I feel like a slacker compared to last year where I finished three books and wrote three others in six months? But that was kind of an outlier and I was in a very weird position with nothing new scheduled after I’d released Yampellec’s Idol and I was kind of in panic mode. That is no longer the case, as I’ve written ahead enough that I’m good into 2024.

But I did finish three books, which is the rough goal I’m going for now (one book to serialize at Patreon and two to schedule for publication). I also started a whack of others that I may or may not come back to.

Putting the long post under a cut, clicky here to keep reading!

Just to update on little Shawn–he had his second dental yesterday and he’s doing quite well today. It was very expensive–I’ve been saving for a year, leftover money from last year’s dental budget and then putting away money ever since (basically any smaller projects like formatting over the past year, you paid for Shawn’s surgery!), and now I’m totally cleaned out (dear god please buy my books*). It was actually two dollars MORE than what I’d spent a year saving.

Here he was flopping around last night:

This is my very high cat 😭 pic.twitter.com/aXJJrKbC71

— @skyladawn.ca at bsky! (@skyladawn) December 22, 2022

His appetite was pretty good last night, though he was clearly still very stoned and confused.

For once I slept without chemical intervention, I’d only slept a few hours the night before and I’ve been awake and panicking for weeks with worry. I still woke up frequently to check on him, and he alternated between lying onto of his carrier beside the bed and curling up with me.

Then about half an hour after I fed him this morning, he tried to get me up like usual by meowing, and as you can hear, he’s purring like mad again (as usual).

He’s got his motor going this morning! pic.twitter.com/CapHhOi4gQ

— @skyladawn.ca at bsky! (@skyladawn) December 23, 2022

It’s just about time for his pain meds, so we’ll do that in a few and I’ll get some coffee, and consider what to do for the day (probably clean).

But this is just to update that the little man is doing okay considering how much he just had taken out of him AND at least he’s still got his big iconic fangs, for now.

He’s totally worth the 10-15% of my gross annual income he costs me at the vet every year. 😭😭😭

I hope y’all have a lovely holiday and you’ll probably next hear from me here with a year-end recap (and if you’re on Patreon, you’re getting another Livi Christmas story tomorrow!).

*They’re on sale! 50% off everything at Payhip, coupon code SHAWNSTEETH at checkout! 😭

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I’ve been planning to post that I’m taking a blogging break until January other than a year-end recap and, hopefully, a good update about Shawn’s surgery, but I’ve been putting it off because I’m tired and I have a lot of things to do.

But I find myself particularly heartbroken just now hearing about the passing of Angelo Badalamenti.

It’s been a rough few years for Twin Peaks fans, but this one seems especially dark given Julee Cruise’s death in the summer as well. Music was as much a character in that show as anything else, and now it’s quiet.

I don’t get particularly attached to celebrities and everyone is always incredibly disappointing (my relief at finding Kyle MacLachlan was not a 45 supporter, and mostly posts Dad Jokes on Twitter, is still felt today), but Twin Peaks is so foundational for me that I’m still delighted to see the cast pop up on other things and always a little saddened at their passing.

But the music. The music.

As should be apparent with my Soundtrack Sundays, music is important to me. It’s crucial in the development of stories, and I also used to write a lot of songs when I was a moody teenager–I’m a self-taught (badly) guitar player and self-taught (even worse) on piano. I still fall back on my 90s playlists when house cleaning, or I go back to Tiffany when I’m particularly stressed.

But the Twin Peaks soundtrack was everything to me when I was a kid.

I had chronic insomnia (basically since infancy) and usually listened to music to try to calm my brain and fall asleep. For Christmas, my great-aunt would give her nieces and nephews money to buy the great-nieces and -nephews gifts, so when I was eight, “from” her I was given the Twin Peaks soundtrack in cassette. I still remember my excitement upon opening it the family Christmas party (and one of my older cousins laughing at me, which is also foundational in why it’s extremely hard for me to show excitement/enthusiasm for things now; it makes me feel vulnerable and I avoid it). I remember the little fold-out insert with the full cast, the feel of the plastic in my hands. How I played it over and over, often at night, when I needed to lull my brain into feeling safe so I could sleep. That was where I did my earliest storytelling, in my brain, creating a safe place to sleep and what I still do today. Julee Cruise and Angelo Badalementi were a huge part of giving my brain a safe place to retreat to (both with the Peaks soundtrack and Julee’s Floating Into the Night).

And that music still has that effect today. It instantly brings me to a place of calm–so much so that this is literally a playlist on my phone and it’s nothing but Twin Peaks music:

Because I’m a night person and mornings are rough, “Falling” is set to play instead of a typical alarm–I literally wake to Cruise and Badalamenti every single morning. And lately I’ve had this weight of anxiety in my chest that keeps expanding and pushing against my sternum; it’s Cruise’s ethereal voice and Badalamenti’s composition that dials it back again. (“Audrey’s Prayer” really helps with that, as does “The Nightingale“.)

I am so grateful for this music, and it’s not hyperbole to say it’s probably saved my life on more than one occasion–I know there are so many others in my position. I hope both were aware they impact they had.

It feels extremely strange to be losing these pieces of Twin Peaks just before my new series starts next year; Waverly Jones very obviously has Peaks‘ influence sewn right into her DNA (because I’m still angry about Audrey). Maybe this is how it is, losing the things that were foundational to us as we launch into the world what we hope will be just as important to someone else. Maybe one day some other creator will hear of my death and feel a little heartbroken as they’re about to put their own creation into the world with some of my DNA in it. It’s a bittersweet thought.

Thank you, sir, for bringing that feeling of calm and safety to my childhood–and adulthood.

If you haven’t, please check out this video of the creation behind “Laura Palmer’s Theme”.

So…I made ham out of bread?

The carnivores I know are shocked that it looks so ham-like.

The taste? It needs a little more flavour–I’d halved the recipe, roughly, and made some substitutions, and I needed more of the dry rub in the dough (SALT, MOAR SALT). But the glaze came out beautifully and overall it’s pretty good? Nice with some eggs in the morning, or I made a ham and gouda grilled cheese for dinner last night. Now that I better know what I’m doing, I think I can make something nice for Christmas.

I’d like to try to do a salami at some point, though it’ll require a few more ingredients that’ll be tricky. It’ll be a new year thing maybe, but it would be nice to make fake meats for when I’m grazing on veggies and cheese at lunch, as I often do.

I finished Silent All These Years aka Waverly 4 last night (well, at 5am this morning?). It was a 10K night. I’m tired, my hands hurt, but at least the damn thing is done and it doesn’t have to release until 2025, which makes it a problem for 2024 Skyla.

For a book that wasn’t supposed to exist, now I can’t imagine the series without it. Most of it is a hot mess but that ending? That’s a good ending. I wouldn’t say my confidence is back but I know at least I hit the right note there.

I’ll have a proper end of the year recap post up later, but for now, it’s official:

BTW, y’all see the TLoU series trailer? I’ve watched it about two dozen times and I cry with every single one. So excited non-gamers will get to meet Apocalypse DILF.

For now, I rest, and I’m not going to write a single goddamn thing for the rest of the year.

It’s been ages since I’ve made anything labour-intensive or from scratch, but a big part of that was being sick off and on for year (the other part was various mental health issues, though of course those were compounded by my physical health issues). But I’ve been consistently doing simple meal prep for months now and rebuilding habits is sort of like having to rebuild skills (which I’ve also done several times after being sick). I used to love cooking things from scratch but have largely gotten out of the habit, though with Christmas coming up I thought I’d try to do something for my own personal little meal (provided I’m feeling up to it with Shawn’s upcoming surgery stressing me out during that time).

Ham was one of the few meats I really liked as a carnivore, probably because of the salt content. I never miss meat, though I make fake chicken now for things, and while I get Tofurkey’s smoked ham deli slices, it isn’t quite the same, and it certainly doesn’t make a roast.

Enter this “pig saver” vegan ham recipe.

I like working with seitan, but I’ve never tried washing flour before, so I am intrigued!

And yes, yes, it’s bread. I’m making ham out of bread. Carnivores, I’ve heard it all: take your mockery elsewhere.

I’ve done my dough balls, washed the starch out, and now they’re resting again (I took a pic but…it is not appetizing looking lol). I have to make up some smoked salt, then I’ll be ready to combine them. It’s a multi-day process, but I used to make aged vegan cheese with rejuvelac so that doesn’t bother me.

With costs of everything skyrocketing–my rent goes up in January again, pet food and litter is up, groceries are up, etc–the flour-washing might be something I use next year to make chicken for salads and wraps and things. And getting plain vital wheat gluten can be tricky sometimes–bless all of you gluten-free folks, but it’s meant it’s trickier for me to find just a bag of gluten.

