What my Substack is "About."

Because maybe some of you don't know.

Hi reader!

Did you know that every Substack newsletter has an “About” page? This is a place where creators can share a bit about themselves and also let readers know what to expect from their subscription, should they choose to subscribe.

Here’s what mine currently looks like:

START-

Beautiful, Daring, Stupid is the latest chapter in an ongoing series of passion-fueled, human-generated storytelling experiments, lovingly conducted by yours truly, Meg Oolders.

“Meg Oolders is a brilliant, incisive writer of contemporary fiction and poetry. Brimful of emotion and beautifully crafted dialogue, her stories speak eloquently of the characters whose tales she tells.” – Barrie Thompson (Feasts and Fables)

“Meg deserves to be read. Her writing is as dark as it is funny and as funny as it is moving and vulnerable.” - Ben Wakeman (Catch & Release)

“The Girl with the Donut Fingers was the first story I read by Meg. I knew I had found gold. And the nuggets keep coming. If (like me) you enjoy a variety of creative stories from a creative mind, then subscribe and enjoy the riches of Meg’s writing.” - Mark Starlin (Mark Starlin Writes)

At forty-five years young, I am still a work-in-progress.​

A fellow writer once described me as “a tenacious survivor of a ferocious fight of feral identities.” I proudly resemble the remark. In truth, I have a diverse resume of jobs worked, passions explored, and dreams deferred, including decades of work in the theater, music, and culinary arts. For the last twenty years I’ve been a wife, and for the last thirteen years I’ve been a mother. I have always been—and will always be—a writer.

As a novelist, I can’t resist writing about people falling in love, especially young people, and my books are ripe with humor, hope, and emotional heroism. My short-form style on the other hand is equal parts empathic, evocative, edgy, and experimental.

I have been writing for attention publicly since 2022, when I launched my first newsletter, Stock Fiction. Prior to that, I wrote five novels in blissful isolation. And somewhere in the middle I started a newsletter all about love stories, which has since merged with its predecessor to become Beautiful, Daring, Stupid, the composite publication you’re currently reading “about.”

My goal for this project is simple:

To provide open-minded people who value integrity and personal connection with a steady stream of eclectic story media.

This may include any or all of the following human-generated content offerings …

Stock Fiction – a dynamic anthology of short fiction, poetry, humor, and multimedia experiments inspired by stock photography

The Romantic – essays devoted to the thoughtful, passionate, and occasionally ruthless dissection of everyone’s favorite (or least favorite) story genre

Not Fiction – non-fictional musings on my writing journey, my mid-life metamorphosis, and the peculiar places they intersect

WATCH THIS SPACE - Make way for my “official” debut: SEE DOT SMILE (Empress Editions, fall 2026!) Watch this space for news, highlights, and milestones on my publishing journey!

Talk Fiction – a podcast dedicated to entertainment media’s most overlooked underdogs: Fiction writers

If you subscribe:

Beautiful, Daring, Stupid gifts will grace your inbox no less than once a quarter and no more than once a week, depending on the season. In the meantime, you can explore the BDS archive of over 130 stories, poems, essays, humor rants, podcasts, and multimedia experiments. If you encounter a paywall in your travels you may perform one of four maneuvers to get around it:

• Take advantage of the 7-day free trial offered at the paywall break

• Become a patron of BDS (and its creator!) for just $6/month or $36/year.

• Drop $20 into my “Author in Progress” tip jar to receive a full calendar year’s access to move through the BDS archive at your leisure. No “subscription” required.

• Contact me and request a 1-month freebie. I’m very nice.

Thank you for reading “about” Beautiful, Daring, Stupid, a mercurial space for fiction and honesty. If you’ve decided to subscribe, thank you again!

If you truly value the work showcased here, please don’t hesitate to share it with your friends. Your word of mouth is my bread and butter.

-STOP

Not only that, but when someone subscribes to my newsletter, they’re sent a welcome email which thanks them for coming aboard and reiterates my goals and intentions behind the content I will be sharing with them.

I bring all of this up, and perhaps I’m preaching to the choir here, because there’s been a disturbing new trend on my dashboard that I’m trying to understand, and I thought maybe you could help me out with that.

Warning: Those sensitive to graphic depictions of heartbreaking metrics may wish to look away.

My subscriber "growth” since September 1st. 😟

Friends, visitors, and natives of this tiny island of internet real estate,

I have been engaging with this “newsletter” project—passionately—for over three years, and have always experienced slow but steady subscriber growth based on the quality and consistency of my writing, my commitment to good literary citizenship, and the generosity of fellow writers who have chosen to recommend me to their readers. Until about three months ago, when I returned from a brief (and necessary) summer hiatus, refreshed and ready to bring my authorial A game.

Since my return, I have seen no notable subscriber growth and instead have been met with a very discouraging decline in subscriptions that “stick,” with a fresh boat of deserters setting sail, seemingly, every time I post.

Is it me? Am I being too much? Not enough?

Does my newfound joie de’ vivre offend?

Truth be told, if anyone is abandoning ship because I’m being “too much” of myself, there’s not much I can (or will) do about that. I know I’m not for everyone.

But, what’s the deal?

I realize I’m asking the wrong people. I mean, you’re still here, after all. And not at this very moment reaching for the escape hatch. Right?

Do you think people who subscribe to this newsletter might feel I’m not delivering what I promised them when they signed up?

In your experience as a Beautiful, Daring, Stupid (formerly The Romantic, formerly Stock Fiction, always Meg Oolders) subscriber, am I adhering to my own “about” ness? Or am I going completely off the rails every week?

Lastly, if you’re a writer on this platform, have you noticed a similar distortion of your “growth” chart over the past few months?

Let’s talk about it?

By the way, this is not about my ego as much as it’s about the future of my writing career. I have an amazing book coming out next fall and it is paramount I attract as many loyal hearts, minds, and eyeballs to this space as womanly possible in the next ten months so I can properly prepare them to embrace their new favorite firecracker of a coming-of-age love story.

So, my dear reader, if you happen to like, love, or simply respect what I’m doing here, please, for the love of good literary citizenship, share my work with a friend and encourage them to subscribe!

Yours very truly,

Meg O.

P.S. Did you happen to catch my most recent podcast interview with the beautiful, daring, stupendous Mr. Troy Ford?

We had a marvelous time being ourselves together. Join us!