Janel Brubaker's Blog, page 2

BONUS CONTENT #4

A Hold of Spectres
Part 2
Chapter One

The next morning, Rhaean awoke, startled from slumber by a strange sound. As she opened her eyes and tried to reorient herself, she saw something moving back and forth in the darkness, scraping the stone floor of her room. She sat up, her eyebrows furrowed, still unsure of what it was she was seeing. The fire in her hearth had died out and offered no light by which to see, and so she lit a candle. Her eyes adjusted to the light from the small flame and she saw her desk chair sliding back and forth along the floor at the foot of her bed. 

She froze. It was a dream, she told herself. Yes, it had to be. Chairs weren’t sentient. They didn’t move on their own. What she saw was impossible, unless…Her eyes widened and she sucked in a quiet gasp. Spirits. Ghosts. Specters. They could move things. She had, after all, heard unfamiliar voices in her room the night before, had she not?

Her heart began to pound slowly in her chest. She didn’t know what to do, how to respond, or how to get it to stop. She wasn’t prepared for this. As far as she knew, the spirits that occupied the fortresses of Passing’s End and Fire’s Hearth were mostly docile and kept to the background, never bothering anyone, and rarely making themselves known to the recruits or the Mothers. Rhaean had no idea where she would even look for information about this kind of activity. 

Should she talk to it? Ask it what it wanted? She didn’t know. She feared antagonizing it, worried that it would retaliate by doing something worse. Right now, the scraping noise was a mere nuisance, but that didn’t mean the spirit wouldn’t go further. Rhaean thought as hard as she could, wishing that she didn’t sleep alone in her dormitory. At least then, someone else would be there with her, wondering what to do. At least then, someone would be able to confirm her story which was likely to not be believed by the Mothers when she explained all this.

She decided the best course was to lay back down and try to sleep. She would leave it be, whoever it was, and see what to do about it in the morning. She would go to one of the Mothers and ask them about it, and if they could not help, she would go to the library and seek out texts that might offer solutions. Maybe there was a ritual or something she could perform? 

Rhaean laid back down and pulled her covers up over her shoulders, and closed her eyes. The scraping continued, but she ignored it. Focused on her breathing, on the feel of her heart beating in her chest, on the warmth permeating her body from her bed. Minutes passed and she continued to focus on everything but the scraping, forced herself not to think about the spirit. Sleep would return eventually, she told herself. 

“Are you so sure?” a voice whispered, so close to her cheek, Rhaean felt the cold air on her skin. 

She gasped and opened her eyes. The chair still moved across the floor, back and forth, its spend and intensity unwavering. How was that possible when the spirit was able to get so close to her, but the chair did not stop moving? Her heart sank. Multiple spirits? No, she told herself. That couldn’t be. Spirits rarely haunted the same specific places as others. They might haunt the same building or general area, but not specific rooms or hallways. And, as far as she knew, they never worked together to contact the same person. And yet, she could think of no other explanation for what had happened. 

Her heart filled with dread. She had to do something before things spun out of control, as was common when dealing with the spirits of the dead. Rhaean, accepting that she would get no sleep, quickly climbed from her bed, and changed into her usual training outfit: she donned a warm, gray tunic made from a cotton and wool blend, pulled on her trousers made of the same fabric, only in black, slipped wool socks over her bare feet, and laced up her leather boots. It was very early and the air was cold inside the fortress, so she grabbed a wool shawl and draped it over her shoulders, and immediately left the room. The chair had not stopped moving the entire time. 

It was dark in the hallway and she had forgotten to bring a candle, but she wasn’t about to go back into that room to get one. She knew Fire’s Hearth well enough to find her way to the library; all the dormitories were on the same floor as the library, so she didn’t have to maneuver her way down or up any stairs, for which she was grateful, but it still took her some time to feel her way along the walls. But once she arrived, she let out a sigh of relief. 

The library was vast and dark, but there were always pieces of iron, flint, and candles, as well as kindling for anyone who wished to use them. Rhaean walked to one of the two large hearths in the library, piled some kindling into it, and then lit a fire using the iron and flint. It quickly took, orange and yellow light dancing against the shadows throughout the room. She then took a candle, lit it in the larger fire, and began to search the library for any texts on ghosts and other kinds of spirits. Surely, in such a well kept cocoon of knowledge, she would find something useful in understanding not only the spirits and from whence they had come, but how to appease them and convince them to leave her alone. Yes, she felt certain that this would solve the problem before it became too serious.

Stuff Your Kindle Day – June 2024 Dark Fantasy Edition

It’s Stuff Your Kindle Day!

I’m partnering with some amazing authors today and tomorrow to bring you some incredible FREE dark fantasy ebooks!

