Hi friends,

Last night, while cuddled up on my couch in my messy apartment, I cried watching a livestream.

The crying part is not super unusual for me, to be honest. I cry at commercials, at the endings of books, at strangers' reunion videos that the algorithm decides I need to see. I cry when I'm happy or sad or mad or frustrated or otherwise processing big emotions.

But anyway, the point is that last night, I was watching the Artemis II livestream, and I completely lost it the moment they came back around from the dark side of the moon and reestablished contact with Mission Control.

If you haven't been following along, there are human beings in space right now, and they have traveled further from Earth than any humans have ever been before. That's emotional enough, but they also keep saying things from up there about Earth and about humanity and about what it looks like to see this whole messy planet from that distance, and it's wrecking me.

You are special, in all this emptiness. This is a whole bunch of nothing, this thing we call the universe. You have this oasis, this beautiful place that we get to exist together.

There is something about watching humans do the audacious, watching them be collaborative and hopeful in the middle of everything that's happening down here. Call them the light and dark sides of the moon: what we are capable of when we try, and what we are capable of doing to each other when we decide some people don't deserve the oasis. The cost of all of that, too—who gets to explore, who funds it, and whether that is money well spent while other things burn. (That last argument always gets complicated when you look at what else the money is being spent on, but I digress.)

The last time I cried, before the astronauts, it was about Our Sister's Keeper by Jasmine Holmes, which just so happens to have some of these same themes.

Our Sister's Keeper is set in East Cobb, Mississippi, a wealthy all-Black free town, meant to be untouched by white oppression. Thea Elliot and her husband Kid arrive with big dreams and find something that looks, at first glance, like everything they could have hoped for. But the town is haunted by ghoulish, walking nightmares that only the women can see.

Marah is a carrier: a woman with the ability to pull traumatic memories directly from men. East Cobb has flourished because women like her make it possible for men to live free of their pain.

It is, I think, one of the most precise and devastating explorations of what community costs (and who pays) that I have ever read. It is also a love letter to sisterhood. It is about audacity and collaboration. Jasmine writes with such tenderness, even in the horror. Especially in the horror, actually.

And while its final pages did indeed make me cry, the last time I cried about OSK, it was because it became real that people would have it in their hands soon.

See, the thing about acquiring a book is that you fall in love with it mostly alone, and then you spend months holding it while you wait for the rest of the world to catch up.

Which brings me to the news: Our Sister's Keeper has been chosen for Aardvark's April box, which means you don't have to wait until the June 9th pub date. You can have it right now. And not just early; This is an exclusive hardcover edition, the only way to get this book in hardback.

Aardvark is a monthly subscription box. They do a genuinely fantastic job of curating a diverse list and are a blast to follow on social media. And if you are new to Aardvark, you can use my code MAREAS to get Our Sister's Keeper for $4 (in the US). It's an unmatched deal, truly, and I hope you take advantage of it!

Meanwhile, pictures are flooding in of people receiving their copies, and every single one makes me cry a little. (See above re: my whole thing with crying.)

If you've already gotten yours, I want to see it. Tag me. Show me where you're reading it—on your couch, on your commute, in a patch of sunlight on the floor. Show me the oasis you made for it.

And if you haven't yet: the code is MAREAS, the deal is $4, and the book is waiting for you.

Finally, if you see me around and I'm weepy, it's either about the astronauts or about this lovely reading community.

Thank you, always.

♥️

Marines