Sara R. Cleveland's Blog
June 9, 2023
Sequels & Things
Today UPS dropped two boxes of books on my front porch. I placed the order with Nook Press a week ago and their communication about it was copious, so the delivery wasn’t a surprise; my feelings as I unpacked the box were.
Opening a box of your own books never gets old, even when they’re just a restock of existing works. At least, I really hope it doesn’t. I never want to be immune to the pure rush of joy that opening that box can bring.
Except for Courting the Dragon.
Over a third ...
February 19, 2023
Regarding Kindle Unlimited
After much debate, I have decided to pull Bared Magic from the Kindle Unlimited program. I will not be enrolling Cursed Magic in KU upon its release later this year.
It wasn’t as easy decision, or one that was made quickly. All my other books are already, and have always been, widely available. Offering Bared Magic through KU was an experiment; I always intended to revisit my participation in the program. Recent events have simply given me the push to get off the fence.
Bared Magic is a...
January 22, 2023
Nightfall – The Impavidus Cycle Book Two
I haven’t had much of a chance to do sequel reviews, so this is exciting! I reviewed Birthright all the way back in March of 2021. This month I finally had a chance to sit down and read its exciting follow-up, Nightfall.
*** Important note. I did my absolute best to write this without spoilers and that was HARD. So if I don’t talk about certain things in the book, that’s why. ***
The cover of Nightfall is absolutely gorgeous. I love the art that features a different main charac...
January 14, 2023
From the First Draft: Bared Magic
While working on Cursed Magic I frequently find myself referring back to the text of Bared Magic because I’m a scatterbrain who can’t maintain a world bible to save her life. This morning, among the various haphazard world-building notes, I found a sort of deleted scene from Bared Magic. Well, not so much as a deleted scene as an original version of a scene that’s still in the book. In the book, the scene is viewed from Callum’s perspective. This first version actually has us hop into the head o...
January 8, 2023
Grief
This post is more than a bit overdue, but I think I’m finally ready to talk about it. The end of 2022 I somewhat vanished from the internet. I didn’t send out newsletters in October, November or December. My social media presence has been spotty at best. And I didn’t publish either of my anticipated novels. I feel that I owe my readers and subscribers some amount of explanation for these things.
My paternal grandmother, who I had not been able to visit for several years, passed away in late S...
November 6, 2022
My Current Writing Beverage of Choice
Many of you may have noticed that I was somewhat absent from the internet during the month of October. I had a few tweets here and there, but I was largely offline compared to my usual routine. I have a blog post about all that half written, but it’s just a heavy topic and I think I want to make my comeback to the blog a little more lighthearted. So, I’m treating y’all to a “what’s Sara’s current favorite writing drink?” recipe blog instead!
No breakroom mochas or faux pumpkin spice lattes he...
August 2, 2022
Creating Seasonal Realism in Fiction: The Wheel of the Year
What are the four seasons in Ohio? Almost Winter, Winter, Just Like Winter, and Construction.
Like many good jokes, there’s a kernel of truth to this punchline. Some years it seems like spring and autumn vanish in the blink of an eye, blasting through our lives in a week before saying adieu for another year. And of course you know it’s summer when the orange barrels come out. Still, here in Ohio we experience the seasons in their due time, even if we’re sometimes to busy to notice.
In many...
June 21, 2022
Embers of Fate
So, before we get into this review, I have a disclosure to make. I was a beta reader for Embers of Fate, and therefore technically a part of the process that brought it out into the world. Some may see that as a reason for bias and that’s totally cool. Take what I say with a grain of salt. That said, I freaking love this book and let’s get into the review.
If you’d like to read my review for the first book in the series, you can do that by clicking here.
At the time of this wr...
May 20, 2022
Mirrors & Ashes
It’s been a hot minute since I went on blog review hiatus. I’m still working on catching up on my review backlog and regular reviews are not back yet. However, I read a book with a monthly book club this month that I felt deserves more discussion than a quick paragraph on Goodreads. I didn’t think I could review the book fairly unless I went through my full rubric and looked at the different facets of it individually. Before I get into the review, I want to give some backstory. I think the conte...
March 3, 2022
My Cowardice
Twice now, I’ve backed down from calling out books I thought contained language that was, at best, problematic. Honestly, that’s being rather generous. Specifically, I hesitated to call out what I felt were disparaging portrayals of Asian and Asian-American characters. The first time, I DNFed the book and blamed it on plot issues (which are also real problems with the book, in my opinion). For the other book, I danced around the issue in my review but ultimately revised it to even milder critici...