I know I’ve been sending a lot of emails with free ebook promos, but this one is a bit different. I’m partnering directly with three other authors (their book covers can be seen in the above image) to bring some amazing fantasy books to you! My two novels, A Kiss of Glass and The Duke of Ithaca, and the other books listed above, are all free on Kindle starting today!

One thing I love about the indie author community is how accepting and supportive the writers can be. The three other writers who are part of this promotion are three of the best people I’ve ever met. Isra is hilarious and authentic; T.R. Sharrow is one of the kindest, most unassuming people I’ve ever met, and although I don’t know T.R. Kavanaugh super well, I’ve enjoyed getting to know them in the Facebook indie author community.

So, when you go and snag your free copy of each of the books listed above, remember that you are supporting some of the most amazing people! Genuinely kind, caring, and compassionate human beings who love writing and literature, and who actually spread support and positivity among the indie author community, and who thoroughly enjoy producing content for their readers.

Here are the links to all of the books:

Her Dark Love by Isra Sravenheart

Burned by the Fae by Isra Sravenheart

Wicked Lightbringer by Isra Sravenheart

Life After Death by T.R. Sharrow

A Mortal Bargain by T.R. Kavanaugh

A Kiss of Glass by J.D. Brubaker

The Duke of Ithaca by J.D. Brubaker

I hope you enjoy these books!

Light and love to you!

BONUS CONTENT #3

A Hold of Spectres
Chapter Three

Life at Passing’s End from that point forward was lonely. Extremely so. She was closer to the other Mothers than she was to any of the other girls she trained with. If they didn’t resent her skills, they feared retaliation from Kyndra if they got too close. And she couldn’t blame them. She didn’t blame them. Her mother, while good at what she did, was a ruthless, and at times heartless, individual. She often accused those recruits who tried to get close to her daughter of seeking favoritism, and that would put an end to whatever friendship might have had a chance to bud.

Rhaean had mentioned all of this to her mother before, and to no avail. Kyndra was an independent soul. She relied on nothing and no one. And though Rahean believed her mother loved her, she often struggled to find proof of it. Kyndra was neither affectionate nor warm. It was, she said, the reason Rhaean’s father did not even wait for Rhaean’s birth before he left them both. Kyndra spoke of him very little, but whenever she did, the resentment and bitterness was palpable. Rhaean knew that Kyndra wanted her to be independent too, to need and want no one else in her life, but that was not who Rhaean was. Where Kyndra thrived on her own, Rhaean craved community. Scarlet had been gone from Passing’s End for over a year, and Rhaean had battled intense loneliness every day. All progress she had been making disappeared, and she was left feeling inadequate and unwanted once more.

At the thought of what the last few years had been, tears threatened to fill Rhaean’s eyes and she blinked hard to keep them from falling. Her chest constricted, as though her lungs, her ribs, and even her very heart were being squeezed into a space much too small. Breathing became erratic and difficult. This was a new development, one that came over her unexpectedly at times. It had only been occurring for a few months or so, but it filled her with anger and self-loathing. She didn’t know what it was or what was causing it, but the intensity would consume her for several moments, and then eventually subside, leaving her exhausted and on edge.

She tossed the history book aside and climbed off of her bed and began to pace the room. She told herself she was being silly. She told herself to calm down; that all she needed to do was reach out to the girls around her, offer them her friendship first, and they’d be sure to accept. But even the very thought of that made her chest constrict even tighter. It didn’t matter how friendly she was. If Kyndra didn’t want her to have friends, she wouldn’t. And she couldn’t force the other girls to accept her.

She considered going to her mother and expressing again her need for companionship, but she knew it would amount to nothing. Her mother did not listen to her. She never had. It was clear that any hope for connection was wishful thinking, and the tears came to her eyes again. Only this time, she allowed them to fall. She stopped pacing, breathing hard as the tears overwhelmed her, and then crumpled to the ground, burying her face in her hands. Her body shook with heavy sobs. She wanted to scream. Felt the pressure of it build in her gut and rise to the back of her throat, but she swallowed it. Held it back. Fought the urge. 

She hated this. She hated Passing’s End and everyone inside of it. She wanted a normal life with normal struggles, not this endless darkness that left her no solace but her own wretched company. 

“But if you weren’t here, who would I play with?” a voice behind her said suddenly.

Rhaean stood to her feet and spun around, her heart racing. She fully expected someone to be right behind her, but the room was empty. Her door was still closed and she had not heard it open. She furrowed her eyebrows and looked around, wondering how anyone had entered the room without her hearing the door open and close again, or how they could have hidden so quickly. Had she been that distracted? Where would they have hidden, anyway? The room was small and held no closet. She waited a moment but whoever had been there wasn’t there now. 

