Voting, Mimes, and Motheater

Welcome to the Stone Soup Weekly Digest! This is where I share what I'm up to and some of my favorite things from around the internet. Subscribe to Stone Soup to get this in your inbox every week.

Hello my friends! I am writing to you today from Napa, where the sun outside my window is dappled and the air is sweet. I’m on the other side of a somewhat hectic move to a new home (not Napa) and some travel (that should solve the mystery of why I am in Napa even though this isn’t where I moved). I hope life is treating you well.

You may be aware that in November, the United States will hold an election. If you are eligible to vote in this election, it’s absolutely vital that you confirm your voter registration status. Voter rolls are being purged and tampered with on a regular basis throughout the United States, so being previously registered to vote is not a guarantee of your current status. 

• Click here to learn your current voter registration status
• Click here to register to vote in your state

For the past several months, I have been sharing links and resources with you to support our neighbors in Palestine, who have been suffering a brutal and sustained attack by the government of Israel. The ongoing genocide in Gaza is not inevitable or unstoppable. We have the power to help the people who need us right now. Here are a few new ways you can do your part, and a few ways to help that remain evergreen.

• Support the United Nations relief efforts in Palestine here
• Donate to the Palestine Children’s Relief Fund (PCRF) here
• Purchase from Palestinian-owned business – here’s 15 Palestinian brands, 8 Palestinian Etsy Shops, and a portal full of Palestinian goods 
• 6 ways you can support Palestinians in Gaza
• Gaza Funds, a website that gathers crowdfunding campaigns from people in need in Gaza
• Check out Operation Olive Branch, which helps fund medical evacuations
• Connect with Jewish Voice for Peace
• Use Resistbot to contact your representatives

Heliotropia is Available for Preorder

Manahil Bandukwala is a spectacular poet. Her second collection is available for preorder right now. Described by her editor Sonnet L'Abbe as follows: "A meditation on love during times of social and political upheaval. As a sunflower’s growth reaches toward the sun, so, she suggests, is a lover’s growth compelled by the gravitational pull and soul-light of their beloved…

“Against a backdrop of terrestrial crisis, come, spend your precious minutes in love’s Heliotropia, where we are magnetized by the unfathomable dark matter of another person, and know ourselves as celestial bodies flowering in spacetime, together.”

Also, if you’re in Ottawa or Toronto, there’s going to be a book tour in September/October. 

• Ottawa: Saturday, September 21st at the Manx Pub
• Toronto: Friday, October 4th at Another Story Bookshop

Watch The San Francisco Mime Troupe’s American Dreams Free Online

The Tony Award-Winning San Francisco Mime Troupe in their 65th Season Presents: AMERICAN DREAMS - A New Musical.

The show is now streaming through September 8th! This recording is available to view free of charge by using the promo code: powertothepeople

While this show is free to view, it is definitely not free to produce! If you want to support the Mime Troupe, you can visit sfmt.org/donate-americandreams to make a donation.

Currently Reading: Motheater by Linda Codega

After her best friend dies in a coal mine, Benethea “Bennie” Mattox sacrifices her job, her relationship, and her reputation to uncover what’s killing miners on Kire Mountain. When she finds a half-drowned white woman in a dirty mine slough, Bennie takes her in because it’s right—but also because she hopes this odd, magnetic stranger can lead her to the proof she needs.

Instead, she brings more questions. The woman called Motheater can’t remember her true name, or how she ended up inside the mountain. She knows only that she’s a witch of Appalachia, bound to tor and holler, possum and snake, with power in her hands and Scripture on her tongue. But the mystery of her fate, her doomed quest to keep industry off Kire Mountain, and the promises she bent and broke have followed her a century and half into the future. And now, the choices Motheater and Bennie make together could change the face of the town itself.

Barnes & Noble | Bad River Website | Local Library | Find an Indie Bookstore

Featured New Release: Glass Houses by Madeline Ashby

Luckily, those who survived have found a beautiful, fully-stocked private palace, with all the latest technological updates (though one without connection to the outside world). The house, however, has more secrets than anyone might have guessed, and a much darker reason for having been built and left behind.

Kristen, the hyper-competent "chief emotional manager" (a position created by her eccentric, boyish billionaire boss, Sumter) is trying to keep her colleagues stable throughout this new challenge, but staying sane seems to be as much of a challenge as staying alive.

Being a woman in tech has always meant having to be smarter than anyone expects--and Kristen's knack for out-of-the-box problem-solving and quick thinking has gotten her to the top of her field. But will a killer instinct be enough to survive the island?

Barnes & Noble | Bad River Website | Local Library | Find an Indie Bookstore

If you’re a paying subscriber, drop by the Stone Soup Supper Club! I’m planning a massive menu and need your thoughts on recipes that work well to feed twenty people. I can’t wait for your suggestions!

—Gailey