Welcome!
I started Survival by Book with the hypothesis that reading a printed book is a quietly radical act: untrackable, unhurried, and independent.
Today, Survival by Book offers a bookish lens on how culture and politics shape our everyday lives. With a searching, at times iconoclast, but always hopeful point of view, SBB weaves together personal stories with wisdom gleaned from great books to parse what it takes for the soul to survive.
Required reading for anyone interested in rewriting the life-scripts that got handed to them toward something more beautiful and true.
My life story is long: pregnancy at 19, Ivy Leaguer, ex-evangelical, mom, wife, teacher, divorcée, leftist, technology worker, experimental gardener, fast-talking American, and on and on. I write about books and also films, television, memes, politics, culture, podcasts—you name it, I’m an equal-opportunity opinion-haver.
Issues come out semi-monthly and are free. Paid subscribers get access to occasional behind-the-scenes content and the group chat, first looks at new concepts, and the satisfaction of knowing you’re supporting a working writer.
Here’s my professional bio:
What readers are saying about Survival by Book
If you don't already subscribe, you really ought to. Courtney is a whip-smart writer, a lover of books and words, and a . . . force to be reckoned with.
Courtney is at her best—that’s saying something—when telling her own story. She writes things that remind me of parts of my life; so different but somehow exactly the same. A gift.
–Judith Solberg, creator of Doodle Dispatches
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