S GOING TO BE PUBLISHED!

So many thank you’s to all the people who’ve helped me along the way— my family, my friends, my neighbors, my reading community, my writing community, my Inn guests, my agent, my editor, and more! I’m the one writing this book, but you are all a part of its story.

See ya next year!

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Thank you SO MUCH for such a wonderful 2023 season at the Spruceton Inn! It absolutely flew by. We welcomed old friends and new, hosted art shows and Sunday Service story hours, celebrated our 10th year of business with a big o’ party in the barn, and got up to our usual itty-bitty bar shenanigans…!

Our calendar is currently closed to reservations. We’re running our annual Artist Residency program for the month of November then hibernating through the winter. We’ll reopen for the season again in May 2024.

Thank you again to all of you who came to stay and/or dropped by Room One for a sip of something this year. Plus an extra special shout-out to our super-duper repeats and our local Friday night bar regulars! I keep thinking about what I said in my toast at our 10 year party— this place is only as good as the people who visit. Thank you, thank you, thank you! I sincerely can’t wait to host you all again next year!

Congrats to the 2023 Spruceton Inn Artist Residents!

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Julie Baumgardner, writer / Nicholas Day, writer / Jessica Goldstein, writer / Arti Gollapudi, writer & performer / Andy Griffiths, writer / Christina Hunt Wood, visual artist & writer/ Chukwuebuka Ibeh, writer / Ishita Jain, visual artist & writer / Joy Lazendorfer, writer / Rachel Mannheimer, poet / Kate McKean, writer / Roman Muradov, visual artist / Janelle Nanos, writer / Billy Recce, lyricist & composer / Alexandra Tanner, writer / Preeti Torul, writer & performer / Sarah Wheeler, writer

A sincere thank you to everyone who applied. We received just shy of 400 applications (!!) and while it’s always hard to choose, I swear, this year made for the hardest deliberations yet. Steven and I spent SO MANY HOURS reading everyone’s applications, poring over the writing samples, getting happily lost in the websites and online portfolios… It has been such a simultaneously humbling and inspiring experience.

I’m especially excited to announce the recipient of this year’s Tracy Kennard Emerging Writer’s Award: Arti Gollapudi.

Can’t wait to host everyone here at the Inn this November!

Late Summer Bookshelf

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More great reads!

SMALL WORLDS by Caleb Azumah Nelson. Tender, poetic, and devastating reflections on family, home, love, and belonging. Such vivid description of the people who inhabit Ghanaian spaces in London and beyond.

BIRNHAM WOOD by Eleanor Catton. Radical agro-environmentalists, a knighted retiree, and a billionaire with a secret agenda all cross paths in New Zealand in this long totally entertaining read.

THE LOST WIFE by Susanna Moore. Based on the true story of a Minnesota Territory settler who is captured with her children during the Sioux Uprising of 1862. Stark and haunting in both style and content. Some absolutely gorgeous language.

ALL-NIGHT PHARMACY by Ruth Madievsky. Toxic sisterhood, substance abuse, mystics, hospital administration. This one lingered with me.

RIPE by Sarah Rose Enter. A black hole hovers near a young woman as she struggles to make meaning of her life at a soul-sucking Bay Area tech company .Come for the takedown of tech culture, stay of the narrator’s inner life as she unravels.

SHUBEIK LUBEIK by Deena Mohammed. Beautifully rendered Egyptian graphic novel set in in an alternate world where wishes are a real, extractable, regulated resource. It follows three premium-grade wishes sold from one old man’s kiosk. (And it reads right to left, back to front, as it was first published in Arabic.)

CURSED BREAD by Sophie Mackintosh. A moody portrait of an unlikely and twisted friendship between a baker’s wife and an American ambassador’s wife in a small French town after WWII. DON’T READ THE FLAP COPY ON THE BOOK as it gives away the ending in the first sentence?!

FAIR PLAY by Tove Jansson. An absolutely delightful, slim little collection of stories following two artists and their love for each other and their work. I felt inspired and uplifted for days after reading! I am in such awe that she can create such great work for both children and adults alike.

