…but so do I.

And my bougie, if unprofitable, books.

Anyway, this month has been a nightmare, of course–roof is okay right now but two weeks ago I guess some snow piled up and I was up until 6am dumping buckets of water every forty minutes or so. The audiobook rights sale in 2024 bumped my gross income over a particular threshold and now I have to collect/remit tax (that that threshold hasn’t changed in thirty years is a real failure, I spent weeks doing extra work and have to refile my taxes on top of doing 2025’s all for the govt to give me back a couple hundred dollars since nearly all my income zero-rated).

But last night I finished the zero draft of the eighth Waverly Jones novel.

I knew how it ended–I’ve known pretty much how all of them do, because I see the overall arc in my head and I know where the character lands book to book. But I did not expect I’d just be sitting there weeping over the last scene. The character goes through so much change, so much loss–every book she’s a slightly different Waverly than where she started from, but by the eighth it’s clear what tremendous growth she’s been through. I ache for her and I’m also proud of her.

And I’m proud of me. So far I’ve written over a million words on Waverly Jones, including the finished books (not the cut out parts of drafts), the shorts for Patreon and the hardcovers, side novelettes/novellas, and the drafts of 6-8 that aren’t publication ready yet.

That’s a lot of words.

I know how the ninth ends but not precisely where it opens–it’s got two mystery plotlines and then a background one–so I’m going to let that roll around my brain over the next few months until it sorts itself out, with the hope I can start it (and get most of it done) in the fall.

I am increasingly grateful to myself that I’ve kept up with my goal to write ahead.

The fifth is on the verge of release–a couple of friends have read it early and eARCs go out tomorrow to the Patreon Book Club tier and last year’s contest winners. So we’re nearly at the midway point in the series. I’ve long set various events into motion, which is why it’s so damaging when I start second-guessing myself–I literally can’t stop the train now! But thank god this time I’ve written ahead so I’m less likely to get paralyzed. It’s written, I’ve committed to the story I want to tell whether people will like it or not. I’m hoping, by the time people are reading the one I’ve just finished, that I’ll already have the twelfth done.

As a series goes on, especially with the wait between books, it’s normal to develop our own expectations (I’ve long thought one of the reason revivals/sequels that come after a decade or two don’t always work for me is because I as the audience and the creator have diverged in how we saw the stories play out, and reconciling that as the audience can be jarring). Our own headcanon. Our own wants and hopes for the characters. Because stories are living things, characters continue in our heads even when the last page is turned.

But after what I went through with a vocal subset of the Livi Talbot readership, I’ve been feeling a lot of dread where I should be feeling excitement. There will be developments that make some people happy and some people disappointed but in both cases it’s because they’re only getting a slice of the story–the full picture isn’t in place until the twelfth book (and…I guess no one will be happy? I don’t know, I hope someone will be besides me).

I have the full picture, and I know what I’m doing, but I started to spin out the past few weeks–the series is deeply unprofitable and has such a tiny readership, I dread them losing interest over the years and especially braced for being yelled at (or disappointing those whose opinions I value).* So I think part of what hit me emotionally reaching the end of the eighth book was how much it drove home that I have made the right choices.

Come what may, the story I want to tell is coming together. And even if the only people still reading at the end is me, my editor, and my proofreader, it will be what I wanted it to be, saying the things I want to say. It will be painful and hopeful, bittersweet and cathartic. It will hurt because it was always meant to.

But the dog lives, so there’s that.

I mailed out some Patreon swag envelopes today and waiting at the post office for me, like a “congrats, you’re done!”, was a couple of test copies from BookVault UK, including the jacketed hardcover edition of The Silent Places** but also the first volume boxset of Waverly Jones Mysteries.

The former will go up soon; the latter, I have to tweak some things and put in a question about something they fubared. But overall, really beautiful products that will cost a small fortune so no one will buy them because everyone is broke, but this is the series of my heart and my soul and I want to celebrate that.

It did feel like appropriate timing, rewarding me not just for finishing the eighth book but for sticking to the story I want to tell.

I had planned to just rest today, March was exhausting and I did a lot of freelance work and just wrote 50K, plus the tax stuff, plus finishing touches on A Dark and Distant Home.*** But now I’m poking at revising files for upload, because I can’t remain idle, and Livi’s about to take over my brain for April.

But I got my fancy bougie books, and I have a deep sense of accomplishment and trust in the story after finishing the eighth, and that’s pretty great.

* Before you chirp in with the cliche of “You have to write for yourself!”–yes, that’s what I do. I’m forty-three years old. I’ve been doing this seriously for twenty-five years. If I wasn’t writing for myself, I would’ve already quit (remember, I did write erotic romance under a few pen names in various subgenres for several years, for the money–I’m not cut out to write for other people).

But I have to make money at writing in order to have more time to write. So while I do not write anything for anyone other than me, I try very hard to signal–through genre categories, jacket copy, and the text itself–to the right readers for the work, rather than the ones who abandon it the moment I kill a main character (or scream at me when they finally figure out I don’t like HEAs).

**

*** I still have to do two illustrations for the hardcover. I’m pulling my hair out. Everything’s terrible and I don’t know how to draw anymore.

You know when you see people who have constant emergencies and you think damn, like this is ridiculous, surely you’re making it up? How can something terrible happen every two to three weeks for months straight???

Well, who had four cats with health issues/veterinary emergencies in four months atop a cold and a leaking roof?

This girl!

I’m still not convinced this isn’t The Bad Place tbh.

I don’t even know at this point. I thought without the cost of Libby’s medication and food every month that some of the financial strain would ease, but that was kind of hilariously naive now that I think about it.

