What We Built, What We Still Need

$20,000 act of care, two essays that won’t let me go, and truth I can’t be quiet about.

I don’t normally do a traditional newsletter format. Most of you know this. My attention tends to drift toward longer reflections and essays, as I try to make sense of the moments. But today, there are a few updates I need to share. So bear with me. This may read more like a bulletin than a meditation, but even in the small notes, the story is still there—trying to shape itself into something worth holding.

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We Raised Nearly $20,000 For Women In Shelters

One of my favorite writers, Joan Didion, once said “We tell ourselves stories in order to live.”

I believe we also tell ourselves stories to remember.

This Women’s History Month, we remembered the women too often overlooked—the ones who are starting over, again and again, in quiet rooms behind shelter doors. The ones who left with nothing but survived anyway.

Because of many of you—your kindness, your generosity, your belief in something bigger than yourself—we raised nearly $20,000 through my non-profit, We Have Stories. There are now over 150 women receiving sweatsuits, blankets, undergarments, cookware, towels, lotions. Simple things, but when you're rebuilding, simple things are sacred.

You didn’t just give money. You gave warmth. Dignity. A reminder that even now, especially now, people care.

There’s no way to say thank you that feels adequate. But thank you. And a special thanks to my dear friend, Heidi Bailey, who is such an integral part of our efforts.

You can see some of the donations below—proof that a different kind of world is possible, one small act at a time.

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What’s Coming Up?

Over the past several weeks, I’ve been quietly shaping a few essays—thinking deeply, writing slowly. I wanted to offer a glimpse into what’s forthcoming, if only to let those who’ve followed my work know what I’ve been wrestling with.

The first piece, publishing next week, centers on the film Magazine Dreams. It is, perhaps, one of the most intricate and unflinching portrayals I’ve seen of how this country constructs the interior collapse of a Black man. There’s no way to discuss the film without also acknowledging the complicated figure of Jonathan Majors—his history now intertwined with the work itself. Still, I left the film haunted not by scandal, but by recognition. The quiet violence of invisibility. The hunger to be enough. I saw my own wounds mirrored back to me in the slow undoing of a man very few truly saw until it was almost too late.

The second essay, slated for the following week, is one I’ve been drafting for months. It’s about the Internet’s ongoing demand for Black labor—uncompensated, unseen, but expected all the same. My lens is Substack, where I examine the stark disparity between Black and white writers: how white writers with fewer total subscribers often receive far more paid subscriptions than Black writers with larger audiences. It’s not simply an economic gap—it’s a reflection of how white supremacy continues to distort notions of value, voice, and worth. This is not new. This is lineage. From the plantation to the present, the expectation remains that Black expression should serve, should entertain, should educate—but should never truly be compensated. This piece traces that expectation and asks what it means to be a Black artist in a digital world that still mirrors the architecture of an old and violent order.

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Let’s Be Honest: Forthcoming Book and Paid Subscriptions

Too much of what I’m about to say has already been said—by me, by others—but it bears repeating, particularly as it pertains to the ecosystem of support for Black artists, and more specifically, Black writers.

Let me begin, as I often do, with what is good. My forthcoming novel, THIS THING OF OURS, has received strong praise from Booklist and Publishers Weekly, and a glowing write-up in Kirkus Reviews. The last two were starred reviews. Meaning the book is good. It is necessary. It speaks to the urgent matters of our time: family, book bans, community, bigotry, and the fight to find one’s voice amidst the noise of systemic suppression. It is, in every sense, a book that believes in young people and demands better of all of us.

And yet.

While I’m not at liberty to share pre-order numbers, I can say this plainly—they aren’t great. Statistically mind boggling, even. I’ve spent years building a community—here, across social media platforms—with nearly 400,000 following or subscribed to my work. And yet, less than .5% of my social media followers have pre-ordered this book. Which is nearly the same as the roughly 1% who have chosen to support my Substack with a paid subscriptions.

This is not a shaming. This is not a callout. This is a reckoning. One, I will again unpack further in a few weeks.

I understand—truly—that not everyone has the financial means to purchase every book or become a paid subscriber. Which is precisely why I offer the majority of my work for free. But there’s another truth I must name: when I look across the publishing landscape, and across Substack, I see my white counterparts receiving a different kind of support. Tangibly. Consistently. People are making choices—and too often, those choices do not include investing in Black work.

So I’m offering the choice again.

Below, you’ll find two buttons. One to become a paid subscriber, if you are able. Another to pre-order THIS THING OF OURS—a novel that, while technically written for young adults, is, I believe, for anyone who has ever tried to find their voice in a world determined to silence it.

And if you’d prefer to pass it forward, you can also donate a copy to The Lisa Libraries, who send books to underserved schools, nonprofits, and libraries across the country.

The Lisa Libraries
Ellen Luksberg, Executive Director
77 Cornell Street, Room 109
Kingston, NY 12401

Support matters. It always has.