WATCH US DANCE by Leila Slimani. Second book in a trilogy based on her family history, this one takes place after Moroccan independence from the French in the 60s as the characters—like the country at large—struggle with reconciling their dreams with their reality, their traditions with their modern ambitions. The wide cast of characters gives you a very satisfying variety of experiences to follow.

10 Year Party!

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Thank you SO much to everyone who came by to celebrate 10 years of the Spruceton Inn with us! To say we had fun is quite the understatement.

There were neighbors! Inn guests! Old friends! New friends! Snacks! Pizza! Barefoot dancing! Soooo many bottles of bubbly!

We even had a little awards ceremony where we gave out Spruceton Inn Certificates and prizes for things like our “Most Regular Bar Regulars” and “Most Stays Ever”.

Like I said I person during these toasts, THIS PLACE IS ONLY AS GOOD AS THE PEOPLE WHO VISIT IT. So while yes, Steven and I have put a lot of love into the Inn over the past decade (!!), we owe so much its success to all of you. So, thank you! You all have very literally made a dream of mine come true.

Here’s to many more celebrations!

2023 Artist Residency Applications are OPEN!

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It’s that time of year again…!

Check out details on the Inn’s website here and/or our Substack here.

And a big thank you to everyone who came out for our Upstate Art Weekend show last weekend featuring work from ALL 79 Artist Residents! I took zero pictures of any visitors (too busy chatting!), but here’s a little peek at what it looked like in the barn:

Looking forward to reading your applications!

Sunday Service Story Hour at the Spruceton Inn

Every second Sunday of the month from 11am-12pm folks can drop by and listen to me read a story/poems/piece by one of our 79 Artist Residents we’ve hosted over the past 9 seasons.

Why? Because I’m not religious but I just love the idea of getting together on a Sunday morning to think about the big questions in life, and for me, art is my absolute favorite way to get at those big questions.

So swing by! Hang out in the sunshine, listen and dawdle. Add a little bit of art to your weekend in the Catskills.

May & June Reads

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More good ones!

I am only a little embarrassed to say I picked up WALKING PRACTICE by Dolki Min because of the cover. I bought it and read it because it’s raunchy and dark and totally bizarre and every once in a while I love to just go somewhere super weird with a read and think with satisfaction, as I close the book upon finishing it, Man, I would have never come up with a story like that.

My friend passed along I’M GLAD MY MOM DIED by Jeannette McCurdy around and I found myself reading it—I kid you not— at the playground on Mother’s Day. I KNOW! I made sure to hide the cover from onlookers. It’s as compulsively readable as everyone says. I was particularly moved by the early chapters about her young childhood before she got into being a child/teen star and all the messiness that came with. She does such a good job capturing the mindset of a tiny kid so desperate to please.

My dad loaned me ERASURE by Percival Everett and I’m so glad he did! A real gets-you-thinking-about-art-and-publishing kind of novel. The main character felt so real to me, just writing this right now had me thinking, Hm I wonder what he’s up to right now? as if he were a real person I’ve met before. The kind of book that makes you feel smarter after reading, like you’re absorbing someone else’s intelligence through reading osmosis.

Made a real 180 and dipped into Book 4 of Sarah J Maas’ series for A COURT OF FROST AND STARLIGHT. It was so feel-good compared to the other books in the series it felt almost like a Hallmark Xmas movie interlude, BUT then I read her afterward about how when she was writing this manuscript her father had a serious health scare and she gave birth so she really just needed to write something a little more gentle and hopeful and I thought Hells yeah Sarah J Maas, you write whatever you want, you KNOW we are all here for it. You better believe I’m going to finish the series next month and get Book 5.

I saved THE GUEST by Emma Cline for a whirlwind trip Steven and I took to Italy. (I officiated our friends’ wedding in Tuscany and yes it was as dreamy as it sounds, though it also HAILED for an hour right after the ceremony?!) I knew I would want to devour it given the nerve-wracking premise and I absolutely did. It’s summer reading at its finest. Fancy Hamptons? Check. A shady past? Check. A totally unlikeable main character who keeps making worse and worse choices but magically keeps your readerly attention? Check!

I also bought Samantha Irby’s latest book QUIETLY HOSTILE at the airport bookstore because I knew I’d want some laughs, and laughs I got. Man, she just cracks. Me. UP. I will read anything she writes. Anything! Send me your grocery lists Irby!

