Happy October, ghoulies! I once again missed a month, despite my best intentions AND persistent reminders by my project management app. (Sorry, ClickUp. You did your best, bro.)
New York Comic Con is next week!
Fierce Reads will be giving away a limited amount of THE BLOODY AND THE DAMNED galleys! To snag one, go to the First Second/Fierce Reads booth (#3300) Thursday 10/9 at 4:00 PM.
Last weekend, I got to travel to FanX Salt Lake City, and despite all my anxiety and nerves about traveling, it was a fantastic time. I especially enjoyed the chance to talk worldbuilding and queer lit and author communities, and just overall, getting to meet attendees and fellow writers and talk books and assorted nerdery. I also got the chance to run over to Under the Umbrella, which is a fantastic indie bookstore with the loveliest and most welcoming staff!
Thank you so much to everyone who came out, attended panels, and stopped by The Printed Garden down on the exhibit floor. 🫶
From left to right: Natalie C. Parker, Tessa Gratton, Zoraida Córdova, Sarah Henning, and then me.
For various reasons — most of them, to be honest, to do with the whole Audra Winters situation over on Booktok — I have been thinking a lot about critique, criticism, and how we synthesize and implement it as writers and authors. I have always felt very supported by my family when it comes to my writing, who have been some of my biggest cheerleaders for decades. My mom likes to bring up me and my books at every random opportunity, like when she’s volunteering at a local blood drive.
Importantly, though, supported has never meant enabled or coddled.
Case in point: When I was around fifteen years old (I think), I was writing an epic fantasy novel that I was sure was going to break big. I was creating a whole world and languages to go with it. It was pure, unapologetic id with a purple-eyed, Chosen One protagonist who had a pet wolf AND a pet hawk AND a majestic black horse. My mind had already jumped far ahead to what the movie adaptation would look like and who would star in it.
I printed it out, all few hundred pages of it, and gave it to my mom for her to read. Which she did.
When she gave it back to me and I asked her what she thought, she told me (to paraphrase) that it was good, but she knew I could do better.
I can’t remember exactly what I felt when she said that; I’m fairly certain I was both hurt and indignant. But it’s hard to recall because these days, I mostly consider it the most important critique I’ve ever received.
She could have told me only what I wanted to hear — that it was brilliant, I was a prodigy, destined for the bestseller list, etc. — but she was honest. And in doing so, she readied me for everything that was to come. For the dozens and dozens of rejections sent back to me in SASEs (self-addressed stamped envelopes, for the youths) when I queried that same novel to agents and publishers. For the experience of sitting in creative writing critique classes with MFA students who tore short stories apart for sport. For the next 25 years of query trenches and failed projects and submission hell and negative reviews.
Because most paths to publishing are rocky at best and total trashfires at worst. The minute you decide to write or produce art for public consumption, you make yourself vulnerable to criticism and rejection, and it can drown you like rocks in your pockets if you don’t find a way to process it. Maybe you need to self-protect more than others. Maybe you have to find ways to pick through everything so you’re not trying to implement every piece of feedback you receive. Maybe you just need ice cream.
But figure out your survival kit early on. Before my mom reads it at least. She’s tough to please. 😉
Stay safe out there, ghoulies.
Favorite Lines I’ve Written in the Past Month
With as Little Context as Possible
She sighed, shoulders sagging. “Then you know more of my family history than I do,” she said.
He chuckled darkly. “Consider yourself lucky, my lady. Better to remain ignorant so that you may fantasize about your lineage however you wish.”
Emma narrowed her eyes. “My apologies, Master Evans, I quite forgot that you have no heart to speak of and therefore no ability to understand anything that I’m saying or feeling. How disorienting this must all be to you. Do you feel alright? Should I fetch a chaise lounge from the parlour in case you faint?”
A flash of pain in his gray-green eyes. Bright and acute. “You, of all people, do not get to lecture me about lacking a heart.”
She tossed her hands in the air. It wasn’t a very ladylike gesture, but all decorum had been abandoned almost the instant this disagreement had started. “What in heavens is that supposed to mean?”
He was quiet for a moment, his gaze fixed on hers, and there was such a mix of bitterness and hurt and rage on his face that she felt quite unable to move. Then he blinked and drew back, his expression shuttering. “It means I have overstayed my welcome.”
Emma huffed. “That would imply you had been welcome in the first place.”
“Indeed.” He inclined his head disrespectfully, said “Goodnight, Lady Blackwell,” and then he was gone, leaving Emma alone.
How I’m Entertaining Myself
Reading Drawing
I’m not actually going to specify what I’m reading right now because it is on a personal topic. Instead, I’ll just mention that I’m trying to work on my drawing skills. It’s always been one of those things I wished to be better at, but I’m trying to take a more systematic approach to it at the moment. Mostly working off of portrait-style references of everything from photos to video game screenshots. If I ever get any decent at it, I may post some.
Playing
I finished Baldur’s Gate 3, so I’ve turned back to my endeavor to play a full canon run of the Dragon Age games. I started with my Warden, Alidda Tabris, in Dragon Age: Origins and am now in Act 3 of Dragon Age 2 with my Champion of Kirkwall, Melody Hawke. The more I replay, the more feelings I have about the entire series, the stories and themes it tells, and how they fit together. That’s a soapbox for another time, though; primarily because it’s so expansive I don’t even know where to start.
The Bloody and the Damned releases April 7, 2026.
Add on Goodreads or Storygraph. Preorder now at Macmillan or Bookshop or Barnes & Noble or order from indie bookstores like these:
Raven Bookstore | Rainy Day Books | Under the Cover
Monstera’s Books | Bliss Books & Wine | The Gilded Page | Ink & Page
That's all for now! Thank you again for subscribing. Here's where you can find me lollygagging around in the meantime: