march 2023

in which i renewed my commitment to project mel

I lied a bit at the start of the year when I implied I refused to have a New Year’s resolution because I did have one (although I didn’t actually start moving toward it until March began, so that wasn’t a lie), and that resolution was that in 2023 I would find my style.

I’m not 100% sure what I mean by that. I think I mean having hair that actually looks like it has been purposefully cut into a shape and isn’t just growing from my head (which it obviously is, but also, I think it can work a bit harder at the same time). I think I mean carrying a nicer bag instead of lugging around a Kanken backpack as if I were a Swedish schoolchild. I think I mean wearing clothes that are chosen to flatter and fit me properly, clothes that I love and delight in wearing, as opposed to a rotation of the same old shapeless floral shirred things I find myself living in now - I don’t want to look like I’m cosplaying a Jane Austen side-character on the Oregon Trail anymore. I have a kind of image in my head of who and how I want to be, and I am now, in March, finally, finally taking baby steps towards it. Project Mel, it’s called - a process of evolution. I think it’s going to take the whole rest of the year.

Which is annoying, because what I wanted was something between a fairy godmother transformation and a movie montage, where it just kind of happened, and I didn’t have to do anything really aside from be grateful, but nope, I have to work for it, slow-y slow-y watch it grow-y.

It’s writing, again. Like the jigsaw, I found another thing to do that wasn’t writing but is actually writing. Maybe this is just the lesson I’m supposed to learn this year. That you have to work for it and wait for it if you want it to really be worth it. There are worse messages, I suppose.

here she is, the old melinda, with her stupid backpack

Projects I’m working on (alongside Project Mel):

I am coming up to the end of the first draft of something new, and will hand that in in the next couple of weeks, and then I’ll take a break before starting the next instalment. I am spending weekend mornings revising the dark academia thing, and working on another project then, too.

I’m also waiting on the edit letter for the folk horror YA, which I’m told is coming at the end of this week, so I’ve scheduled some time to go and stomp angrily through the woods, lamenting the fact no one understands my artistic vision and genius, before I catch on to myself and start doing the work that will actually make it work of genius (it happens every time).

BREAKING News - I have a story in a YA anthology being published by Scholastic in autumn this year! On September 14th A Taste of Darkness will be released, containing thirteen spooky stories to savour over Halloween.

It’s been a goal of mine to be included in an anthology for years, so I’m thrilled it’s finally happened, and my story, Saint Clover, is the horrible thing I’ve been talking about these past few newsletters. More on this very soon, but for now, look at the lovely cover!

In personal news, I have done things! I completed the outline of my jigsaw (I have thus far gotten no further); I have refilled my story-well with other art and novelties! I went to two exhibitions! I saw The Horror Show at Somerset House in London, and Cloud Falls in Love with Mortal at Hastings Contemporary! I went to an independent cinema to watch the deeply weird Enys Men! I saw my very first opera, Rusalka, at the Royal Opera House! AND I HAD A HOWL’S MOVING CASTLE AFTERNOON TEA.

This is one of the best things to ever happen to me. If you ever want to catch me in a trap, bait it with Howl’s Moving Castle paraphernalia and I’ll walk right in and close the door after myself. I loved the book, and then I loved the film; I love it all.

The tea was at Selfridges, as part of a Studio Ghibli x Loewe collaboration, and it cost approximately £1,000,000, but it was worth it, and here are the photos to prove it!

the tea! THE TEA!!!

No updates for events, but maybe with the anthology coming out, I’ll get to do a few more later in the year!

I have been reading, but very eclectically. I’ve read proof copies of Bea Fitzgerald’s forthcoming steamy debut, bold Hades and Persephone retelling, GIRL, GODDESS, QUEEN; and Sarah Street’s also steamy debut, a Beauty and the Beast retelling set at sea with pirates, A CURSE OF SALT. Then I read Mieko Kawakami’s MS. ICE SANDWICH, Sequoia Nagamatsu’s HOW HIGH WE GO IN THE DARK, and James Read’s just-released non-fiction for fermenting enthusiasts (of which I am one!) OF CABBAGES AND KIMCHI. And I have finally, finally started Ali Smith’s SEASONS quartet, unseasonably, with AUTUMN and WINTER, and they are some of the most stressful books I’ve ever read, in terms of reflecting the full spectrum of humanity right back at me (the passport application/post officescenes in AUTUMN made me so anxious I had to put the book down and go for a walk).

The only thing I’ve watched is the Studio Ghibli animated Howl’s Moving Castle, twice, because the tea, and then my heart, wanted it. Which leads to what I cooked!

Or rather, baked.

A week after the tea, I still couldn’t stop thinking about it, so I decided to recreate a tiny part of it myself at home, with Calcifer cookies and a pot of Lapsang Souchong.

it was weird to eat things that clearly knew what was about to happen to them. look at them

To make the cookies, I followed Nigella’s Butter Cut-Out Cookies recipe:

• 175 grams soft unsalted butter/vegan butter substitute

• 200 grams caster sugar

• 2 large eggs/vegan egg substitute

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 400 grams plain flour

• 1 teaspoon baking powder

• 1 teaspoon salt

The full instructions can be found here, and I will say I chilled my dough overnight, then again for an hour once it had been cut out to make sure the cookies held their shape. Then I baked them per Nigella’s instructions and iced them once they were cool. I tried two different icing styles, one with edible gel pens and one with fondant icing I made by mixing red and yellow together.

And, not content with just the cookies, I took myself to Hobbycraft to buy Fimo to make the version of the stand-topper from the afternoon tea!

the amazing professional version on the left (with calcifer macaron), and my fimo recreation in the middle and on the right!

I liked the gel cookie faces best so I ate the fondant ones first, with two cups of smoky Lapsang Souchong while watching the film (for the second time that month) and it was lovely.

i had to varnish the topper with clear nail polish because i didn’t have any varnish, so i thought twice about putting the cookies on it, but you know what? my fingernails were varnished in the same thing and they sometimes end up in my mouth while i’m eating, so i risked it, and i survived. that said, i’m legally obliged to tell you NOT to try this at home

And so to magic, which this month has been the sowing of seeds in tandem with the new moon. New moons are the best time for sowing any seeds, literal or less-so; it’s a time for new starts, to take leaps forward, to begin new projects and set things in motion, and so, on the night of the new moon, in my kitchen by candlelight (for vibes and also to save electricity), I planted the first seeds of the year.

This is an easy magic, because all you need are seeds and something and somewhere to grow them in. I sowed two different kinds of cherry tomato, basil, rosemary, thyme, chives and perilla in my hydroponic unit - I don’t have a garden, or even a balcony, so it all has to happen on the inside kitchen windowsill. Tomatoes self-pollinate almost all of the time, and we don’t need the herbs to be pollinated, so indoors is fine!

To do the magic, I simply placed a seed in its little pot and imagined it breaking free, growing up, and reaching for the sky. I thought about how happy I’d be when I saw those first green shoots and all the things I would do with the fruits and herbs once they were grown. Then I wished them well.

Say it with me kids, it grows because you tend it.

See you next month x