I read LITTLE EYES by Samantha Schweblin in the 25 hours it took us to get home from Italy. (1 boat, 2 trains, 1 tram, 2 planes, 1 shuttle, and 1 three-hour long drive!) It’s creepy in a kind of Black Mirror-ish way aka showing you how different make make tender and/or terrifying choices with the same technology.

YELLOWFACE by R.F. Kuang is a publishing world thriller, a genre I didn’t even know I needed! I absolutely ripped through this one. I love when delusional narrators lie to themselves and I love freaky tales of plagiarism. This one felt so particular to this era of book making right now. It makes me want to read Kuang’s other previously published books and see what else she’s nailed on the head.

10 Years Already?!

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Like I said on Instagram the other week:

It’s our TENTH season running the Inn this year. Over the past decade we’ve changed a lot (hello kids! hello so many other nuanced and kind impossible things to list right here right now!), the Inn has changed (remember when we were open 7 days a week all year long and the bar was poppin every night until 11pm?), the Catskills have changed (there are approximately 100 million more hotels and Airbnbs), and omg THE WHOLE WORLD HAS CHANGED (I can’t even begin to list those differences, we’ve all lived them— the good and the excruciatingly bad).

Adorable and completely staged family photo by Anna Wolf for Tidal Mag. Well, it is authentic in that these are some of our legitimately favorite things: picnics, painting, snacks, pretty dresses.

You know what hasn’t changed here though? The beauty of Spruceton Valley, the humbling majesty of the Milky Way we see out here every night, aaaaand you. Well no, you’ve changed over these last ten years too. But only for the better. What I’m really saying is, this place is made of and made for our guests and you all are the F*CKING BEST. Our stayed-here-20-times “repeat” guests, our annual regulars, our local bar patrons, our folks-who’ve-been-following-on-the-’gram-still-waiting-for-the-right-weekend-to-come-up… So thank you— all of you!—for making the Spruceton Inn the place I love so much. Here’s to much more together!

April Reads

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Read four goodies this month.

THE CHINESE GROOVE by Kathryn Ma was so charming and funny. Loved the narrator. Loved the themes of immigration and expectation and family. One of those books that can feel light and amusing while also having some emotional heft.

I listened to DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEADS by Olga Torkarczuk and highly recommend the experience! Hearing the narrator’s voice made all of her observations about rural life, aging, sexism, and more hit home that much more intimately. It was delightfully eerie and ultimately went somewhere I didn’t expect but found quite satisfying.

WOMEN TALKING by Miriam Toews was harrowing and fascinating. It felt like a play in the best way. I went down the rabbit hole and watched the movie then read a bunch of articles the premise is based on (an isolated Mennonite community experiences mass sexual violence) and it was intense to say the least.

It’s when a while since I settle down with a big fat epic and CLOUD CUKCOO LAND by Anthony Doer definitely scratched that itch. Very impressed that he managed so many storylines and kept them each so interesting and (ultimately) connected. A book lover’s book.

March Reads

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My March reads were all over the map in topic and style.

AMERICA REDUX: VISUAL STORIES FROM OUR DYNAMIC HISTORY by Artist Resident Ariel Aberg-Riger is a gold star BANGER. Like Howard Zinn and Maira Kalman had a book-baby but better. It’s gorgeous and brilliant, will make you question everything you think you’ve understood about this history. Every American should read it, no hyperbole.  

I had the distinct honor of first reading YOU WERE ALWAYS MINE by Spruceton Valley neighbor and all around hilarious and talented gal Jo Piazza & Christine Pride back when it was still a Word Doc work-in-progress. Like their previous novel together, this one tackles super complex relationships and race, this time centering on the fate of an abandoned baby.  

I had to hop on the LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus train and see what the fuss was all about and let me tell you, it’s a delightful ride. Feminism meets chemistry meets cooking meets a brilliant dog.  

WALK THE VANISHED EARTH by Erin Swan (which was edited by a Spruceton Inn Artist Resident!) is a post apocalyptic space epic spanning hundreds of years with multiple story lines that come together in a verrrrry satisfying way. Now I want someone to turn it into a tv mini series I can watch!