“Great,” Rhaean muttered to herself, running her hands through her thick, dark curls that hung down past her shoulders. “Now I’m hearing things.”

From above her, a laugh echoed. Rhaean turned her gaze towards the ceiling, but then the laugh was behind her; she turned, and the laugh was suddenly closer to her door. But no one was visible. Rhaean’s heart pounded in her chest. The very breath in her lungs seemed to be frozen inside of her body. 

“Who are you?” she heard herself ask, though her voice was closer to a screech than anything.

The voice only laughed harder.

“Who are you?” Rhaean asked again, her voice sounding more forceful, more demanding, even though she felt terrified.

“I don’t think I’ll tell you that,” the voice said in a sing-song way, as though mocking her and her fear. “Not yet, anyway.”

Rhaean felt her chest constricting again. She was nearing a state of panic and she didn’t know how to repress it. Her breathing intensified and quickened and her vision blurred. She shook her head and tried to breathe, tried to think of anything else, but the laughter continued. 

“It’s only in your head,” she whispered to herself, “It’s only in your head.”

“Is this in your head?” the voice said and Rhaean immediately felt something grab at her clothes. She gasped and swatted at it, whatever it was, but felt only air. 

“What about this?” the voice asked, yanking on Rhaean’s hair. 

“Stop it!” Rhaean said, her voice weak and full of fear.

The voice laughed and started picking up various objects around the room and dropping them to the floor. With each moment that passed, the laughter got louder.

“Stop it!” Rhaean shouted, covering her ears with her hands. “Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!”

But it only continued, laughter mocking her every thought, her every emotion until  Rhaean couldn’t take it any longer. She grabbed her history book and made her way towards the door. She was clearly losing her mind after spending so much time alone, she told herself. She needed to be around other people. She needed to accept the reality of her life. If she could somehow find some semblance of normalcy, she would soon be back to her usual self. Even the loneliness she hated seemed a welcome reprieve from whatever was going on around her now. This was not the kind of connection she wanted. 

The voice laughed again as she grabbed hold of the doorknob. 

“I’ll still be here, Rhaean,” it cooed softly, close enough that Rhaean thought for sure she could feel breath on the nape of her neck. “Waiting for you.”

Rhaean didn’t respond. She left the room and slammed the door behind her. 

BONUS CONTENT #2

A Hold of Spectres
Chapter Two

She had made one such friend in her second year of training with a girl named Scarlet. Rhaean had been incredibly shy, which was why it took a year before the two girls actually became closely acquainted. Once they had, they were inseparable. She smiled softly, remembering the day they had really spent time with each other. The girls had all been taught embroidery and they were spending a few hours practicing; Rhaean’s hands were small and she had trouble holding the cloth in one hand while navigating the needle over her pattern with the other. She had struggled for some time when Scarlet suddenly walked over to her.

“May I help you?” she asked. 

Rhaean blushed and looked around at all of the other girls. They were watching, all of them keenly aware that Scarlet was speaking to Mother Andromeda’s actual daughter, and no one had yet dared to do such a thing. She looked back at Scarlet and nodded, too timid to speak. Scarlet sat next to her and leaned in close.

“If you hold the embroidery hoop here,” she said, pointing to the side of the wooden hoop, “you will have more control over it than if you hold it on the bottom.” She looked at Rhaean and smiled, her brown eyes open and friendly. She was taller than Rhaean by a few inches and lanky, with dark brown hair that she always wore in braids, and pale skin with freckles.

Rhaean looked back down at her embroidery hoop and adjusted her hold on it, moving her hand to where Scarlet had pointed. 

“Now, your fabric will remain steadier and your needle will be easier to manage,” Scarlet said.

Rhaean tried to continue stitching over her pattern and smiled when it was, indeed, easier. She looked over at Scarlet. “Thank you,” she said softly, too timid to say anything else.

Scarlet smiled. “You’re welcome.” She looked down at the pattern Rhaean had been stitching and smiled even more widely. “Is that the big oak tree just outside? The one that shades half the courtyard?”

Rhaean looked down at her embroidery, suddenly nervous. No one ever paid attention to her. No one ever commented on her work, and she didn’t know what to do, or how to respond. She swallowed and nodded quickly, keeping her gaze cast down. 

“It looks good!” Scarlet said.

Rhaean chanced a glance up at the girl and saw she was beaming, her eyes bright with excitement. Was she…in earnest? Or was she teasing? Rhaean wasn’t sure, but she was caught by the immense joy in the girl’s eyes. How could she possibly be so happy in a place like this? 

“I mean it. Your colors are perfect, and the branches are shaped exactly as they look in the summer, covered in all those leaves,” Scarlet added. “Are you going to include the rest of the courtyard? Or just that tree?”

