In January of this year, I began to see what AI was doing, and I fell into something like a depression or a suffocation. I could barely speak about it. For four decades, I had attached myself to the art of writing with ropes so thick they could pull me through any of life’s muck. But this year, I began to feel the fibers fraying in my hands, and I started choking on mud.

Sometime in February, I had a meeting with Zach Schisgal, a publisher at Wiley. We talked about what AI was doing to the industry. With downcast eyes (for me, or for him, I'm not sure), he told me that Wiley had just become the first publisher to announce that they would accept works fully written and developed by AI. 

"We want to get ahead of the curve," he explained. Two weeks later, Wiley released their official guidelines for AI writing. 

The following week, I met with a literary agent at Aevitas. When I asked about AI, she insisted that agents can tell when writing is good and when it is bad, and good writers have nothing to worry about. "Publishers don't want AI junk," she said.

This, my friends, is what we call "a freakin' pipe dream." Ninety-five percent of published writing is already junk. So if AI can write that--and can do it in seconds--how exactly is the industry going to survive? More frightening, the language models are advancing so quickly that we, in fact, don’t know what levels of literary genius these machines might be able to reach.

April came. By now I had crawled out of my depression and replaced it with something like "the dogged pursuit of meaninglessness."  I painted, I worked on my children's books, I polished my novel (it's about a teen chef in Utica). 

Once again, surprise, art was proving to be infused with meaninglessness—or perhaps the right word phrase is “birthed from meaninglessness.” And all my years in Nepal, hanging out with Buddhists, should have reminded me that meaninglessness is not the place for despair but rather the place for unfettered joy. No, let me correct that: the place for joyful unfettering.

I have no idea what the future holds for my work, for our work. But what I do know is that I’m alive, and while I’m alive I want to feel and to love and to hurt and to make. Wrinkle my skin with paint, cover my bones with words. We live. Unfettered, we live.


→  If you want to learn more about AI, I highly recommend the Hard Fork podcast from the NYT and the TLDR AI Newsletter. 

I swore on my life I would walk away from social media without a blink. The blah-blah of the Internet has been unusually annoying, and I just don’t feel like being around it anymore. It has ruined the best minds of my generation. It has ruined mine, too.

I nearly succeeded at walking away from it. I suspended my social media accounts and lasted three weeks without even peeking at Reddit or the New York Times or whatever other powdery drugs are peddled into my palm every day.

But then a literary agent, whom we’ll call Miss Floofy, rejected my picture book series like a champ and told me that anyone who has any hope of getting published neeeeeeds to be on Instagram. It was a non-starter, she said. Agents and publishers and readers want to see your inner world.

It all felt very 2010, if I’m honest, because as far as I can tell, the Internet is totally broken for anyone with an old fashioned thing called “a soul.” Besides, most writers lead rather mundane inner lives (photos of tea and cats can only go so far). If I could make the rules of publishing, which I can’t, I would declare that writers abandon the sport of marketing altogether and leave it to the billions and billions of cheery non-writers in the world.

And so, here we are. I’m back on Instagram and I’m promoting “my brand.” I want to vomit.

All this brings me to David Foster Wallace who, in my opinion, is the greatest writer of the 90s and possibly the greatest writer of the 20th century. I say this having never stomached the full Infinite Jest (though it recently rose to top spot on my 2025 To Do list). Instead I speak of DFW’s transcendent essays, the collections of which sit substacked on my nightstand, next to a puppy-eyed Bible. Sometimes I swear I hear God’s voice coming out of them and saying, “See Kate, I gave the world a second son.”

Unlike God’s first son, most people have never heard of DFW. That is fine. Most people have never heard of most people. He wrote about a lot of things, but he especially loved to write about tennis. He was an avid player and enraptured fan, and his tennis essays were collected in a gorgeous little book called String Theory. (This book is the best gift you can ever get a tennis fan, unless your tennis fan doesn’t like to read, in which case, I don’t know, get him custom wristbands). I read a little bit of String Theory every week, return to it a little later, re-read it, and so on. I’ve done this for years, even though it’s a tiny thing, much tinier than a Bible, which I’ve barely thumbed.