Omg guys, TAMPA by Alissa Nutting is NOT for the faint of heart! A cheery but absolutely gruesome novel about a 20-something middle school teacher and the 14 year old students she tries to seduce. It’s still haunting me. But I’m here for anything Nutting writes.

Went back to Austin!

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Steven and I went back to Austin and it was sooooo fun. Just three nights, but not in the middle of a serious pandemic crisis? And with the little ones back East with their grandparents? It felt like THREE WEEKS of tacos and two-stepping.

We stayed at the lovely little Hotel San José on South Congress, same neighborhood we “lived” last year for a few months so we felt right at home. Such a different kind of trip to just be hitting up all your old haunts vs. constantly researching spots and how to get there etc. Extra lovely to get a big dose of sunshine as spring out here in the Catskills is really just winter with more mud. (I say with some affection.)

All that said, in some ways it feels like summer is just around the corner because I’m opening up our Spruceton Inn summer and fall reservations THIS FRIDAY!

February Reads

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February was a good one for my bookshelf!

BIG SWISS by Jen Beagin. What happens when a 40-something year old woman calls off her ten year engagement, moves into a 1700’s farmhouse in Hudson that’s very literally falling apart, gets a job as a transcriber for the one sex and relationship therapist in town, then uses what she knows from these supposedly anonymous sessions to befriend one of those clients? Well, if Jen Beagin writes it, it’s dark, horny, hilarious magic, that’s what.

IF I SURVIVE YOU by Jonathan Escoffery. Such a tender read about a kid growing up in Miami with this Jamaican born parents and the visceral pain of feeling misunderstood and like there’s nowhere you fully belong. Weeks later I’m still thinking about the characters, wondering what they’re doing “now”.

OLGA DIES DREAMING by Xochitl Gonzales. I came for the gentrifying Brooklyn storyline, I stayed for the lesson in Puerto Rican politics, and I stayed up late blowing through pages for the interpersonal dramas of a high end wedding planner’s journey of self-discovery along side her politician brother.

REALLY GOOD, ACTUALLY by Monica Heisey. Didn’t think a book about young divorce could be this funny!

BLACK CAKE by Charmaine Wilkerson. Listened to this one during all my drives this month and was totally hooked by the family secrets, intergenerational drama, and Caribbean history.

ELEMENTS OF SURPRISE by Vera Tobin. At her reading at the The Golden Notebook, Jen Beagin said this very brainy, technical book booked helped her write BIG SWISS so obviously I had to give it a go.

THE DAYS OF AFREKETE by Asali Solomon. One of those books that makes you think about how time moves slowly then so suddenly, about how easy it is to wake up and look around and wonder, “Who have I become?” A book full of such yearning, asking questions about bisexuality, Black displacement in Philly, and what wealth does and doesn’t do to your heart.

EMBASSY WIFE by Katie Crouch. A satirical but juicy look at the embassy scene in Nairobi. It gave me real flashbacks to my Fulbright time in Mali— the hierarchies of “ex-pats”, locals’ views on the Peace Corps, and just how damn hot it was all the time.

THE PACHINKO PARLOR by Elisa Shea Dusapin. Moody, anxious, terribly lonely. A young Korean woman who’s grown up in Switzerland visits her Korean-born grandparents who’ve lived in Japan for the past fifty years running a Pachinko parlor to prepare them to visit Korea for the first time since they left.

BODYWORK by Melissa Febos. Listened to this one for book club and it birthed a really rad convo about the slippery nature of “truth” in any kind of personal narrative, about the sidelining of female memoir as “navel gazing”, and the dangers and beauty of auto-art as therapy.

Lately

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Some snow, some NYC time, so much fun with neighbors.

January Bookshelf

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I popped into a lot of short story collections this month: THE BEST AMERICAN SCIENCE FICTION edited by Rebecca Roanhorse, SEVEN EMPTY HOUSES by Samanta Schwerin, and GET IN TROUBLE by Kelly Link. All of them were spooky in their own ways which was, I guess, what I was in the mood for to kick the year off?? * shrugs *

I also read a super smart, gorgeous essay collection: THE CRANE WIFE by CJ Hauser. That title essay in particular is real banger.