Rhaean’s heart beat fast. She wasn’t used to compliments, and she was an even greater stranger to friendliness. Even when the previous cohort had been here, they treated her with something more akin to tolerance than actual friendship. Rhaean had understood that; she was a young child while they were growing into adults. But here, with girls her own age who either wanted nothing to do with her or were too frightened of her mother to try, she was an outsider, an ignored presence simply existing around the others. Not connected. Not wanted.

Until now, it seemed.

“I’m…” she started, her voice faltering, “I was planning on just the tree,” she said, unable or unwilling to explain that the tree signified her own isolation in this dark, lonely fortress. 

Scarlet nodded. “That will be great, I’m sure,” she said, grabbing her own pattern and showing Rhaean. It was a stunning landscape in autumn that reminded Rhaean greatly of the woods around Passing’s End as summer faded. 

“That’s really pretty,” Rhaean said, smiling over at the girl.

“It’s taking forever to complete,” she said, “but I’m happy with the progress.”

Such had begun their friendship. They were inseparable, always doing everything together. Most of the Mothers thought this a good thing, seeing as how Rhaean’s progress in training improved shortly thereafter. She was still not learning as fast as the others, but she was quickly catching up. They were all pleased to see it, and so encouraged the friendship between the two girls. 

All but Mother Andromeda. 

Rhaean shuddered as she remembered the ways in which her mother had been cruel to Scarlet, unnecessarily so. Inappropriately so. She would push her to within an inch of utter exhaustion; she would punish her for things every other girl got away with; she humiliated her whenever she made a mistake, berated her for any impertinence, real or imagined, and yet Scarlet never wavered in her friendship with Rhaean. She took each punishment silently, no matter how cruel or abusive, and then always returned to Rhaean for company. She never forsook Rhaean. Never abandoned her. Never blamed her for the abuses she suffered at her mother’s hands. 

And Rhaean loved her all the more for it.

Finally, some three years later, Rhaean awoke one morning to find that Scarlet was gone. She had been removed from training in the middle of the night. Rhaean hadn’t even been given the opportunity to say goodbye. All at once, the only friend, the only ally, she had in all the world was taken away from her. And she grieved for months. She grieved still.

Author Events and Other Things

This weekend, I have my first author event of 2024: I was invited back to a bookstore where I signed and sold copies of A Kiss of Glass last year, to sign and sell more. I’m excited because this time, I will have copies of A Kiss of Glass and The Duke of Ithaca, which has me extremely excited. The Duke of Ithaca is much slower to take off (because I have no idea how to market a Regency romance, but I have some ideas brewing since I’ve been researching), so I’m hoping I can interest some readers this weekend as I meet them and talk about my books. Especially since the sequel is coming out in October, I’d like to start building up the hype.

I have another author event next month at this same book store, which also has me extremely excited. I will still only have A Kiss of Glass and The Duke of Ithaca to sell, but by that point, my prequel novella to A Kiss of Glass, A Hold of Spectres, will be on preorder, so I will be showing off its cover as well as some quotes from the book in hopes that people will be interested in preordering from either me directly, or Amazon. I’m excited to meet with more readers and talk to them about my books. It’s one of my absolute most favorite things.

I’m also hoping to have at least one author event in September, so that I can sell all three books (A Kiss of Glass, The Duke of Ithaca, and A Hold of Spectres), but that may or may not happen. One thing I’m hoping to do is keep track of any book/author events in the Portland area so that I can have more opportunities throughout the year to sell my books. I’m hoping to attend the Rose City Book Festival this year, but the cost of having a table to yourself is extremely expensive, so I’d likely have to find another author willing to split the cost. I will also be attending OryCon again this year; even though it was definitely a difficult experience last year, I’m hopeful that I can sell more books this time around. By then, I will have those three books published with the sequel to The Duke of Ithaca on the way, as well as A Shift of Crimson only a couple of months away from publication.

Those are the events I am currently looking at for this year, and I hope I can add more to the list.

Another idea that I am playing around with is hosting a TikTok live author event with myself and a few other women indie authors I know to discuss our books, our writing process, our inspirations, etc. This idea is still in the works, but I’d like to try something like this every quarter, just to get our faces and our books out there to all of our following lists. All industries are harder for women, but I’ve found that within the indie author community, the standards are much higher for women than for men. I’ve seen male indie authors with wretched covers on their books and horrible blurbs making 200-300 sales in a matter of a couple of weeks. Consistently. Whereas women will have incredible covers, blurbs that they spent months on and that are genre-accurate, they market themselves extensively, and they still struggle to find readers.

I want to try and change that for fellow women authors as much as I can. So that’s what the above idea is for.