This week I read a little of String Theory out loud to Christoph—my tennis fanatic of a husband. (I myself play a little tennis. I’m terrible at it. But it is a part of my life now because Christoph is a part of my life now.)

I read him DFW’s brilliant and hilariously scathing critique of Tracy Austin’s memoir, Beyond Center Court. Tracy Austin is a player whose name is all but unrecognizable to most people today, but in 1980—at age FOURTEEN—she became world number 1. This was, and is, one of the most spectacular sports feats of all time. The tennis world quaked apart and showed a lode that nobody knew could exist.

When given a chance to describe her career to readers, Tracy Austin sums it up like this:

“It was tough.”

and:

“I won easily.”

Here’s an athlete with one of the most interesting stories of all time—and this is how it is told?

Poor DFW writhes at this. And writhes at this. And in bubonic agony, he takes laugh-out-loud shots at Austin’s inability to articulate herself.

But he goes on to argue that it’s perhaps all very simple: professional athletes are pretty much incapable of articulating their experience to the rest of us. Athletes (the very good ones) are dumb as rocks when it comes to their sport (but possibly not elsewhere in their lives) and the rock-substance-between-the-ears is exactly what makes them so utterly brilliant. In other words, they need the cold, blank slate to achieve their earth-defying feats on the court (or other surfaces). He writes:

It may well be that we spectators, who are not divinely gifted as athletes, are the only ones able truly to see, articulate, and animate the experience of the gift we are denied. And that those who receive and act out the gift of athletic genius must, perforce, be blind and dumb about it—and not because blindness and dumbness are the price of the gift, but because they are its essence.

DFW is an aesthete with a sesquipedalian vocabulary. You picture his sort in high school and you wonder just how many lockers braced for impact each time he walked by. But then you realize that actually, probably, he never once found himself on the fist-side of a bully because there is something superhumanly kind about this guy. Even when he is eviscerating a writer’s work, he is doing it not to mock them but to show the world just how much of an unrecognized genius this person is, a genius whose talent transcends the common bits of human language that the rest of us “literary types” are forced to dink around with. Somehow he pulls off his whole argument without ever sounding like he is picking a fight with the jocks, but rather like he is begging for a chance to stand at the dimmest boundary of their glow.

Ahh, so at last we loop back to my point. It’s brief:

The essay on Tracy Austin got me wondering whether being a writer and trying to market your own brand is anything at all like being a writer and trying to be a professional athlete. The two sides of the soul use such different fuel that they risk burning down the whole lab—rendering both “The Art” and “The Marketability of the Art” basically cindered. We’re all lame now, our whole mash of creativity and branding just dumb, and if Miss Floofy is right, there is no way out of it for a budding creator like myself. I don’t have a cat, and I don’t have a typewriter, so here—have my inner gibberish about God’s second son.

This cartoon was inspired by the Nantucket Book Festival as well as by my work on Colie Cobble. I have been deeply submerged, some might say like an old whaler, in all things Nantucket.

As anyone who has read Colie Cobble knows, Macy’s Mermaid Hotel was going through some seriously tough times until the cobblestones came along. Together they helped transform Macy’s bed and breakfast into Nantucket’s most popular hotel.

Immerse creative kids in the captivating world of Nantucket with my exciting paper craft project. Recreate the enchanting Macy's Mermaid Hotel right at home!

This project is included in Colie Cobble: A Nantucket Story and Craft book.

Bring Fiction to Life: Construct a Miniature Macy's Mermaid Hotel

Step into the pages of Colie Cobble and embark on a journey to Nantucket's whimsical streets. This paper craft project allows children to bring the charming Macy's Mermaid Hotel to life with their own hands. They'll love assembling and decorating their very own miniature version of this fictional gem, creating a tangible connection to the magical world they've explored in the book.

An Afternoon of Creativity: Unwind with a Captivating Craft Activity

When the day calls for a relaxing indoor adventure, this paper craft is the perfect solution. Let your child's imagination flourish as they spend a lazy afternoon bringing Macy's Mermaid Hotel to life. As they cut, fold, and glue, they'll find joy in the process and create a cherished keepsake that captures the essence of "Colie Cobble" and Nantucket's enchantment.

