Important: Moving Kadambari to WordPress
Hello, this is just a short post to announce that all future essays written for Kadambari will be posted on my blog. I will keep up this archive for those who found the book through Bear, but I will not make any other updates here.
Why so? I realised after writing all these essays that I am not creating something that’s very distinct in substance and format from the kind of writing I often do on my blog. Moreover, I have spread myself too thin right now. Yet I don’t want to give up working on Kadambari, nor do I want to neglect my blog as I have in the past. Merging the two would help me accomplish both goals without my having to do twice the work.
As I said in a recent blog post, I’m posting Kadambari’s first draft online as I write it because I hoped to work with readers, get some feedback, and answer questions I hadn’t thought of. I recently invited such feedback on my blog, but a lot of my blog readers aren’t reading Kadambari, and vice-versa.
Having this book on the blog will make it easier for readers to give feedback through my contact form (which I prefer over comments) and for them to follow the book by subscribing to the blog via email—following blogs on Bear isn’t easy.
I don’t have a separate newsletter for the book; I think there are too many newsletters to keep track of already, so I don’t want my existing readers, many of whom receive my blog posts in their inbox, to have to sign up for another one.
Perhaps I should have never started a separate website for Kadambari in the first place. But at that time I was feeling a hundred different things about blogging, and also despairing about the enshittification of the internet, so it felt like joining a genuine and human community at Bear would help.
And I do love Bear and all the tiny, wonderful, personal blogs I’ve discovered because of it. I have also recommended it to a friend who wanted a blogging platform that was simple and focused on the writing part of blogging (as opposed to all the branding and commercial customisations).
However, it would be better for me to move Kadambari to my blog on WordPress so that I can keep writing this book (which I’m really enjoying), blog (which I’ve loved for years), and have enough time and energy left over to focus on my work as a freelance writer and a postgrad student.
I am visiting family here in a small village in the middle of India right now. For at least another week, I’ll be traveling and spending time with relatives we get to meet only once a year. I won’t be able to avoid all work, of course, but unpaid work (such as this book) will have to take a backseat.
Over the next two weeks, I will publish on my blog each of the essays released so far. Once that’s done, I will write new essays directly on my blog, along with a weekly (?) writing log of the process.
I also won’t be able to respond to emails, although I will be checking my inbox, so if you have any feedback about Kadambari or any questions about the art, craft and business of writing that you want me to address through the essays, do get in touch.
Finally, if you’ve found the essays useful and/or enjoyed reading them, consider supporting the project on Ko-Fi. All comments and contributions and even views and likes are very deeply appreciated!