C.S.E. Cooney's Blog, page 6

The Street of Many Porches

by C. S. E. Cooney

(I hand-wrote a draft of this in my journal in February of this year, 2024; we’ll see what it turns into tonight)

(This is one of my fondest daydreams)

not so many years from now
after retirement, before attenuation
somewhere near water, but on a hill
(above the floodplain, on the hospital grid)
view of the sky, trees nearby
post office, library with study carrels (and maker space)
smoked fish at the grocery store (a zero-waste store)
farmer’s market, night market, craft fair
a festival for every season (and for idiosyncratic reasons)
someone to lead foraging walks
somewhere to host game nights
a concert venue and a bookstore
a place to dress up for
a theatre, a park for outdoor movies
near enough to bring you soup when you are sick
near enough to drive you to the airport or emergency room
where we can celebrate birthdays, have a bookclub
monthly literary salons, poetry nights
walks in the graveyard, walks by the shipyard
bare branches with lights
picnic in the grass when we’re up
tea on the deck when we’re down
no borders between us but zinnias and oyster shells
no miles between us: walkable
[him in his guayabera, arms spread wide:
“bienvenido, mi amigos!”
me in my ballgown, apron, and pocketknife
our house your second home, your third place]
and we will all have our gardens, our disasters
and travel together, and signal from windows
run into you randomly, walk you home part way
borrow sugar, babysit, show up at need
gift exchange, thrift shop, stress bake, create
keep each other honest, exercise en masse
age in place, gracefully
see each other’s faces,
as we fade like lace,
every day

Today’s Infernal Salon Draws

These are a little blurry because of the screencap, but here they are!

Will’s Draw

Sol’s Draw

Steve’s Draw

Sophia Babai’s Draw

Danni’s Draw

Silvatiicus’s Draw

Dylan’s Draw

Audience Draw

Infernal Salon Tomorrow on Twitch TV!

Hello, my beauties! Happy Autumn Equinox weekend!

I’m so excited that Carlos Hernandez and I were invited to host an Infernal Salon this coming Saturday on Dr. Gregory A. Wilson’s Twitch TV channel.

For those of you who don’t know:

An Infernal Salon is a fun, low-stakes writing workshop, high on community, ix-nay on the essure-pray. We’ll draw cards from “the Deck of Destiny” from our forthcoming TTRPG “Negocios Infernales” for creative prompts, set a timer for 20 minutes, and UNLEASH! Then we all share what we’ve made! It’s all very raw and vibrant, like a lightning storm!

(Learn more about the game and see some of the cards here . Pre-order at Outland Entertainment’s website here.)

Our salonnières this Saturday are:

Writer, fiber artist, and tarotista Danielle Brigante
National Book Award-winner Will Alexander
Dark fantasy writer and forest-punk Silvatiicus Riddle
Writer, editor, Bram Stoker-nominee Tina L. Jens
Writer, activist, somatic therapist, and creativity coach Sophia Babai
“Vocateur” reader and writer of SFF fiction and poetry Dylan Haston
Frankenwald based horror writer and comics reviewer Steve Toase.

If any of YOU want to tune into https://www.twitch.tv/arvoneleron on Saturday, from 4-6 EST, please feel free! We ALWAYS draw cards for the audience as well.

Anyone who wants to create something with us in the 20-minutes of creation time is always welcome to “whisper” it in Greg’s DMs. If there’s time, he’ll read/share your work too!

News of Great Sadness

CW: critical illness.

I have had this news recently. What you read here is the announcement crafted by Howard, his wife Shannon, and their friend Mark.

I know there is grief across the world, for so many awful reasons. And this is another awfulness: my friend is dying.

Perhaps he is your friend too. Or perhaps you have read his novels, or his reviews on Black Gate Magazine. For my part, Howard Andrew Jones has been my friend and colleague for going on twenty years.

We saw him last month at GenCon. We ate dinner with him. We laughed and caught up in person, after too many years of just phone or zoom. We talked about creating new monsters to fight, in this fantasy-novel business of ours of fighting monsters.

I am glad we broke bread, and played the poet game, and left each other laughing. That’s all the gladness I have right now, because the rest is grief. And gratitude, that our mutual friends are acting as a bridge between Howard’s nearest and dearest, and the rest of us who are sending him so much, so much love.