As for the novels—

FIRE SEASON by Leyna Krow reminded me of Anna North’s OUTLAWED in a good way. Think Wild West with a tiny dash of magic.

I haven’t read a good old fashioned historical fiction in ages so THE MARRIAGE PLOT by Maggie O’Farrell really hit the spot. The language was delicious and it did such a good job of being way more than a spunky-princess-can’t-abide-by-the-suffocating-reality-of-court-life story. Be sure to read the afterword.

SOURDOUGH by Robin Sloan was cheery and spunky (just like his other one, MR. PENUMBRA’S 24 HOUR BOOKSTORE). Made me miss Steven’s sourdough baking! (We were on the road without his starter.)

And MILK FED by Melissa Broder was absolutely bananas and brilliant and bizarrely erotic. Who knew mother-daughter relationships, Judaism, disordered eating, and frozen yogurt could be so sexy?? Melissa Border. That’s who. (Have you read her other one THE PIECES yet? Also filed under “bananas and brilliant and bizarrely erotic”.)

Sunshine & Big Rocks

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We snuck off to Palm Springs and Joshua Tree for a few weeks of sunshine and big rocks and DAMN was it fun!

We started in out in Desert Hot Springs just 20 minutes away from Palm Springs at a house rental with Steven’s whole fam. Then we popped out to 29 Palms (where we stayed at the sweet and quirky 29 Palms Inn), then Pioneer Town (where we all piled into one room at the very cute and only joint in town the Pioneer Town Motel), then Joshua Tree proper (in a house we rented via Homestead Modern).

The highlight of course was the park itself because HOLY GUACAMOLE guys— those rocks! That blue sky! Those weird Dr. Seuss Joshua Trees! We’d been once before one hundred years ago (ok, fifteen years ago) to rock climb, but it was even more stunning than I remembered.

I’ve got a Stories Highlight on my Instagram profile of our favorite spots if you’re looking for recs. All in all I 10/10 recommend the area for a trip!

2022 Reads

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I never used to keep lists of what I’ve read, but now that I put my reads up in my Instagram Stories I’ve got a whole photo diary of ‘em! Swapping book recs with folks there is my favorite part of that whole stinkin app right now. DM’ing with authors too. I love to be able to send instantaneous fan mail.

Big shout out to my friends/fam who wrote some truly stellar non-fiction this year: DIRTBAG, MASSACHUSETTS by Isaac Fitzgerald, BAD SEX by Nona Willis Arnowitz, UNSETTLING by Elizabeth Weinberg, and HYSTERICAL by Elissa Bassist. I’m so proud of all of you!

More big shout outs to this year’s reads by our Spruceton Inn Artist Residents! ESSENTIAL LABOR, by Angela Garbes, THE RED ZONE by Chloe Caldwell, THAT’S DEBATABLE by Jen Doll, AND YOU MAY FIND YOURSELF by Sari Botton, KNOW MY NAME by Chanel Miller, SELF CARE by Leigh Stein, WE DO WHAT WE DO IN THE DARK by Michelle Hart, and SELF-PORTRAIT WITH NOTHING by Aimee Potwokta.

And a little extra love to DAWN OF EVERYTHING (David Graeber and David Wengrow) for completely rearranging how I view human history, to THE EMPLOYEES (Olga Ravn) for being so wonderfully weird, NEW ANIMAL (Ella Baxter) for lingering with me long after I finished reading, THE RABBIT HUTCH (Tess Gunty) for making me take out a pencil and underline all those absolutely perfect descriptions, and THE COURT OF ROSES AND THORNS (Sarah J. Maas) for reminding me the sexy genre reads can be such great fun.

Now, off this laptop and back to my latest read in front of the wood stove!

Lately

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Fall was a whirlwind having the Inn open and both kids in school for the first time ever. It meant that for several months someone had to be somewhere EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. OF. THE. WEEK. Not to mention it’s been germ soup. And with me running the Inn solo without any employees, it was borderline unsustainable, so we’ll see what we decide about next year…!

All that said, this place is so damn beautiful. Nothing quite like Mother Nature to keep you grounded.