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Becca Worby

@beccaworby.bsky.social
365 followers 413 following 35 posts

I'm here, I guess! Writer, sometimes. Editorial director of Reasons to be Cheerful, an online magazine founded by David Byrne. She/her. rebeccaworby.com

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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Thanks Jaime!! It feels really good! And hard, but not all the time? To quote the wise Sarah Perry responding to my hand-wringing about too much "me" in the pages: "Be careful about your resistance to the work that feels easier." 🏆
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
...that I need to hang on my wall and suspect could help other writers: "You’re a deliberate writer. Trust your own process" "You instinctively know what you’re doing" "You’ve been practicing for this for years" (I love my writing group)
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
1) Always take Jaime's writing advice 2) I'm writing more these days and maybe will start using this account to post about it?? 3) While we're talking process, I recently shared (rough!) pages with my writing group for the first time since baby (about to turn 1!) and here are 3 things they said...
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Jaime craft book WHEN
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 28/10/2025
Thank you Jaime ❤️❤️❤️
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
and when you do have the go-ahead, turn on track changes before you implement edits 🙏
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 24/03/2025
we need a boat to get stuck NOW
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Erin McReynolds @erinmcreynolds.bsky.social · 11/03/2025
“We are the arsonists and the fire department.” An absolutely beautiful essay by my friend @beccaworby.bsky.social
lithub.com
The Best Story Collection About California Wildfires Isn’t a Book—It’s a Brand-New Record
On a summer afternoon early in the pandemic, the songwriter Will Stratton was riding his bike near where he lives in the Hudson Valley when he had an experience that felt strange at the time but ha…
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 11/03/2025
Thank you Erin 💕
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 07/03/2025
Come for the discussion of @willstratton.bsky.social's gorgeous record, stay for the wild tangent about an arsonist who was also a fire investigator!!
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𝑾𝑰𝑳𝑳 𝑺𝑻𝑹𝑨𝑻𝑻𝑶𝑵 @willstratton.bsky.social · 07/03/2025
Deeply grateful to Becca for this long read, a mixture of personal climate essay based on her own time in California, and overview of the scope of my album based on a conversation we had last month. Thanks again Becca 🙏
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 07/03/2025
For @literaryhub.bsky.social, I wrote about "Points of Origin," songwriter @willstratton.bsky.social's beautiful new short story collection about California wildfires — which happens to be a record lithub.com/the-best-sto...
lithub.com
The Best Story Collection About California Wildfires Isn’t a Book—It’s a Brand-New Record
On a summer afternoon early in the pandemic, the songwriter Will Stratton was riding his bike near where he lives in the Hudson Valley when he had an experience that felt strange at the time but ha…
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 04/03/2025
We can't be having news like this right now. I'm going to need somebody to check on that "remarkably plump" beaver in Chicago immediately
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Jaime Green @jaimealyse.bsky.social · 05/02/2025
extremely stupid timing what with the coup and all, but My spring teaching fell through and I'm looking for work. I do developmental editing for nonfiction books, copyediting & proofreading, and I've worked as an editor for essays and science journalism, too. Freelance or part-time. jaimegreen.net
jaimegreen.net
Jaime Green | author and editor
Jaime Green is a freelance writer and editor. She is the author of The Possibility of Life, and she offers online writing classes and editing services.
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Jaime Green @jaimealyse.bsky.social · 28/01/2025
still some space!
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 27/01/2025
The Philadelphia Wife would be the best of all the wife books
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Jaime Green @jaimealyse.bsky.social · 06/01/2025
Maybe it fulfills your New Year's resolution, maybe it's a Valentine's Day gift to yourself: Scrivener for Creative Writers is back, 2/15 at 1pm ET. 📝📚✨ Info & registration at jaimegreen.net/classes, some testimonials below:
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Reasons to be Cheerful @reasonstobecheerful.world · 02/01/2025
Happy New Year! Welcome to our annual look back at the boldest, most surprising ways the world has changed for the better. This epic list is a treasure trove of hopeful facts, each linked to one of our stories from 2024. We hope it brings you joy and inspiration for the year ahead. ow.ly/fhuE50UyMbs
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 17/12/2024
For a while I tried to send a new application out after each rejection, but that got expensive 🫠
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
So exciting! Somebody tell the Longform boys that this is how you do it!!
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Krista Langlois @cestmoilanglois.bsky.social · 02/12/2024
If you're a writer who has had an essay collection or literary memoir published by an independent press, I would love to connect with you and hear more about your experience. Happy to share more about my own journey in a DM. Thank you!
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 26/11/2024
Congrats to you both on a great series!
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
I currently have 1 book ready for pickup and 5 in transit .... and I already have 8 books checked out. I live 2 blocks from my local branch and my holds are my joy 😬
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Happy rainy day, NYC
Leg mannequins stick out of a cart on a rainy NYC street.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 20/11/2024
Hey look, @rtbcheerful.bsky.social has arrived! Don't let the name fool you: RTBC publishes rigorous solutions journalism. Give us a follow for a daily dose of hopeful news.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 20/11/2024