Fathoms in the Earth: an Air and Nothingness Press anthology

I am SO EXCITED to announce this! Soon releasing is the FATHOMS IN THE EARTH anthology, published by Air & Nothingness Press.

AANP books are SO BEAUTIFUL, heavy with fine paper and thoughtful covers. This anthology comes with interior color plates and 12 double-sided postcards–one for each story title!

This one is a limited run of 200, so it’s probably best to order soon if you want one.

I have a story in it, called “The Book of Games.” For my archetypes (which you’ll read about in the following paragraphs), I chose to play with:

Maid/Familiar/Monster.

I particularly enjoyed researching Naples, and re-spinning characters from The Tempest from a, you know, 21st century, feminist, post-colonial viewpoint.

(I realize that the “post-colonial” part is an ongoing project; and may we all contribute to and live to see widespread reparations to those we have harmed.)

About this book, by editor/publisher Todd Sanders:

“The Tempest entered the consciousness of Western Civilization with themes of magic, betrayal, revenge, and family. It is a singular work ripe for reinterpretation with archetypal characters.

This collection of 24 stories, with titles taken from the film Prospero’s Books by Peter Greenaway, explores these five fundamental characters and their interactions, placing them in new contexts, and inventing new narratives for their relationships.”

Here’s the order link again:
http://aanpress.com/aanorder.html#fathom

Find Air and Nothingness Press at the following social media places:
Twitter: @aanpress
Mastodon: @aanpress@wandering.shop
Bluesky: @aanpress.bsky.social
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aanpress

Hearthglow: the Podcast

Well, one of the most hilarious things of my 40s in suddenly loving and playing D&D.

I mean, I’m not UNUSUAL in this, given the rampageous success of shows like Critical Role and Dimension20, which, yes, we watch.

My main job–other than writing–is voice acting, specifically as an audiobook narrator. But I was never into RPGs before Carlos. In fact, I was mildly repelled enough by them that he proposed co-designing a TTRPG I’d like to play with me so that I WOULD play RPGs with him. Yadayadayada, look at me now. LOOK AT ME NOW!

Designing an RPG was, in fact, A TOTAL GATEWAY into a whole world of gaming I now love. I’m sorry now that I ever felt any other way about gaming… but fandoms are complicated, and hospitality is a long game. Sometimes we bounce off things if we don’t feel actively welcome in the spaces those things are loved. Sometimes it’s just a matter of exposure and social circles, etc. I’m here now. I’ll do my best to invite others in.

I have some personal goals as a gamer, which are:

1.) Be less anxious about learning new games and playing games in general

2.) Playtest a lot of NEW games-in-development by brilliant designers, be in the conversation, learn the vocabulary

3.) Lean into the fun and YES, AND!

One of my “Yes, ands” is, when Dr. Gregory A. Wilson asked me to be one of his cast for the Heathglow podcast, I said yes. AND now I’m in a podcast, lol.

Greg wrote a 5e adventure and sourcebook called Tales and Tomes from the Forbidden Library, published by Alligator Alley entertainment, and available as a PDF and a hardcover.

I thought that playing Mog Rizz, a Hyena-shifter trickster and student at Hearthglow Academy was a one-off thing for the Damon Runyon Foundation charity that Greg was running a couple of years ago.

Mog Rizz, a Hyena-shifter rogue, 3rd Level (Arcane Trickster). I asked artist Hannah Flaherty for her to look like a cross between Eponine from Les Mis and Eurydice from Hadestown… only, a hyena.

First, we performed live at the Klein Auditorium and the tickets benefited cancer research. Artist Hannah Flaherty made character art for all of us. But THEN there was a follow-up performance at the Klein (along with a level-up of our characters) last year.

And THIS year, the Klein is letting us record on their second-floor mezzanine for a third adventure… in fact, a series of them! This is the Hearthglow Podcast.

When Greg proposed this to us, I looked at Carlos, blinked a few times, and then said, “Well, yeah. I guess I’ll do it. That sounds like something I want to have done in my 40s.” I already knew Carlos was in. He was getting that glinty-eyed thing again.

A D&D LIVEPLAY PODCAST! LIke the COOL KIDS. Here’s a link to the Hearthglow page, with all the episodes so far. More coming, since we just recorded a session, which is enough material for 2-3 more episodes, I think.