As for the writing I’m currently working on, draft 3 of A Shift of Crimson is complete and back with beta readers, which means I am focusing on revising A Hold of Spectres. For all of June and July, I will be revising this novella extensively to make it ready to publish. I will also be drafting the sequel to The Duke of Ithaca. Then, about halfway through August, A Hold of Spectres will be sent to my designer and formatter. In August I will also be completing the second draft of the sequel to The Duke of Ithaca. At the end of July, I will be getting back draft 3 of A Shift of Crimson from my beat readers, and I will start working on the fourth draft. In September, the sequel to The Duke of Ithaca is going to be with my beta readers, which means I will be focusing on the fifth draft of A Shift of Crimson. Once I get feedback from my beta readers, I will be starting the final draft of the sequel to The Duke of Ithaca, and it will be released near the end of October. Then, I will be focusing entirely on the last two drafts of A Shift of Crimson, and it will be released in December.

I will then be taking the entirety of December off from writing anything but poetry.

In January, I will start working on another prequel novella for A Kiss of Glass.

That’s the rest of 2024 in a nutshell. We will see if I can keep to it, especially as we go into fall and I’m revising so many books at once. I am determined to keep to it as much as I can, though. I want the rest of these books to be published before 2025, so I will do what I must to make it happen.

BONUS CONTENT FOR A KISS OF GLASS

This was sent out in my newsletter a few months ago, and I thought I’d also post it here for everyone to enjoy. I am going to be publishing this into an ebook and paperback soon, so there will also be a copies for sale once I’ve completed revisions, but for now, here is what I have so far. Be sure to subscribe to my newsletter to get these bonus content emails sooner than everyone else!

A Hold of Spectres
Part 1
Chapter 1

Fortress of Fire’s Hearth
Country of Utara

Fourteen year old Rhaean Fell sat on her bed, back against the headboard, as she read in her second volume of Utaran history. She was six years into her official training as a recruit of The Order, and while the other girls had all completed their textual studies, Rhaean had not. She was far behind them and, based on her slow-going progress, it seemed she would remain so. Unless some miracle occurred, she would likely not graduate with the rest of her cohort. Typically, this would have gotten her removed from training altogether, but one of the Mothers of The Order, Kyndra Fell, was her actual mother, and she would not allow Rhaean to be removed from training. If she did not graduate with this cohort, she would try again with the next. 

Rhaean sighed and set down the book. She hated this place. It was even worse than Passing’s End, and she didn’t understand how such a thing could be possible. She had been born at Passing’s End deep in the heart of an especially cold and ruthless winter. Her training there had lasted until she was twelve, and then she and a few other recruits had been taken to this place, the magical fortress of Fire’s Hearth, to learn how to control their magical abilities. 

Except Rhaean had no magical abilities. 

That didn’t stop her mother from bringing her here, farther away from the world, from life, from freedom than even Passing’s End had kept her. It was agony, existing in this space when she knew there was so much more the world could offer. She was the slowest recruit, the shyest recruit, the clumsiest recruit, and she could not retain any of the information the recruits were taught, no matter how relentlessly she studied. And it did not matter how many of the other Mothers pushed Kyndra to remove Rhaean from training, nor how often Rhaean begged to be removed herself, Kyndra would hear none of it. Even when Rhaean had begged to stay at Passing’s End rather than go to Fire’s Hearth, Kyndra would not hear of that either. She was the blood daughter of one of the Mothers of The Order, and that meant she would receive no special treatment and even less compassion than the other recruits. Therefore her entire existence, from her very first breath, had been in the isolated, secluded mountains of Utara.

She had never lived anywhere else. Didn’t know what the rest of the world was like, except for what she read in the books that filled the fortress library. But even those only told her so much. She enjoyed learning of the histories, of the main events that had shaped the world she lived in now. She was fascinated by the people in these histories, their choices, their values, their sacrifices. Despite how long ago they lived in comparison to her, she felt a distinct kinship with them. How hard they fought to make themselves known in the world, to leave their mark in some way that would last. It was the same driving force that Rhaean felt inside herself.

As it was, she had made no mark on the world at all. How could she when she was stuck inside of this dark, damp, depressing fortress? The world was vast and its opportunities endless, and yet she was not allowed to leave Fire’s Hearth, just as she had never been allowed to leave Passing’s End. None of the girls could. Not until they graduated, and that wouldn’t be for another four years. More for her, she thought sadly. Only then would she be free to live in the world, meet other people, and visit the places she read about. Only then would she understand what it meant to be alive. 

Only then would she actually live.

