The Writing Shed gift guide

Some of my favorite things

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

This week, in lieu of my normal 10 links, I thought I might roll out my first Writing Shed gift guide—some ideas for the writer or other creative person in your life. Many of these are tools I use day after day in my work, and they’ve come to be my favorites after many years of trial and error.

FYI, beyond numbers 1 and 2, I don’t make any money off of these … I don’t get any Amazon commissions or anything like that. In fact, when I can, I always link directly to the product page. I recommend this stuff because I like it.

1. If you enjoy this newsletter—and if you’re reading it, I hope that means you do—consider giving a gift subscription. Then you and the giftee have a ready icebreaker every time you talk! I’m always happy to make human conversation a little easier. Giving a gift subscription is super easy—just mash the button:
   

2. I also humbly submit that one or both of my books would be a fine gift. You already know, if you’ve been subscribing to this newsletter long, that I have a deal with Park Road Books for DOGLAND—if you preorder through them, I’ll sign and inscribe the book however you like. But if you’d rather order through your local store, or one of the big chains, that’s fine too—the Simon & Schuster page has links to Amazon and so forth. Right now you can order a hardcover or ebook, and I’m pretty sure we’ll have an audiobook available later.
   My first book, THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM, is available pretty much everywhere in all formats. It’s about weight and weight loss, so please give with kindness and empathy, but I do think it can be a meaningful gift. If you order through Park Road, I’ll be happy to sign those, too.

3. Let me also recommend some books from my friends:

   — Joe Posnanski’s WHY WE LOVE BASEBALL, a New York Times bestselling book of essays about great moments in baseball history
   — Ryan McGee’s WELCOME TO THE CIRCUS OF BASEBALL, a very different baseball book, about Ryan’s wild summer as an intern with the Asheville Tourists minor-league team

   — Gavin Edwards’s MCU (co-authored with Joanna Robinson and Dave Gonzales), another NYT bestseller about the origin and development of the Marvel Cinematic Universe
   — Kim Cross’ IN LIGHT OF ALL DARKNESS, a powerful true-crime story of the 1993 kidnapping of 12-year-old Polly Klaas
   — Max Marshall’s AMONG THE BROS, another true-crime tale about a massive drug ring centered around fraternity members at the College of Charleston
   — Gary Gulman’s MISFIT, about Gary’s journey from kindergarten through 12th grade, and the people who helped make him who he became
   — Kate Medley’s THANK YOU PLEASE COME AGAIN, a beautiful photo book about gas-station food throughout the South

4. On to the tools: My favorite writing tool of all time is the AquaNotes waterproof pad and pencil. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve used these to capture ideas I otherwise would’ve forgotten before I ever got out of the shower.

5. The notebook I use for my daily journal is a Moleskine—small, so it can fit in my back pocket; soft cover, so it can bend when I bend; and ruled, because I like having lines even when I don’t write on them. I’ve been using these for 15 years now and I’m on notebook #86.

6. Calendars are a tricky thing—everybody’s mind works a little differently, so a layout that works for one person won’t work for others. The one that works best for me is a Moleskine weekly planner—it’s the size of a magazine and gives me lots of room to jot down notes and to-do lists.

7. Every newsroom I’ve ever worked in has kept a stash of Portage reporter’s notebooks. They fit great in a pocket or purse and the sheets don’t get hung up on the wires as much as with other brands.

8. I don’t have a favorite pen for taking notes—I generally use gimme pens from hotels—but I do love black fine-point Sharpies for signing books, and silver Sharpies for marking the covers of my Moleskines.

9. A game our family discovered when having Thanksgiving dinner with our neighbors: Blank Slate. Everybody gets a palm-sized whiteboard and dry-erase marker. One person reads from a card that has part of a word on it; for example, PRO____. Your job is to finish the word however you like (PROPANE, PROJECTOR, PRODUCE, etc.) You get points if your guess matches someone else’s guess. It’s fun, fast and easy to figure out. Great dinner-party game.

10. Finally, here is the most important recommendation of all, a perfect gift for any very small child, dog or cat: a cardboard box. Babies don’t care what you give them; they’ll happily spend hours with wrapping, ribbon and an empty box. Dogs and cats love them even more because they’re puzzles and chew toys in one. Our cat happily shreds boxes and old grocery bags for an hour or so every day; he lets loose some pent-up aggression, and all we have to do is sweep up the shards. (Be a little more careful with dogs. They might treat the boxes as food, because dogs consider every substance in the universe as food.)
    
    Back next week with book updates and my regular links. Although I can’t leave without mentioning the passing of Shane MacGowan, the brilliant and boozy frontman for the Pogues. It’s fitting, I guess, that he died here at the beginning of Christmas season, because he’s responsible for one of the finest Christmas records ever made: “Fairytale of New York,” his duet with Kirsty MacColl. She’s gone now, too. Raise one to them both this Christmas day.
    

    
    Have a great week, everybody.