Hearthglow

Carlos, who’s always been a cool kid (as defined in this blog as a cute-patootie gamer who loves D&D, which Carlos has been since he was 13), is playing Ally Needy (pronounced Nee-DAY currently), a fairy dragon with a confusion breath weapon. I’ll try to get a pic up of her later.

In the new Hearthglow podcast, Ally’s introduced a new CONSTRUCT companion: MR. ROUND CLOWN! Carlos asked Bek, the illustrator of our Negocios Infernales cards, to create character art for her.

Mr. Round Clown. Art by Rebecca Huston

Carlos did up all the specs for Mr. Round Clown, and created this character sheet for him that looks, you know, like something you’d find in a campaign setting or something.

I know I linked to the Hearthglow page above, but just in case you don’t fee like clicking, here are the first few episodes, as well as the YouTube link.

Episode 1 – Hearthglow: “Everybody, meet Mr. RoundClown!”

Episode 002 Hearthglow: “To the Urinals, and Beyond!”

If you’re into this kind of thing, I hope you enjoy this! I know, for my part, it’s fun to participate. It was an honor to be asked.

Sitzfleisch Poetry Hour: The August 2024 Edition

I’m late to our Sitzfleisch Poetry Hour today, but that’s okay: I’ll stay over 10 minutes. Jennifer Crow opened the silent Zoom room for everyone, but she was there alone for the first ten minutes anyway. Now we are THREE, and I’m trying to decide what to write.

I think I’m going to go with the ditties I scribbled for our GenCon Infernal Salon at the beginning of this month. We had over 40 people in the room, and everyone got a group draw (according to their birth months or something), as well as a single additional card that was just their own.

I think Carlos and I did individual pulls for each other, at the very end. My cards were:

YOU ARE MOSTLY HOLES. (Espacio)

GUTS MAKE THE FINEST MUSIC (Carne)

IS THAT THE CRY OF A DYING STAR (Rayo)

I thought to write three nursery-rhyme style bits, thinking about how we build worlds not just through blocks of text, not just through character and dialogue, but through scraps of poetry, song, art, adages, newscasts, radio blips, paper clippings, posters. Anyway. Here’s what I came up with, freshly typed up tonight.

I added the ending rhymes while I was typing them, because I’d let a few drop in the 30-minute squeeze of first-draft writing, and I wanted to see what was what. Bonus words tonight include “swine dame,” so I call that a win.

They’re all very silly, but what can you do with only 30 minutes and a small journal? (Answer: anything, really. One just… writes. SO MANY DIFFERENT THINGS come of it! We have everything from poetry, to character sketches, to bits of novel, to whole short stories. People write plays. People draw pictures. People write reels! It’s AMAZING.)

But here is what I did last time, in 30 minutes.

1. PIG GOD RHYME

Here, piggy piggy A
Mama’s made a bargain B
Daddy’s marching far on B
The reaches, past the hills C
Mama’s gonna catch ya D
With her axe she’ll fetch ya D
Butcher ya and dress ya D
Off up the kill C

Here, piggy piggy A
Look you at the god now B
Entering the brown sow B
Headless and aglow C
Mama’s on her knees here D
Keeping Daddy safe, dear D
Offering her pleas clear D
Anyway or how C

Here, piggy piggy A
Effigy of pigskin B
Protector of the Farmkin B
From cottage to the pale C
Wedded to the swine dame
Oink we in your great name D
Thank thee, light the pig flame D
God who will not fail C

2. Lullaby of the Void

Hush, my beloved
Let silence descend
Hear what this prophecy-darkness forfends
Night is your guardian
Her whispers, your friend
Hush now, and sleep now
And dream of the end

The dim stars are screaming
A void for their song
Be easy, you’re dreaming
You’ve done nothing wrong
It’s only, our emptiness yearns to belong
Hush now, and sleep now
Till morning bell’s gong

3. Origins of the Moon

My father has two holes for eyes
A cavern for a mouth
An open pit of belly
And an appetite uncouth

My mother’s head is riddled through
With meteoric dents
Her ribs are cracked and peeling
And her thighs are ripped and rent

Is it any wonder, then
That I, their lovely child
Am hollowed-out and chasm-deep
My innards all out-piled?