A Magical Connection to "Colie Cobble": Inspire Young Readers

This paper craft project serves as a delightful bridge between the imaginative world of "Colie Cobble" and your child's creativity. It encourages engagement with the story and fosters a deeper connection to the characters and settings. Watch as their excitement and love for the book grow while they engage in this hands-on activity, making memories and igniting their passion for storytelling and adventure.

Like most of my projects, I’ve designed a full-color version as well as a black-and-white version.

And guess what: I’ve got more paper houses and other Nantucket craft ideas on the way. I can’t wait. Subscribe to my newsletter for updates.

Have you completed this project? Send me a pic!

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Unlock a world of endless creative possibilities with these adorable Nantucket Cobblestone Character Cards. Each mini card showcases a unique cobblestone character from Colie Cobble, capturing the essence of Nantucket's famous streets and playful charm. From memory games to gift tags, ornaments, banners, standing dolls, mobiles, and stickers, these versatile cards offer endless opportunities for imaginative play and artistic expression.

Like most of my projects, this PRINTABLE DOWNLOAD comes to you in full-color and in black-and-white.

So many creative Nantucket-themed activities in one download!

Memory Game Excitement: Challenge your memory skills with my Cobblestone Character Cards. Cut out the pieces, mix them up, and place them face down. Take turns flipping two cards at a time to find a match. If you discover a match, take another turn. The player with the most pairs at the end wins! Enjoy hours of family fun while exploring the cobblestone world of Nantucket.

Gift Tags or Ornaments: Add a touch of charm to your gifts or decorate your tree with our Cobblestone Character Cards. Cut out the pieces and use a hole punch to create a small hole at the corner of each card. Attach them to your gifts using colorful ribbons or hang them as ornaments. Let the whimsical characters of Nantucket bring joy to your celebrations.

Create a Playful Banner: Transform your space into a Nantucket-inspired wonderland with a playful banner made from our Cobblestone Character Cards. Cut a 9-foot length of string and leave a foot of string at each end for tying. Arrange the cards in any order you like and secure them to the string with tape. Hang the banner on a post, wall, or doorway to infuse your surroundings with the spirit of Nantucket.

Standing Dolls for Imaginative Play: Bring the cobblestone characters to life as standing dolls! Create small cardboard stands for each character by folding a piece of cardboard into a "V" shape and gluing it to the back of the design. Now you can engage in imaginative adventures with these delightful cobblestone friends.

Craft a Whimsical Mobile: Craft a mesmerizing mobile using our Cobblestone Character Cards. Create matching pairs and attach them to strings. Once you have your strings ready, hang them from a coat hanger, a stick, a bar, or any other suitable "handle." Watch as the cobblestone characters dance and twirl, adding enchantment to any space.

Custom Stickers for Personalized Fun: Unleash your creativity by turning our Cobblestone Character Cards into custom stickers. Print the sheets on adhesive paper and cut out the designs to create your own unique stickers. Add them to scrapbooks, journals, artwork, or any other creative projects that deserve a touch of Nantucket charm.

Storytelling Adventures: Encourage children to create imaginative stories featuring the cobblestone characters. They can use the cards as visual prompts to inspire their narratives and develop their storytelling skills.

Scrapbooking Delight: Let children incorporate the Cobblestone Character Cards into their scrapbooking projects. They can use the cards as decorative elements, embellishments, or even as themed pages in their Nantucket-inspired scrapbooks.

Miniature Playsets: Cut out the cobblestone characters and create small scenes or playsets using cardboard boxes, paper, or other craft materials. Children can design their own miniature Nantucket town and bring their stories to life through imaginative play.

Collaborative Art Projects: Encourage group creativity by inviting children to collaborate on a large-scale art project using the Cobblestone Character Cards. They can combine their cards to create a mural, collage, or a collaborative storybook showcasing the cobblestone characters.

Educational Sorting and Categorizing: Use the cards as a tool for educational activities. Children can sort the characters based on different criteria such as colors, professions, or activities. This activity promotes cognitive skills like classification and logical thinking.

