What's my deal?

Or: what you'll be getting from this newsletter

Hello cruel world!

Yes, here’s yet another newsletter entering the ether. A little bit on who I am, why I’m here, and what I’m hoping to do here:

I am a cultural critic currently working on my first book, a work of narrative nonfiction called American Orphan. It’ll be coming to you via Bold Type Books at some point in the not-so-distant future. The book melds memoir, social history, and analysis to deconstruct America's obsession with fictional orphan stories—from the many iterations of Annie to Orphan Train, from Party of Five to The Queen's Gambit—and reflect on the gap between these myths and the lived experiences of dependent children from the 1800s to the present day. Along the way, I reveal how classicism, racism, and religious charity have always decided who gets to have a family.

In addition to writing American Orphan, I’m also a freelancer who writes a lot about books and culture (and sometimes about myself in relation to those things). My writing has been published in places like The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic, The New Republic, NPR, and elsewhere. You can check out some of my clips here.

For the past decade or so (!), I’ve mostly been sharing my work on Twitter, but given the instability over there—and the limits of that space—I’ve been reflecting on how else to reach readers who might be interested in some of the same things I can’t stop thinking about, both related to my book and to my freelance work. Hence this newsletter, or blog, or whatever you want to call it.

I’ll be sending missives here every so often to share bits of research related to my book, to share my freelance work as it’s published, and to share links to things I’m reading that are broadly related to either the world of orphans or the world of books and culture. On the American Orphan side, you can expect thoughts on largely forgotten slices of American history through the lens of children considered to be “orphans,” notes from many hours of watching too many different versions of Annie, and stories from the archives. On the freelance side, I’ll share links to my book reviews, essays, and journalism.

First up, coming soon: a report from my recent visit to Carlisle, Pennsylvania, the site of the former Carlisle Indian Industrial School and what it has to do with orphans. Plus some recent book reviews!

xoxo Kristen