They gouged me from their excess
And shaved me down to size
And now I smile, craterous
From o’er your midnight skies

***
I had some bonus time, so I wrote a ridiculous short play–just dialogue.

The scene:

Imagine two, immense, fleshy, golem-like caryatids, holding up a kitchen ceiling on their flayed shoulders, watching with peeled white eyes as a bevy of feral cooks work on their next meal.

They’re facing each other across a vastness, just chattin’.

Dramatis Personae
LF = Left Face
RF = Right Face

LF: They’re at it again.
RF: They’re always eating what they shouldn’t.
LF: So outré.
RF: Disgusting.
LF: Riveting.
RF: Marvelous.
LF: What’s on the menu today?
RF: Rocks.
LF: Rocks?
RF: And tripes.
LF: Tripes.
RF: And rocks.
LF: I was forgetting the rocks.
RF: I think it cleans out their systems.
LF: Roughage.
RF: Sort of flushes it.
LF: And tripes?
RF: Protein.
LF: We all need protein.
RF: Not us.
LF: Not anymore.
RF: They ate us long ago.
LF: Better this way.
RF: Debatable.
LF: More relaxing.
RF: Tedious.
LF: At times.
RF: What are they eating now?
LF: Maggots.
RF: Suckers.
LF: Better to be done with all that.

***

(That’s all I had time for.) (Like LF says, probably “better this way”–but I did enjoy diving back into an all-dialogue format for a hot second.)

Fan Art: The Twelve Gods from SAINT DEATH’S DAUGHTER

Ah, friends.

Get you a reader who is an artist, a genius, a darling, who is so full of love and jeweled colors and divine radiance, that she makes you, over the course of a year, a cathedral window of your own gods.

Phoebe Leung Ashcroft, @phoe.ash on Instagram, is a visual artist bookstagrammer, who reviews ARCs by drawing illustrations for them, and creating a little write-up in the caption.

For my books, she has drawn Loreila Winter-Touched from Dark Breakers, Alizar Eleven-Eyes from The Twice-Drowned Saint, and Lanie from Saint Death’s Daughter.

But, wait. Phoebe, the aforementioned artist/genius/darling, has done EVEN MORE.

In addition to her three versions of Saint Death…

…she has made ALL THE REST OF THE GODS of Liriat and Quadiíb!!!

Phoebe’s third and latest depiction of Saint Death, the Doe-Her-Mother, is taken directly from the text of Saint Death’s Herald, of which she has had some special peeks.

I, um, made a LORE FOLDER for Phoebe and my buddy Anthony, who is a DM and sometimes plays around in my world.

Because when people draw you pictures and adapt your stories to D&D games, you want to make that as EASY AS POSSIBLE FOR THEM, because they are the AWESOMEST PEOPLE.

A little while back, I made a little video about the Twelve Gods and some of their attributes, which I included in that lore folder, in case you were interested. You can listen as I speak in one window, and admire Phoebe’s craftswomanship in the other!

Thank you forever, Phoebe. Now when I write, I am also always thinking of you.

I have written before about fan art, when I was on Substack for a hot second last year. I wonder if I should just copy/paste the material I made there last year to this blog, so that it shan’t be lost forever if I give up the platform entirely.

But for now, here’s a link to that blog about fan art, for you will see how bright this world is with wonders, and how awed I am to have provided some of the source material for these visions artists have.

“The Deck knows.”

LOL. Carlos and I released a backers-only update on Negocios Infernales today, and on it, we gifted them one of their rewards: a new web-based tool for our “Deck of Destiny” cards.

There’s a box to input your question, and then you get to pick 1-3 cards to draw to help interpret your fate. The tool randomly pulls them for you. Each card pull includes an explanation of the suit.

Right now, the tool is just for backers on a private link, but eventually we’ll migrate it over to Outland Entertainment, where it will live for ALL THE REST OF YOU to enjoy. (Although, naturally, you’ll want YOUR OWN DECK OF PHYSICAL CARDS.)

Anyway, I was testing the web tool out today, and I asked it: “How I can keep motivating myself to finish my edits on time?” I chose a 3-card draw.

My answer?

– “You are mostly holes” – LIKE MY MANUSCRIPT, AFTER I CUT IT UP!

– “Skin is a coward” – THAT QUILL IS BLEEDING! (Self-explanatory.)

– “The scavengers win every war” – after I SCAVENGE the SCRAPS remaining of my manuscript, I will WIN THIS NOVEL!

Yay!