Rhaean laid her head back against the bed rest. It wasn’t that she wanted to do poorly or disappoint her mother, but she just wasn’t suited to this life. Where the other girls had adapted and learned to challenge themselves, Rhaean had merely struggled and suffered. She gave everything she had every single day, and still it was not enough. The Mothers all despised her, including Kyndra. They either singled her out and shamed her in front of everyone, or ignored her entirely. She was used to it, but it never failed to sting. Kyndra said that, like everything else, it was for her betterment, her growth, her chance to succeed after graduation. That was what The Order represented, she said: opportunity and freedom.

“More like oppression and imprisonment,” Rhaean muttered to herself.

She turned away from her book, eyes glancing out the large window to her left. It was late summer. Autumn was fast approaching and, while Rhaean loved the autumn weather, she found herself yearning for a completely different life. It wasn’t that she was unhappy; at least, that was what she told herself. Rather, it was that she felt like an outsider, even among the women who had been like family to her. She had known the other Mothers all her life, and while they were brutal in their training, she remembered when they had treated her more like a niece than a recruit. Kyndra had started training her early, wanting Rhaean to not only be prepared for her life within The Order, but to also outshine all of the other recruits once they were brought to Passing’s End. She saw it as a mark of honor for her daughter to be first in every subject. It was for her mother that Rhaean gave a damn about The Order at all.

Those initial years of training had been minimal, more focused on how to conduct herself and how to learn discipline, with the basics of some other subjects thrown in. There was already a cohort of recruits training when she was born, and she spent a great deal of her younger years watching them, studying with them, attending their lessons. She had understood little of it, but enjoyed being around them, feeling as though she was part of something very important. It was during those years that the Mothers had been pleasant and friendly; they would sneak her sweets when Kyndra wasn’t watching, or take her out into the gardens to teach her little things about botany, or chase her around Passing’s End just to hear her laugh. 

Rhaean was seven years old when that cohort graduated training. All at once, the girls she had looked up to as older sisters were gone. She had no one to play with, no one to talk to, no one to study while she was curious and wanted to see what the recruits were learning. Over the course of only a couple of weeks, she watched them all pass their final test, and then leave Passing’s End forever. 

She passed one year alone in Passing’s End with no one but the Mothers for company. It had been lonely and grueling; her mother had intensified her private lessons greatly, wanting her to know as much as possible before the new cohort arrived. Her carefree days came to an abrupt end and she quickly learned that her life would be completely different from that point forward. And though she did not want to begin her official training itself, she had been excited at the prospect of having other girls her age to talk to, to spar and study with. She would have friends for the first time in her life. And by that point, she was desperate for kinship, for belonging.

Almost Summer Updates

It’s been a while since I last posted, and now here we are — only two weeks away from the summer solstice.

I last posted on May 2nd, announcing that The Duke of Ithaca was officially published. Since then, it has been a #1 New Release on Amazon, and it’s been a multi-category bestseller on Amazon as well. I’m really pleased with that. So far my ARC Readers have loved it as well, and it has five 5-star reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, which is, obviously, making my day all day every day.

I haven’t started writing the sequel yet, but I have been drafting it. The book I’m focusing on most intently right now is the sequel to A Kiss of Glass: A Shift of Crimson. It’s still in its third draft, but I am very close to finishing it. I received incredible feedback from both my beta reader and my sensitivity reader, but it meant some really heavy revisions. I wasn’t entirely sure I was up to the task, if I’m being completely honest; I knew it was going to be closer to a total rewrite than a revision, but I was also excited by what their feedback showed me in my mind. It’s taken several months of extremely close revisions and a hell of a lot of focus, but I am only about two and a half chapters away from completing the third draft!

Friends, this book is going to be so much longer than A Kiss of Glass. AKoG clocked in around 110,000 words, which, for a fantasy novel, is pretty average. But this sequel is already at 171,000 words and there is at least one new scene I have to add to chapter 23, and there are several scenes I need to add to chapter 24, and then I need to completely rewrite the epilogue, so chances are this book is going to be at least 175,000 words, if not more.

That is the longest novel I’ve ever written.

That is the longest piece of writing I’ve ever written.

There are potentially some scenes I can cut, and when I send the manuscript back to my beta readers, I’ll be asking them to point out any scenes that aren’t adding anything to the story, and can be cut. But I doubt there will be very many of those. And honestly, even though I am a bit hesitant over the length, I can see confidently that the third draft is so much better than the second! Like, by miles! There is so much more character development, there’s fantastic world building, there are some interesting points of conflict for the main character; I have genuinely enjoyed this revision process because it’s shown me that yes, revision can be extremely difficult, but if given the dedication required, it pays off and delivers a manuscript full of emotion and compelling characters.