DIY Puzzles: Transform the Cobblestone Character Cards into personalized puzzles. Children can cut out the characters individually and then reconstruct the images by piecing them together, challenging their problem-solving abilities.

Role-Playing and Skits: Encourage children to act out short skits or role-play scenarios featuring the cobblestone characters. They can create dialogues, develop characters, and showcase their creativity through dramatic play.

Let the cobblestone characters of Nantucket spark your imagination and bring joy to every activity!

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I was made speechless yesterday by the strange connective tissue that exists between horror and the sublime. I sat at my desk and read, for the first time, The Party: A Mystery by Jamaica Kincaid, with illustrations by Ricardo Cortés.

The story immediately captivated my unapologetic Cinderella complex. Three girls find themselves in a palatial museum, eavesdropping on a resplendent gala. The architecture is extraordinary, and the girls’ eyes widen as they admire the dresses and cakes of the upper class.

As the story continues, things become more complicated for these partygoers. Two of the girls witness something. Or realize something.

Something.

The “something” is never disclosed, and when we arrive at the end of the book, we immediately find ourselves turning back the pages and trying to solve the mystery for ourselves. The illustrations unfurl their elegance all over again, but this time, we are left with an intuition that the girls’ horror is of the existential kind. Something has shaken these little ones, and they are at a loss for words.

This strange silence infuriates the smallest girl who begs for words. The older girls never tell her. It’s as if they want to protect her, just a little longer, from a realization that has suddenly and decidedly dashed their girlish dreams.

Kincaid and Cortés have so much to say, and it is their silence that says the most.

I could try to go on here, but writer Gabrielle Bellot does such a better job of describing the mysterious power of this book than I can. Read her thoughts on The Party here.

Is The Party by Jamaica Kincaid a good book for kids?

Many children will be disappointed by the deliberate untidiness of this book. Others, with a little encouragement, will enjoy probing the book’s hidden layers. At the very least, they ought to be able to relate to the rage of the littlest girl who has been excluded from the conversation, as littlest children so often are. They will also, surely, enjoy losing themselves in the powerful illustrations.

But this also makes an excellent book for older children and even, or especially, for adults. I do not think it would be too much to refer to The Party as an “art book” or as a “graphic novel.” It transcends the normative, which is precisely what makes it such a strong representation of both the uncanny and the sublime.

Awards can be deceiving.

That’s a cliché, but it’s one we should all tattoo on our foreheads—for ourselves, for others, for the gods in between. They are buoyed by political whims and aesthetic fads, and we know this. We know this. But still, every year, everything that glitters is gold.

Any time a children’s book comes across my desk, which is often, I try very, very hard to read it without worrying about which awards it received, who reviewed it, or who published it. It’s darn near impossible, and the unconscious bias of these stamps of approval steals my mind, again and again, away from my heart.

And so I was especially fortunate to recently read a copy of Doug Salati’s Hot Dog (Knopf, 2022) without having any idea that it had won any awards at all. When I plucked the book from the shelves of the Boca Raton Public Library, it was nothing more than an anonymous block of paper, wobbling somewhere in the Leaning Tower of Pisa I held in my arms:

What a perfect experience it is to fall in love with a book without being told that you really ought to fall in love with the book.

To lose your heart to a picture book, without prejudice, is to slip away to that long-departed essence of childhood. That was the time, so quiet, so still, when we were not servants to the algorithmic stars of Amazon, or to the armchair nods of NPR, or to the brazen tricks of medals and seals. You fell in love because you fell in love.

I fell in love on Saturday with Doug Salati’s Hot Dog. It is a book with only a few words—if I were to count them, I think I’d find less than 100. Instead, it tells its story - and it is very much a story - through illustrations that beam with feeling. A restless dachshund swelters under the heat of New York City and begs his owner—an older, red-headed woman—to take him out of the city.

She relents, taking him on the train to a New England island. (Salati has created artwork for the Nantucket Atheneum Dance Festival, so of course I have my fingers crossed that Nantucket is the nameless island.) The dog’s joy is infectious, and as he splashes and sniffs along the seashore, you cannot help but swell with delight. You want to reach into the pages and fling the nearest wand of driftwood across the sparkle and spray.