I spent ten hours on Sunday waiting to be seen at the emergency vet with Temperance as she’d been vomiting for two days and it was a long weekend. Today we had a regular vet follow-up to run some tests and treat her continued symptoms of not wanting to eat even though she can keep it down now. She might also have cancer so, you know, that’s fun.

I was cautioned to not panic yet as there were a few things that could explain the fluid around the intestines and it’s fine, I’m actually not panicking, I’m too tired for that at this point.

My life is just a happy little dumpster fire being carried away by a flood.

I am so exhausted. I was months behind in some projects because of how much time I lost in the fall due to Shawn’s emergency, Rodney’s cancer, and saying goodbye to Libby. Rodney is still doing well so of course Tempe, who was fine in October, is having an issue. I already was looking at working weekends this month and I’ve just lost another three days.

I should still be on track for Waverly 5’s release but I’m still behind on the hardcover extras (as I said on Bluesky, SATY sold 23 hardcovers and 4 paperbacks, so let’s be clear: I am killing myself here for something that will maybe make $70 total, but I just will feel really bad if folks can’t order it early to arrive on the eBook release date). Patrons have also selected who Elis is going to kill for the new serial, so I have to get that new chapter written this weekend.

This means I’m going to pop up Freedom for at least the next week and try to calm my brain enough to focus on getting through as much work as possible. So if I’ve disappeared, it’s not that anything’s wrong, it’s that I need some silence right now so I can get some stuff done because working is all that staves off panic.

My thanks to my neighbour for taking us (I continue to feel horrible about how long her dog was left alone at home), and then Krista for starting a Bluesky thread encouraging people to buy books to help with extra costs, everyone who boosted, everyone who bought books, kicked in Ko-fi, or grabbed a premade cover. It helped a lot.

It took a few more days but they did get the leak sealed and I felt a whole lot better. I hope I’ve had my turn with the bad luck in 2025 and I get a period of quiet. *stares at Rodney and Shawn*

This week I’m having proper rest (or trying to), refilling the well and doing some writing. Last week I did a chunk of work, including getting the first three Livi books in paperback with the rebranded covers.

This includes Ashford’s Ghost on its own in paperback for the first time (simply because I like the cover and wanted it lol).  Paperback at Payhip | Paperback at Amazon

In AG’s and ET’s cases, I actually went through and reread them entirely*, and did a tiny bit of trimming/working some lines (net 500 words added to AG, mostly a couple of spots of flesh, and net loss of 1000 words to ET). This is the first time since 2022 (when Charon‘s Gold came out) that I’ve been able to reread any of these books in their entirety and did not have any panic attacks. I did not go through SS and OS because they’ve been proofread a few times and they’re out in audio, so I’m letting them be.

So it feels good to get those four done to start with, and I remade the various eBook files including the boxset, so if you’ve bought anywhere outside Kindle (where I no longer sell), you can update your files to the latest versions.

I would actually really like to see Emperor’s Tomb in audio after all this. That first arc is so good, it’s works as a complete story with no cliffhangers**, and would be nice to have for audio listeners. I still don’t know how feasible it’ll be, I’ll talk to Kristi Burns more in the New Year about the various costs–maybe I’ll have the interest built up by the summer and I can launch the Kickstarter. For now, please don’t forget to follow (and pick up 1 and 2 in audio if you haven’t).

Shiva’s Bow, Yampellec’s Idol, and Charon’s Gold will wait a little while until I’ve got time again for re-proofing/tweaking, reformatting, and doing the full-wrap covers, and I’ve got plans to do the same thing with the Demons of Oblivion books (those front covers are done, I just don’t want to rebrand until I’ve had a chance to go over the books again).

As I’ve been redoing them, I’ve been adding them to Payhip to buy direct.

Printing and shipping is done through BookVault. The shipping costs can be obscene (esp in Canada) but multiple orders combine into one shipment, so it’s an okay option for those looking to get a few books and cut out Amazon, and don’t mind paying shipping. Later I plan to offer some sets of books in boxset slipcases because that’s a cool option.

Print books on Payhip also unlock 50% off the associated eBook and 35% off the audio (if available).

Other than that, I actually do have some exciting things in progress–in addition to the new serial coming in 2026 I announced for Patreon a few weeks ago, which they get a preview of on Thursday, I have a cool thing I’m doing with an Elis O’Connor “First Dates (That End Badly)” story launching in February, I’ve got another announcement and cover reveal for something else special, and I’m currently working on a Waverly story to go in the hardcover this spring for A Dark and Distant Home. So it’s a good quiet week to enjoy myself and I’m hoping folks at Patreon are excited about all the announcements about what’s to come on the first of the month. They’ve been patient and given me so much, and I want their investment in my work to be worth it for them.

Next week I’ll get my freelance stuff sorted for the month (dear god this month’s credit card bill is gonna hurt, I will be working 24/7) and then try to steal a week in January to do my final big pre-edit revisions pass on Waverly 5 done. But right now? I rest.

So, in marginally better spirits*** this time: Happy New Year.

God I hope it’s not terrible.

* Genuinely, truly, once again, like COMPLETELY gobsmacked at the lack of reading comprehension among certain previous “fans” of this series, like imagine getting five books into what was going to be a twelve-book series, seeing all the carefully setup and connected threads I’d woven in, and believing West was gone from the narrative forever because Livi told him to go away and declaring with your whole chest that I’m the devil incarnate for it. It’s one thing when friends reassure me “no, Skyla, you did fine, these women just don’t know how to read” but it’s a whole other to see it with my own eyes after all this time and distance. Pity folks got their panties in a wad rather than trust me to tell the goddamn story as intended.

** Threads of what to come, obviously, but I think folks can do 1-3 and feel satisfied.

*** We miss Libby here and it’s hard, but I’ve been spending as much time with my other cats as possible, so I’m doing okay.