I loved Scarlet le Ve when I was writing her as a side character in A Kiss of Glass, but I love her even more now. She is complicated and nuanced, but also sticks to a moral code rigidly. I love her personality, her feelings, her perspectives, her courage, her honesty. I also love one of the side characters, Renji, even more than before. His part in the second draft was fairly minimal, and his relationship as Scarlet’s adopted father was not well developed. But this time, it is. He plays an even larger role in this manuscript than before, and the relationship between him and Scarlet is one of my favorite aspects of this draft.

There are also so many hints to other fairytales to come, and I cannot express how much fun that has been! I guess my point is that, if you’re an aspiring author and you find revision really difficult, I encourage you to embrace that difficulty. Let it be hard, and then do it anyway. That’s what makes us stronger authors; it’s what develops our writing skills from novice to master, and it’s what actually allows the real writing to take place. Rough drafts are important, but books only become what they’re supposed to be through revision.

I’m also working on two side novellas connected to A Kiss of Glass. The first was an exclusive content offer for my newsletter. I completed the newsletter version, and have been revising it to prepare it for publication by the end of August. It’s called A Hold of Specters. The second I just started, so be sure to subscribe to my newsletter (link in the upper lefthand corner of the page); it’s focusing on a very minor character from A Kiss of Glass who actually will be playing a major role in the overarching plot. It’s title for the newsletter is Like a Secret. It will likely not be published until February of next year. And then, of course, the sequel to The Duke of Ithaca will be released (hopefully) sometime in October.

There’s a lot of writing happening over here, friends. And I am so excited by all of it!

The Duke of Ithaca is Officially Published!

April 30th, 2024, I published my second novel!

The Duke of Ithaca is the first novel in my new series, The Olympic Fates Saga. It is a mythic regency romance which retells different myths and stories from Ancient Greece in an alternate Greece set in the Regency era. When I put it on pre-order, it quickly jumped to a #1 New Release on Amazon, and since it’s release only a couple of days ago, has already sold several copies.

I hosted my book launch event on both Facebook Live and TikTok Live, and I was extremely pleased by the number of people who attended! It was a fun event, full of laughter and questions and a few excerpts from the book. It’s been a really rough couple of months, so this was a much needed boost to my motivation, my inspiration, and my confidence.

If you’d like to purchase your own copy, please do so here.

I am, now, focusing exclusively on getting the third draft of A Shift of Crimson completed. It was going quickly until about two and a half weeks ago, when some personal events took place that have occupied a lot of my time and energy. I am still making progress, and I am currently ahead of my schedule for several chapters. According to my timeline, I have until the end of June to complete this third draft, but I should be done with it by the end of May. Then, I’ll send it back to my beta readers, and that’s when I will begin the rough draft of the second book in the Olympic Fates Saga.

I am also working slowly on a novella that takes place before A Kiss of Glass; it includes some extra content not in any of the novels themselves, and I’m hoping to have it completed and published by the end of 2024.

I am also still working on multiple poetry collections. They are fairly slow going at the moment, but they are still being worked on. I’m hoping to have another poetry collection acceptance by the end of this year. We will see if I can make that happen.

I hope you’re all doing well!

Love and light to you!

Countdown Until The Release of The Duke of Ithaca – 6 Days!!

We’re less than 1 week away from the release date of The Duke of Ithaca!

I am so excited to get this book out into the world. It’s only the first book in this new series, but I know they (the book itself and the series as a whole) will do really well! I can feel it in my skin and in my bones. Could it be just hoping? Sure. It could be. But I’m also going to do everything I can to make it a reality. Romance novels are hugely popular, especially Regency romance due to the hit series Bridgerton, as are retellings of myths, so I think this series is the perfect cocktail of components to bring in readers.

I’ve been working on trying to get ideas for the structure and plot of the second book, and it’s coming along nicely. I’m definitely itching to start the second book, but I’m waiting until I get further into the revision process for A Shift of Crimson. Plus, I need to give myself time to really market and promote The Duke of Ithaca, and I can’t do all the things at once, so prioritizing is the word of the…well, year.

This book is going to be available in both ebook and paperback. Remember: the ebook is available for pre-order right now! Just click here and you can get your own copy for only $2.99! If you’d rather pre-order a signed paperback copy, then click here and you can reserve your copy for only $12.00! I’ve got a limited amount of these copies available, so you don’t want to miss the opportunity!

I’m also going to be hosting a virtual book launch on April 30th! I’ll be going live on both Facebook and TikTok at 5:00 PM PST. The event will be about an hour and during it, I’ll be reading a few excerpts from the book, writing down the names of the people who have joined on either site and left comments, and using those names for a giveaway after the event. The giveaway prize is a FREE signed copy of the paperback, so if you can’t afford to buy a copy, you definitely want to attend the live event for a chance to win! The people who comment the most will receive an extra 3 entries into the giveaway. I will be giving out 5 free signed and personalized copies of the paperback, so you do not want to miss this event!

