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Jan 10, 2025 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski |Hazel Gaynor
When I was an awkwardly tall teenager, I worked in the children’s section at Barnes and Noble. (I’ve written about this before.) People often ask if I loved it, all starry-eyed, because working in a bookstore conjures images of You’ve Got Mail and New York City in the fall. Love is not the right word. I made seven bucks an hour, which was a lot back then. But I worked in a mall. I would get Crunchwrap supremes on my lunch break and bring a Baja blast back to the store.
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Dec 6, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski |Tomie dePaola |Nikki Grimes. One
I’m currently typing this the week before, from the Northwoods, where the snow is seven inches thick and still coming. I just ate leftover cranberry sauce, pulled on thick woolen socks, and admired the view of the glittery-cold lake from the back porch. My daughter recently asked me if winter is the last season of the year or the first season of the year. I told her that it’s both: it’s a transitional time, when growth feels dormant but much is still happening.
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Nov 19, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski
At this stage in my career, Iâve been interviewed many times. Iâm not, like, a Good Morning America regular. But Iâve been on a lot of podcasts and featured on a lot of blogs. Speaking events. A handful of magazine appearances. My small town newspaper, The Lakeland Times. Nearly every time Iâm interviewed, Iâm asked the same handful of questions. One that nearly always comes up is, when did you know you wanted to be a writer? And my answer is the same: always.
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Nov 1, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski
I posted on Instagram the other day that I felt like burnt toast, and I wasnāt lying. Iām weary in heart and spirit. I finally got the first draft of my next novel for adults turned in (yay!), and I basically took to bed like a Victorian woman with āhysteriaā. I pampered myself with TV, read a lot of books, and ate entire bags of jalapeƱo chips. This lasted approximately a day and a half before the rest of my real-world responsibilities called out to me.
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Oct 7, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski
Iāve so delighted in biking to school with my kids this autumn. Itās sharp + cold in the mornings, and the stream of bicycles reminds me of Copenhagen. All of the children come zipping and zooming down their driveways, shrieking to their friends, and we ride through the neighborhood before turning onto a leafy, tree-lined path to the schoolyard.
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Sep 9, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski
Iāve long been a summer girl, but this is the first year in a long while where Iāve greeted September with open arms. Itās hard to embrace autumn in Wisconsin; for a long time, all Iāve seen it as is the welcoming mat for the five-month hellhole that is soon to descend upon my muddy, wet-socked, red-cheeked life. But this year I found myself leaning more towards the Instagram Girlies that pull out their pumpkin mugs and turn on their Gilmore Girls while itās still 90 degrees out.
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Aug 9, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski
I’m currently sitting in an AirBNB in Sopot, Poland with two day sea hair. I’m attempting to stick to my goal of 500 words a day but it’s pretty tricky when jet lagged children who are out of clean underwear are arguing for more string cheese and more stories and more Nintendo. They have sand in their swimsuits and we’re all wishing we could have Diet Coke with ice or better yet, air conditioning. I swear, when we get home I’m walking straight up to the AC and cranking it down to like 50 degrees.
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Jul 10, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski |Sara Franklin
In Wisconsin, we wait all year for July. When itās warm enough to read late into the evening on the back porch under our brand-new twinkle lights with a summer shandy, and the lake with its curling and crashing waves is perfect for tubing. Thereās a reason so many of my books (What Happens Next, The Funeral Ladies of Ellerie County, Take It From the Top) are set in the summertime. Its magic is a thing to behold.
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Jun 17, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski
Friends, Pardon me for hopping in your digital living room an extra time this month, but I can finally announce something exciting Iāve been sitting on for a while. I have so much to say about this story, but let me start with this. After Funeral Ladies, I submitted an idea to my editor for my next book. HarperCollins owns my āoptionsā, meaning that they get a first look at any books I want to publish.
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May 2, 2024 | 
authorclaireswinarski.substack.com | - Claire Swinarski |Lea Michele |Ingrid Michaelson
(Let’s be clear: this is not rare.) It was just one of those days where nobody would listen, everyone hated each other, and the crabbiness was out of control. Nobody wanted to play outside or read or play Uno. I couldn’t muster up the energy for a Target run or playground adventure or library escapade. Nobody would eat a meal, but everyone wanted four granola bars.