The story felt all the more refreshing in the summer of 2023 when all of us have been feeling like sweltering dachshunds ourselves.

The irony of all of this is that by the time I got finished with this book, I said repeatedly, “Man! Somebody should give that book the Caldecott!”

Well.

See more of Doug Salati’s work at his website and Instagram.

In 2017, illustrator Jean Jullien collaborated with Amnesty International to turn John Lennon’s iconic “Imagine” song into an illustrated children’s book.

That probably seems like a great idea to most kind-hearted humans who care at all about things like world peace and the future of humanity. While I do care about these things, I am generally a grinch, and when I picked up this book at the library, I was certain it was going to be a flop.

I was sure that Imagine was going to be the kind of project that well-intentioned adults create for themselves and then hoist on their poor children. After all, it’s adults who idolize John Lennon, and children need a hell of a lot of context to understand why this iconic song locked itself into the Western world’s heart so tightly. That context includes things like: what is heaven, why wouldn’t we want there to be one, what are nations, what is war, and the biggest one of all: what the heck is death (which adults can’t seem to answer very well for themselves, let alone for their offspring.)

Now that I’ve gotten all of that out of my system, allow me to reveal that reading this children’s book adaptation of “Imagine” moved me deeply, and I think it might even move the right kids, too.

On the first page, we see a man on a crowded subway. He looks disillusioned by something beyond his control. A pigeon with an olive branch in its mouth trots happily past him, which he does not appear to notice. Then we see the words:

Imagine there’s no heaven.

It’s easy if you try.

How familiar these words are to us. We would recognize them on any t-shirt or bumper sticker. How strange they must be to a child! To experience them, a child must first imagine a heaven, then must imagine that it does not exist, then must wonder if this is an easy thing to do or a difficult thing to do, and if it is a difficult thing to do, why? So much happens here on this first page! Life, death, self, other, up, down!

Then there is the scene. Why are we talking about heaven and non-heaven here at a subway stop? What’s up with this man? What’s up with this bird?

I imagine an adult reader presenting this first page to a child. They might be bit giddy, and misty, and maybe they can’t stop themselves from humming a little. The child on their lap must think, “How exciting!” As they mull the words and the images over in their head, everything starts to feel upside down. This is no ordinary book.

In a very strange way, this book achieves exactly the dismantled universe that Lennon proposes in his lyrics.

I’m not sure whether children would enjoy this untethered experience. I really do not know. But it’s certain that very is something very beautiful at work here, and I am so grateful to experience it at my ripe old age. I will return to it, as I have to the song, again and again.

Colie Cobble loves crossword puzzles, but is this one just too difficult for him to solve? See if you can help him out!

Click here for the answers!

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Don’t mess with Nantucket’s police department! The island has two sheriffs: one human and one very strict cobblestone! When Buddy Biggins and Barnstable try to pave the cobblestones, they are in for a big surprise.

Download this Nantucket coloring sheet to celebrate the island’s victory!

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Macy’s Mermaid Hotel needs a little refurbishing, shall we say. Help Macy add some color to these mermaids to make her hotel sparkle!

This free downloadable coloring sheet is perfect for children ages 3-7. Simply print from home and get coloring!

Still haven’t read Colie Cobble: A Nantucket Story? Check it out here!

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Buddy Biggins and his contractor are feeling pretty great about their plans to pave Nantucket’s cobblestone streets! It looks like even Barnstable the cat is in on it! Give these characters their colors back so they can realize Nantucket’s cobblestones are the island’s biggest tourist attraction!

This coloring sheet is free to download, and is a great activity for children ages 3-7. Simply print from home and get coloring!

Still haven’t read Colie Cobble: A Nantucket Story? Check it out here!

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Darth Vader? Ursula? Voldemort? These villains have nothing on Buddy Biggins.

Readers of Colie Cobble know that Buddy Biggins is the meanest man on Nantucket. He and his cat Barnstable want to turn all the open land into buildings—into skyscrapers, to be exact—and he’ll stop at nothing to pave the famous cobblestones!