So. Quite an optimistic reading, eh? (I particular love two Carne cards, especially that line in the suit-meaning: “the triumph of self-interest over community.” It is, after all, in my best self-interest to FINISH THIS NOVEL.)

THE DECK KNOWS.

Saint Death’s Herald: The State of the Edit

plus, a little bit of what I’ve been reading…

The edit letter my editor David from Solaris sent me was incredibly warm and reassuring. What he wrote was in line with many of my thoughts.

The first thing I did was make a big 23,000 word cut, and set it aside. In my head, it might become a novelette that I will publish sometime, someplace. In lieu of Lanie as the main character, with Duantri at her side, it would feature Tanaliín and Duantri on a separate adventure years before they ever came to Liriat and met Lanie Stones.

With that in mind, I am (in the current iteration anyway) using some of those events, which I have cut from the book, to give Duantri some prior knowledge about a place she and Lanie must go to, and some of the dangers they might be facing.

Cutting out a large part of the middle necessitates me going through and snipping and stitching so that the rest of the book makes sense. I need to add some things back in, but in a different order. Much of the work is structural: order of operations stuff. Things need to happen in order for the plot to make sense. But how the information is conveyed, and by whom, and when… that is all fluid.

It is fascinating work. (Writing is so DELICIOUSLY WEIRD.) I just must make sure to keep progressing, and rather quicker than is perhaps my natural wont.

And then there’s the entirely pleasurable sentence-level draft work. I love me an adverb, don’t get me wrong. But sometimes a well-wrought metaphor can more precisely describe a gesture, expression or emotion. Alternately, my language has a tendency, sometimes, to jump the shark of “extra” into, um, n’extra (next-level extra?), and when language gets too too too fancy, all at once, all the time, the general splendor can be… hmn. Diluted.

My answer to this? Fart jokes.

Okay, fart jokes in iambic pentameter.

I don’t know. It’s all a big experiment, but with a deadline. But I love the work.

I’m so happy to be home after our summer of madcap and marvelous travels. I have fallen in love with my office again, and my little twinkle lights, and my beeswax candles, and my mug of tea. I made a little to do list on a notebook with my fountain pen, then left the window open, and it got rained on. I kind of loved that too.

My friend Patty Templeton has been getting up very early in the morning, before dawn, to write before her work day. I’m two hours ahead of her, but it’s still earlier than when I’d normally rise on my own, but I’ve been waking in order to write with her on Google Meet. We wave blearily into the camera and then tap away. Carlos writes naturally early in the morning, but I can really only do it consistently with a body mirror. I’m so grateful for this time with her.

…and so, so grateful for Carlos, who is often just around the corner in the living room, finishing up the gorgeous work of poetry, philosophy, and humor that’s his current sci-fi novella (working title: “The Cyberpunk Microseason Pillow-Book”), the likes of which, by the way, the world has never seen.

We read to each other, all our little drafts, and polish the work in the air between us. Soon he will start his semester, and steal his writing time when he can, so he is working feverishly to wrap up this project for himself before he starts on Thig again.

My friend Kyle and I are back to a more normal schedule of late morning-early afternoon writing as well, most weekdays. He’s working on a screenplay as I work on my novel edits. We often start by chatting about goals, and it’s so useful to learn cinematic vocabulary, and all the iterations a screenplay takes–summary, outline, script, pitch deck–before it ever gets embodied in actors, much less makes it to the screen.

I’m so lucky Patty and Kyle and I all started establishing these habits earlier this year and last year, because now they feel familiar and fine, and being in the “office” with other working artists really puts me right into the worker’s groove.

***

I took a break from blurbing till August, which I realize… it now is. I’ve been trying to catch up on some romance, some fantasy, some science fiction–and I got to judge a poetry contest for F(r)iction Magazine, which was an absolute delight. All the poems were so wonderful—full of color and musicality, experiment and beauty.

I must go back to blurbing soon, for my friend Randee Dawn has a new book out soon from Arc Manor, The Only Song Worth Singing, and I must read it!!!

***

Some books I recommend.

