Hi dear ones –

Been a long while, friends. I hope you’re well. Last time we talked, it was to mourn Hal­cy­on the Destroy­er, Team Nerka’s too-bold-for-this-world adven­ture cat who left us too soon. Today I’m back to share hap­pi­er news. 

I’m thrilled to announce that my first book, What Water Holds, enters the world today, pub­lished by Emp­ty Bowl. Hap­py May 30^th birth­day, dear first­born! Here’s the flap copy:

Tele Aad­sen met the ocean as a child when her par­ents trad­ed jobs as vet­eri­nar­i­ans for a migra­to­ry life shared with sea birds, salmon, and fish­er­men. In the mist of the Ton­gass rain­for­est, Tele learned to explore life with­in end­less shades of gray, com­ing to know first­hand how fine the line between life and death and the pre­car­i­ous bal­ance of sea, land, and sky. She’s spent the four decades since trolling for salmon in South­east Alaska. 

In What Water Holds, a series of lyri­cal essays first shared at Oregon’s Fish­er­Po­ets Gath­er­ing, Tele exam­ines ques­tions of equi­ty, iden­ti­ty, com­mu­ni­ty, the chang­ing cli­mate, and sus­tain­abil­i­ty with lov­ing, detailed atten­tion, reveal­ing the com­plex­i­ties with­in their many shades of gray. Weav­ing sto­ries of what lies beneath the sur­face and the pos­si­bil­i­ties beyond, What Water Holds speaks to any­one who has fall­en under the spell of the sea, strug­gled to find their own unchart­ed path, and wres­tled with big philo­soph­i­cal ques­tions — in short, any­one seek­ing to live a full, deeply con­sid­ered life.

Emp­ty Bowl is a small lit­er­ary press in Chi­macum, Wash­ing­ton… and I couldn’t have imag­ined a bet­ter, just-right-for-me part­ner­ship. Hol­ly Hugh­es and John Pierce have been dream edi­tors, and how’s this mis­sion for a per­fect fit of val­ues? “…to pub­lish work shar­ing Emp­ty Bowl’s found­ing pur­pose, lit­er­a­ture and respon­si­bil­i­ty, and its fun­da­men­tal theme, the love and preser­va­tion of human com­mu­ni­ties in wild places.” What Water Holds wouldn’t be here with­out their warm invi­ta­tion and gen­er­ous labor. I’m grate­ful for the unwa­ver­ing sup­port, enthu­si­asm, and care they showed for both book and author. 

One of the unique joys of part­ner­ing with Emp­ty Bowl was Hol­ly and John’s trust in my vision for this book. Ear­ly in our process, Hol­ly asked if I had ideas about the cov­er art. I did. I want­ed to sup­port the work of a Sit­ka artist, and who bet­ter than Lisa Teas Conaway, an artist whose work I’d long loved, who I met at the Back­door Café through her salmon trolling part­ner. I’m thank­ful Lisa was will­ing to take on this project, and am in awe of her intu­itive skill, some­how cap­tur­ing the vague image in my mind’s eye and cre­at­ing a cov­er far more beau­ti­ful than I’d imag­ined. Send­ing these words into the world dressed in Lisa’s gor­geous art… An honor. 

So – how to order your copy of What Water Holds?

Thank you for choos­ing to buy direct­ly from Emp­ty Bowl, or from your local inde­pen­dent book­seller. Bil­lion­aires don’t need our sup­port. The peo­ple nur­tur­ing writ­ers, read­ers, and more thought­ful, think­ing com­mu­ni­ties do. 

Want to express sup­port with­out hav­ing to spend mon­ey? Thank you for:

* ask­ing your local book­seller or pub­lic library to car­ry What Water Holds

* shar­ing a link to What Water Holds

* leav­ing a review on Goodreads or Ama­zon (Don’t need to give them your mon­ey to give your opinion!)

* post­ing pic­tures with a copy, or shar­ing favorite sentences

* sug­gest­ing What Water Holds to your book club or com­mu­ni­ty group. (I’m hap­py to explore readings/book con­ver­sa­tions in per­son or by Zoom.)

* sug­gest­ing an event venue and help­ing to coör­di­nate a reading

What else, sweet­ies? I’m new to this – do you have thoughts of addi­tion­al ways to wel­come What Water Holds into the world? Thanks for shar­ing your ideas in the comments.

Speak­ing of thanks… 

Many of you have been here since Hooked launched in 2011. Those ear­ly days of blog­ging were a pow­er­ful learn­ing expe­ri­ence, equal parts writ­ing prac­tice and com­mu­ni­ty build­ing, con­tem­plat­ing my rela­tion­ship with writ­ing and what I want­ed it to be. Through Hooked’s posts and your respons­es, I explored seem­ing­ly dif­fer­ent iden­ti­ties (com­mer­cial fish­er­man, writer) and found points of con­nec­tion. You were my teach­ers. Your will­ing­ness to engage helped me learn how to find uni­ver­sal human expe­ri­ences in sto­ries set in com­mer­cial fish­eries, how to write in ways authen­tic to fel­low fish­er­folk and mariners while remain­ing inclu­sive and acces­si­ble to land friends. You were here through my first book jour­ney. While that book didn’t end up mak­ing it into the world (yet), your sup­port and encour­age­ment was a life­line through that dis­ap­point­ment, and nur­tured the space for this one instead. You helped cre­ate a kind com­mu­ni­ty here, a safe place for me to grow as a writer, and although I’ve long neglect­ed this page, I remain deeply grate­ful for your pres­ence. Then and now, thank you.

I hope you enjoy What Water Holds, friends. I’ll be stand­ing by, wel­com­ing your thoughts, and will update the Events page as we get read­ings sched­uled. (As of now: June 20 in Belling­ham, 6 – 7:30 at the Squalicum Boathouse; June 25 in Port­land; Sep­tem­ber 2 in Olympia.) Sign up if you want infre­quent updates; I’m tru­ly not orga­nized enough to over­whelm your inbox!) Thanks so much for reading. 

With salmon love,
Tele