I’m so excited! Only 6 days away from publication!

As always, I am overwhelmed by and grateful for your continued support. You’re all seriously the best.

Love you!

COUNTDOWN TO THE RELEASE OF DUKE OF ITHACA – 11 days!!

We are officially at the 11 day mark until the release of The Duke of Ithaca!

April has been a hard month, but it has also had its tremendous joys and victories. I’m still working to get accommodations at work, and while it isn’t as smooth going as I would like (a lot of people still don’t understand what accommodations even are and what they’re for), I am determined to keep pushing for it. I have also met with my new psychiatrist and, while I definitely wish I hadn’t needed to change to this doctor, I am also grateful that she seems to be good fit. She’s compassionate, understanding, and listens well.

I have also been F I N A L L Y getting back into revising A Shift of Crimson. I received feedback from my sensitivity reader, and her response was incredibly motivating. I wasn’t even slotted to work on the third draft until May, but I was too excited to hold myself back. I’m already through some big revisions up through chapter 6, which means I’m over halfway done revising the first third of this book. And it isn’t just the ability to get the revisions done, it’s also seeing where the novel needs to go to reach the place I imagined when I drafted it. That’s a really huge accomplishment because it means every subsequent draft is actually going to continue to take the shape I want them to.

It also means that I am that much close to getting a polished draft. My characters (Scarlet, Liam, Nasya, Florynce, Mothers Lynx and Fornax, and my villain, Kyndra) are feeling much more thoroughly developed, with their motivations and internal conflicts making sense. There’s still a lot of work to be done, but I am on the right track to get there. If I’m lucky, I’ll be done with the third draft by the end of April/first week of May, and then hopefully I can complete the fourth draft by the end of May, and then send it out to my beta readers one last time.

I am, most definitely, going to make it to the December 21st publication goal, barring any other mental breakdowns, and that has me giddy.

Once The Duke of Ithaca is published and I’ve successfully marketed it for the first month of its release, I’ll be starting on the second book in the Olympic Fates Saga: The Duchess of Ithaca. This book is going to pick up where The Duke of Ithaca leaves off, and throughout the course of the book, it will set up all of the pieces for the third book, which will start to cover the events of The Iliad. The Duchess of Ithaca will continue to cover the marriage between Odysseus and Penelope: there will be love, sex, passion, disappointment, heartbreak, and confusion. The book will also introduce the two characters who will feature the most prominently in books 3, 4, and 5: Hades and Persephone.

Persephone is the daughter of Zeus and Demeter, both Olympians. In my series, the gods and goddesses live among humans disguised as either lower nobility, or landed gentry. This is to allow them maximum ability to cause mischief among the people. Persephone, while she is a goddess in Greek Mythology, does not know she’s a goddess in my series; neither of her parents live with her and, at least for the first book, she’s not even going to know who her parents are. She lives alone, said to be the orphaned daughter of a marquess, and is unmarried when book 2 begins and we meet her more fully.

Hades is the ruler of the underworld and sibling to Zeus. (Technically also the sibling to Demeter, but I don’t like the incestuous nature of that between Zeus and Demeter, so Demeter is not going to be the sister of Zeus and Hades at all. She’s a goddess by other Titans.) In my series, Hades is nonbinary and, while definitely a dark, often morally gray character, is not evil. They don’t kidnap Persephone because yuck. They don’t force her to stay in the Underworld with them because ew. And they don’t commit infidelities against her because ugh, exhausting. Hades will be a main character in books 3, 4, and 5, where we will get their back story and a deeper understanding of the feud that exists between them and Zeus.

Hades has a tragic backstory, one filled with heartbreak from their earliest years up to when book 3 begins. They are the gothic, broody, wary deity who falls desperately in love with Persephone, queen of spring and summer. Their 3 books will have romance, passion, sex (obviously), meddling Zeus and Demeter, lies, betrayal, heartbreak, kidnapping, magic, manipulation, choosing between one love and another, self-sacrifice, monster romance (which also means monster sex because why the fuck not?), and a slew of other things. I am so excited to write these books, but first, I have to complete The Duchess of Ithaca.

One of the reasons I’m retelling these myths is because there are several characters who come to tragic, unfair ends, and I want to give them something better, something at least a degree closer to happiness. I still don’t know how I’m going to structure the books after book 2, but I’ll figure it out; with so many different characters and so many different stories being told at the same time, I’ll have to outline each book in pretty great detail. But it’s a challenge I am looking forward to because these books are going to do so well. I can feel it. They’re new, they’re different, and I think people are going to enjoy them a great deal. Especially with the Bridgerton craze going on.

I hope you’re all doing well. I love you. I’m sending light to you today.