Romance:

I read Penny Reid’s Bananapants, which I was really looking forward to. Not only did it not disappoint, it surprised me with its poignancy. I wrote, in two separate updates:

Penny Reid’s new rom-com Bananapants did so much important, gorgeous work, and with such exquisite care taken to the specific metaphors of each character, including those who were living with chronic illnesses. There was something so human and so endearing about this one particularly, and I’m already a huge fan of the author’s previous work.

and

I really loved [Bananapants]. There’s so much I want to say about it. Of course, I’m a huge Penny Reid fan, but I thought this was a level-up in terms of characters who are charming, funny, sexy, neurodiverse, and dealing with a chronic illness. There is such care and specificity in the writing, and such vigorous metaphors, always particular to that character’s own experience, without saying it’s the same for everyone. Also just totally great, as far as writing, romance, and action subplot. And of course, the cast of family and friends surrounding our young lovers is so lovable.

Because I subscribe to Penny Reid’s blog, on her recent recommendation I also just flew through the first two books in B. K. Borison’s Lovelight series. Super charmed. Also, they’re fast, so I can FEED MY BRAIN nice things while in frenetic revise-and-edit mode.

Mystery:

My order of Sherry Thomas’s newest Lady Sherlock book, A Ruse of Shadows, came in more than a week ago, but I haven’t even unboxed it yet! I already know I’ll recommend it though, because I have loved every. single. sherry. thomas. book. thus far–especially the Lady Sherlock books–and I cannot fathom a world wherein this one would be the EXCEPTION.

F&SF:

I have books to pick up at our local Indie Kew and Willow–including P. Djèlí Clark’s The Dead Cat Tail Assassins. I finally got to meet Phenderson at Readercon this year, and it was thrilling, because I am SUCH A FAN GIRL. We were autographing in the same hour slot, side-by-side, so we got to chat a bit. He’s so cool. I love everything I’ve read, so far, by him.

Meanwhile, I am a few stories into Ann Leckie’s wonderful collection Lake of Souls. I read a short story or two at night, a few nights a week. I keep removing the “Slay the Spire” game app from my phone, so that I’ll read instead of play. Of course, then I keep re-installing it. >.>

Earlier this week, I read the first book in Sarah J. Maas’s A Court of Thorn and Roses series, on a friend’s recommendation, but also because it is everywhere I look, and mentioned on panels, and just sort of… in the air right now. It has a few elements of the ballad of Tam Lin, and many elements of Beauty and the Beast–the fairy tale, the Disney movie, as well as both Robin McKinley versions, Beauty and Rose Daughter–but that feeling of familiarity could just be me bringing my own canon to the reading. I read Holly Black’s Folk of Air series earlier this year, and this book lives in something of that same sphere.

I might read the others in the Maas series someday, or a different series by her, but for now I just went and read all the synopses of the other books, to get the overview. I was plot-curious. I’m not someone who minds what other people call “spoilers.” (I call them “spicers.”) Knowing the outline of what will happen makes everything better for me: alleviates my plot anxiety, and lets me focus on what I like best, craft.

I’m excited to finish reading a friend’s book, one that they wrote in a very exciting IP, but I’m not sure I’m allowed to say that I’m reading it until it’s published. It’s out soon, in the fall, so…So… I’ll talk about that one later.

I have stacks and stacks to read, including our beloved ZigZag Claybourn’s Breath, Warmth, and Dream, which is getting all the loveliest kinds of reviews that it deserves.

***

What else? I am sad sometimes. I have difficult, imaginary conversations in my head that I’d rather speak aloud.

I am often very happy. I am so glad to be home. I am trying to walk more. Every time I walk, I fall in love with the world, and my thoughts are at their most… fabulously useful, I guess you could say.

Also, after spending so much of the summer on the road, at hotel rooms and eating out, it is so good to cook. I love planning meals. I wake up, thinking about eating, and looking forward to a day of eating. A friend of mine once described her daughter as “food motivated, just like you,” which was the first I’d heard of it, but it wasn’t wrong.

Sometimes I cook even when I’m not hungry, just because I like the work. When I don’t want to, I don’t. There’s always plenty of leftovers to eat.

It feels good to blog again.

Now I need to re-establish our regular, monthly Sitzfleisch Poetry Hour now that I’m home, and get back in the habit of writing poetry.

I want to send more letters. See more theatre. Strengthen bonds with friends, new and old. What else is this life for?

In the meantime, Saint Death’s Herald is emerging from its newest chrysalis.

And soon, next year, it shall be yours.

As ever, I am

Yours truly,

C. S. E. Cooney