By the way, I wrote a book

After a festival or a hike, my husband will ask, “Did you tell anyone about your book?” or “Did you mention you have a blog?” and I will answer “No.”
Honestly, I forget. And I’d rather talk about Mosquito Buckets of Doom or Caterpillar Host Plants or Native Habitats than talk about myself, even when “myself” is 100% relevant to the topic at hand.

So, I am extra grateful that Margaret Renkl let slip that my forthcoming book is finally coming forth.
She put two surprise shout-outs in her essay in The New York Times, “The Cicadas are Here, Singing a Song for the Future” (link). While quoting from one of my cicada Instagram posts, she mentioned my book, “This is How a Robin Drink: Essays of Urban Nature.”

“This is How a Robin Drinks: Essays on Urban Nature” releases September 24 from Trinity University Press. It’s my urban almanac. Not a field guide, not a memoir, not a how-to, but a collection of short, true stories through the year’s nearby nature.
From the publisher: “In This Is How a Robin Drinks, Brichetto weaves observation, reflection, and commentary with unsentimental wit and an earthy humor into an urban almanac of fifty-three short lyrical essays.”

I’m proofing pages right this minute, but a launch is scheduled for Monday, September 23 at Parnassus Books (6:30pm). And although I’m terrified to sit on a stool facing a row of people, I’ll be even more terrified if the stool faces empty chairs, so do stop by if you are free. The event is “in conversation” with Margaret Renkl, and I hope to bring some seasonal show ‘n’ tells.

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The book cover:
I don’t know if the cover is final or just a placeholder, but it is a funny coincidence. That photo—it’s my pic, my aphid, my fingertip—is also one of the photos in the hottest new TED talk in the Native-Gardening World.

Have you seen Rebecca McMackin’s “Let Your Garden Grow Wild”, (link) the excellent 12 min. video that shows the why and how to increase biodiversity in our yards? I’ve been recommending it to people as a quick and smart “way in” to the idea of adding native habitat at home.

Last year, Rebecca found my aphid pic in my SidewalkNature blog post about what to do about aphids (spoiler: “let predators eat them”), and asked if she could use it in her TED talk. And now this cute little aphid has been seen by about a million people so far.

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CICADA NEWS

But back to cicadas…
I also need to share the news that my front yard cicadas (and I) were on tv.

Thank you to News Channel 5 reporter Aaron Cantrell for asking why my Instagram feed is so cicada-heavy, and to Alex for happily filming emergence holes, empty exoskeletons, and lots of fresh, new cicada grownups.

My knees felt like water but I had fun, and I think they did, too. For this 2 minute video (link) they spent nearly an hour talking with me in the yard.

At one point, I got to be the Cicada Handler. You know, the one who stands out of frame with a handful of cicadas, so she can dart forward and place one on the reporter’s polo shirt before the camera rolls.

I almost said no thank you to this interview (talking is not my thing, what if I have a migraine, what if I look stupid) but Michael has taught me, again and again, that it is our job on this earth to make fools of ourselves for the things we love.

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Links:
-“This is How a Robin Drinks: Essays on Urban Nature” at Trinity University Press, here.
-Preorder from Amazon here, Barnes and Noble here, Bookshop.org here, Parnassus here, The Bookshop (Nashville) here.
-“Mosquito Bucket of Doom” DIY post, here.
-“Selective Squish: Aphids” post, here.
-“The Cicadas are Here, Singing a Song for the Future,” by Margaret Renkl in the NYT, here.
-“Let Your Garden Grow Wild” TED talk by Rebecca McMackin, here, and her website and newsletter sign-up are here.

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Bio:
Joanna Brichetto is a naturalist and writer in Nashville, the Hackberry-tree capital of the world.
She writes about everyday marvels amid everyday habitat loss at SidewalkNature.com and Instagram (@Jo_Brichetto); and her essays have appeared in Short Reads, Brevity, Ecotone, Fourth Genre, Hippocampus, The Hopper, Flyway, The Common, The Fourth River, and other journals.
Her book is forthcoming from Trinity University Press: This is How a Robin Drinks: Essays on Urban Nature.