Recently I've had multiple (nonviolent) dreams about cats and raptors. Like imagine there's a cat sitting tall with its back to you and when you look again, it's a hawk. I'm here to tell you this happened to me FOR REAL on a run this morning. Saw a sitting creature, assumed cat, and then it flew.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
"I think this is important: memories and ideas happen in a place. An essay is a place for ideas; it has to feel like a place. It has to give one the feeling of entering a room." I have been thinking about this Elisa Gabbert essay every day since I read it. www.thegeorgiareview.com/posts/the-es...
thegeorgiareview.com
The Essay as Realm - The Georgia Review
When I was nine or ten years old, my grandmother gave me a book full of so many random, interesting facts and tidbits of science and history I sometimes think it’s the secret source of all my adult ob...
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
"I also saw it at the Public" had me cackling, thank you for that
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Margaret Eby @margareteby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
YOU GOTTA EAT is finally out in the world! It’s a Cheetos and caviar for breakfast kind of day!!!! bookshop.org/p/books/you-...
bookshop.org
You Gotta Eat: Real-Life Strategies for Feeding Yourself When Cooking Feels Impossible a book by Margaret Eby
A trained chef teaches you how to keep yourself fed--and maybe even enjoy it!--in the face of stress, burnout, and exhaustion. Delivery is expensive. Eating a spoonful of peanut butter is depressing. ...
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
Or editors of any kind, for that matter. Even a generally good editor is probably not a good editor of their own work!
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Long ago, I used social media to share things I read and loved. It's a nice thing to do, so maybe I'll do it again on this here platform — starting with this total joy by Elizabeth McCracken on libraries as "engines of optimism": texashighways.com/culture/texa...
texashighways.com
Texas Libraries Are Engines of Optimism
At the frontline of their communities, libraries connect people to information, resources, and each other
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 13/11/2024
Unsurprisingly I loved this. I wrote an eerily similar essay about Dirt Cat, the cat I fell in love with while lonely in Santa Barbara. It has been rejected by numerous prestigious lit mags but maybe will see the light of day eventually 🙃
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 23/01/2024
Just here to scream into the void about the LA Times layoffs!!!
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Kea Krause @keakrause.bsky.social · 11/12/2023
A few years back, magic happened in Maine when two dams on the Penobscot were removed and *millions* of sea-run fish returned. I wrote about the effort and joy for Reasons to Be Cheerful with edits from the brilliant @beccaworby.bsky.social:
reasonstobecheerful.world
'Take It Down and They'll Return': The Stunning Revival of the Penobscot River
A historic project in Maine shows that when dams are removed, a river and its fish can recover with surprising speed.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 25/10/2023
Always astonished and delighted to find out how many wild cats out there are no bigger than house cats news.mongabay.com/2023/10/meet...
news.mongabay.com
Meet Japan’s Iriomote and Tsushima cats: Ambassadors for island conservation
Japan is home to two rare subspecies of leopard cat, one found only on Iriomote Island and the other on Tsushima Island. Neither larger than a housecat, each subspecies has an estimated population of ...
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 11/10/2023
My velvet potato sends her regards
A cat looks regal and potato-like with her legs all tucked in.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 05/10/2023
Weird. Thank you for looking, Nicole!
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 05/10/2023
This led me to find the archived version of my Catapult piece from 2016. It, uh, hits different now. All that musing about leaving NY, which I did not long after this was published, is pretty weird to read now that I just moved back after 7ish years in CO, CA & TX 🤸‍♀️ web.archive.org/web/20230127...
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 05/10/2023
Thank you! It's ok, and not your fault obviously. It's called "The Desert Half." Looks like the last archive.org capture is from January of this year: web.archive.org/web/20230127...
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 05/10/2023
Mine seems to be gone-gone. Adding "magazine" brings up a blank page, and the search bar doesn't bring up anything for my name or "the desert half." I have a pdf of it somewhere, but still a bummer.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 05/10/2023
So it's not just me! The piece of mine that Catapult published is one of my favorite things I've ever written. I went looking for it a few weeks ago and emailed their general contact address. Never heard back.
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 31/08/2023
(They were all about NYC waterways, which I am again thinking about again since I'm living here again 🙃)
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 23/08/2023
I don't know how to post anymore so here's what I just texted to a friend: I just read this story and I LOVE it, it is extremely my thing, I will be thinking about it all day. electricliterature.com/find-water-n...
electricliterature.com
Even the Smartest Phone Can't Find Water in a Desert - Electric Literature
"Find Water Near Me," a short story by Jessie Ren Marshall
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Becca Worby @beccaworby.bsky.social · 10/07/2023
For my first post here, I'm letting you know that the bears are back in the stream. The bear stream is back. Watch the bear stream. Bears in a stream. Eating salmon. It's beautiful. Enjoy. explore.org/livecams/brown-bears/br…
explore.org
Brown Bear Cam - Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park | Explore.org
Watch LIVE as hundreds of Alaskan Brown Bears descend on a mile-long stretch of the Brooks River to feast on the largest Sockeye Salmon run in the world.
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