The gluten has to rest a lot, so I’m doing this between reading books for editing. I have about two and a half weeks to finish two books and get drafts of a cover out, and then it’s rest–sweet rest (or worrying, because of Shawn’s surgery, but at least I’ll be 100% on worry).

Kneading dough and washing out starch is like running, it gives my brain time to rest and I need more of that. I’m working out knots for the end of Waverly 4–I’ve got about 10K left to write on this messy, messy zero draft, and I know the very end, but trying to weave this together is…tough. The book is honestly like making this vegan ham, and I’m at the stage where I need to wash some starch out but it’s just falling apart in my hands.

I’m also suffering wavering confidence with this series because I have no idea how it’s going to be received. I’ve got a solid draft of book one ready–early next year, I’ll be tackling the final draft before copyedits, so I’ve got that time to revisit it and see if I’m properly setting up everything from the main mystery to the series tone.

I have zero interest in writing the same book over and over again, which I realize frustrates some people because that’s what they want: their procedural standalone drama that’s the same tight forty-two minutes with the same beats. But I’ve always let character dictate everything, from structure to pacing, which is most obviously apparent in Demons of Oblivion with the widely different narrators but both Livi’s and Waverly’s arcs do the same from book to book.

It’s Livi that has me second-guessing Waverly because the two series are structured very similarly (adventure/mystery-of-the-week but also overriding plot arc, like Buffy). I continually wonder what I could’ve done different with Solomon’s Seal to better set up the rest of the series, but I think I was a) relying on subtext being extremely obvious (Livi is an adrenaline junkie; that is not normal, it’s a coping mechanism, that will eventually have to be deconstructed) and b) seeing the series arc in my head and how it moves book to book organically instead of just focusing on that book by itself. The darker tone later in the series was always there at the beginning, for me–I didn’t suddenly decide to go dark in the fifth, as I’d been planning to kill ____ then, and that way, since the end of Solomon’s Seal. West’s presence and their angst was always going to build to a head by this point. Livi was independent to a fault due to her parents abandoning her at different points so her arc was always going to involve needing to rely on others so she learns to ask for help (she gets it from me–she will not ask for help and has to be forced by circumstances to accept it).

This was never a dumb mindless popcorn series–it’s always been meant to grapple with long-term trauma and how we move forward in the world when we’re shaped by our PTSD, just in the way I enjoy which is over-the-top adventure. Because, hai, I’ve got PTSD and I’m a DV survivor and I’ve got anxiety and depression, and writing books is how I process things.

So in my head, I still keep pulling apart Solomon’s Seal to its pieces to figure out what I could’ve done differently, done better, while still easing readers into the journey, and how I can apply that now to Waverly. Because I want to learn and do better.

But I have no idea. I wrote it a decade ago, and even with that level of distance, I can’t figure it out.

I function best as a writer when I’m a megalomaniac, and my brain right now is the opposite of that. I dislike it immensely.

It amazes me how often we have drama in the book world because writers and publishers will advertise books as things they are not–usually trying to cash in on those romance dollars with women’s fiction or tragi-porn–and meanwhile me, who sells next to nothing, wants to reach through the screen and beg various people to please go buy something, anything, else. I can’t fathom trying to mislead people just to sell books.

I know money is money, but I’ve never wanted to be someone’s hate-read, and if you’re four books in and you literally hate a) one or more main characters, and b) the overriding plot arcs and character arcs, my god, please save yourself. Because I am writing exactly the books I would want to read, and while I can identify a few missteps (mainly that I should’ve found a way to work the plot of Ashford’s Ghost into a main novel, given its ties to later in the series), everything I’ve published is written exactly as I want them to be. West is integral to the plot and Livi’s life, he’s not going anywhere (unless I kill him, and I’m hoping not to); Livi’s PTSD is integral to her character and it’s not going anywhere; the bigger conspiracies and mysteries are integral to her adventures and will come back book to book. If you literally hate 75%+ of what I’m doing with the series, we have different tastes!

And that’s cool. I’m not writing it for everyone; I’m writing it for the people who DO like it. Life is too short to be miserable! If you’re reading something that is clearly not what you want it to be, write your own book. That’s why everything I’ve written exists in the first place.

Anyway, I’m exhausted, and frustrated, and I wish I could rest like my gluten is right now.

It’s time to smoke my salt. I will report back on how the vegan ham goes.

Also, patrons, the penultimate bundle of Soul Spell chapters are up–there’s one more coming in January, then the book will be done! Final edited version will be coming sometime late spring or early summer.