The first Colie Cobble costume I’ve made is a Buddy Biggins costume because I know how much fun it is to dress up as a villain. There’s actually some pretty interesting child psychology behind the joy of embodying the bad guy (in short, kids are able to act out their fears and learn their boundaries). But I’ll skip all that and just say that this Buddy Biggins download is one of my favorite projects yet.

As with most of my projects, the download comes with a full color version AND a black and white version, so there’s no excuse not to get busy.

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Macy’s Mermaid Hotel is the most enchanting hotel on Nantucket Island. That’s why I put together this mermaid craft to celebrate this most charming bed and breakfast. This activity is perfect for the mermaid fan in your life, with five different mermaids of varying skin tones and hair color.

When the beach is too much and town is too crowded, this is a calming activity for a lazy afternoon.

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Colie Cobble has made a mighty mess of his words. Can you help put them back together? He could use all the help he could get.

This activity includes three illustrations of Colie Cobble for little ones to color.

Hey grownups: think this is easy? Think again! I stumped Christoph!

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Colie Cobble and his friends on Nantucket love a good par-tay, and they especially love one with you. As they say, “Let’s rock!”

My printable party decoration packet includes a black and white version AND a full color version so you can plan your party exactly as you wish.

You can prepare this project before your party or as a DIY craft activity with your guests. The cake toppers make excellent party favors, if I do say so myself.

Wanna kick your project up a notch?

I recommend you get your hands on a 2.5 inch hole punch. You can read my thoughts about these nifty things here. It will allow you to make crisp, perfect circles and it will save you time & physical therapy bills. But it’s definitely not a requirement, and good ol’ scissors will do just fine.

I also suggest you use card stock, though again, it’s certainly not a requirement. Read more about the card stock I recommend, and my other tips for printing.

SUPPLIES YOU'LL NEED FOR THE BANNER:

• card stock (preferred, though regular printer paper is fine too)

• scissors

• tape

• string/yarn - 9 feet

• crayons/markers/pencils (optional)

SUPPLIES YOU'LL NEED FOR THE CAKE TOPPERS:

• card stock (preferred, though regular printer paper is fine too!)

• scissors

• tape

• glue

• 4” long tooth picks

• crayons/markers/pencils (optional)

SUPPLIES YOU'LL NEED FOR THE GIFT TAGS:

• card stock (preferred, though regular printer paper is fine too!)

• scissors

• hole puncher

• string

• crayons/markers/pencils (optional)

Hi! I’m Kate.

I am a writer and illustrator. Thanks for visiting!

I first created these Easter eggs for The Squirbles a few years ago and am filled with joy every Easter when I take them out to celebrate the holiday. Oh wait. I keep them out all year long because they are so stinkin’ adorable. And NOT stinkin’ stinkin’. I blow them (and rinse them) before I dye them, so they’re fresh as a chicklet’s down. (Something like that.)

This is an easy Easter craft activity for children (with a helping hand from your deadbeat babysitter).

The project includes six cobblestone characters:

• Colie Cobble

• Lulu Cobble

• Bo Cobble

• Dr. Massachewsitz

• Ms. Tick

• Sheriff Sparks!

Get to know more about Colie and his friends right here.

Like most of my projects, this download includes a full-color version and a black & white version.

Well, isn’t that swell.

A few suggestions to make this DIY project a super hit:

1) Get yourself some card stock. Your kid deserves it (maybe?).

This project will be better with card stock, but ok fine, don’t sweat it if you don’t have any. (Be sure to check out my tips for printing my downloads.)

Card stock is not as intimidating as it sounds. (Am I the only one who gets nervous meeting new papers?) It is also surprisingly affordable, at least as of writing.

Astrobrights makes a card stock that is the best deal on the internet, and believe me, I’ve done my research, for once.

2) Don’t forget the toilet paper.

Yes, sage advice, generally in life.

In this case, don’t forget to fold a small piece of TP into the bottom of your craft. You only need 1/4 of a sheet. It will absorb any lingering liquid inside your shells. In the photo below, I dried the eggs for 24 hours, and STILL there was a little water inside of them.

3) Prop your eggs up vertically

When you dry your eggs, it’s a good idea to lean them against something to prop them up. This will allow excess water to drain.

Send me pics!

I’d love to see your finished work, and so would Colie. Happy Easter!

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