I’m offline this week for most of the time*–quite literally, I unplug before bed–so I can work without distraction and tackle this massive to-do list. Social media, correspondence, DMs, etc eats up a good chunk of time, but that’s really just part of it–it’s that my brain seems to get a little scrambled just being online. I need one of those resets. Just cutting back on the weekend and starting the week offline has helped tremendously–I should be able to get some major things done this week and next, and hopefully be able to breathe again.

I think part of it is the dopamine hits from being online, refreshing and checking things, becomes an easy source if your brain doesn’t really work right in that regard. One of the reasons I’m a prolific writer, I think, is because when I was young, writing and storytelling became intrinsically attached to that reward feedback loop–I feel good when I’m thinking and problem solving and writing. And it came about as a kid because I was largely alone and it was how I entertained myself. As an adult, I need to consciously get back in touch with that feeling, and cutting off online ties is the best way to do it.

I was noticing it really badly at the Saturday night write-in at my Discord server–I just could not form words. I was too scattered, too out of focus.

For the Waverly 4 revisions, part of that book involves Waverly revisiting the day Sebastian went missing and her sister was killed, that final conversation. Now, I know broadly everything that happened, all the secrets yet to come in the series–who The Butcher is, what happened that final day and the ensuing eleven years, etc. But the smaller details were always fuzzy and a few things I knew had to happen but not the specifics, it didn’t quite fit.

I decided I’d write four shorts under The Last Conversation. Waverly and Meadow’s argument at the school (which was mentioned in Alone at Night), Waverly’s POV of the last conversation with Sebastian, Sebastian’s POV of that same conversation, and then Meadow’s murder. (Yes, writing depressive things is my idea of a good time, I guess?)

I drafted out the first one at the past two write-ins, but the next one was a real struggle. I realized it was because I needed Sebastian’s first since it’s his scene–he’s the one with a lot more knowledge about what’s going on, he’s the one with the most to lose. It needed some theme music, though, so I went through some of the unreleased music from Twin Peaks, and ran into Angela Badalamenti’s demo for “Questions in a World of Blue”.

Of course I was familiar with Julee’s, which is haunting and beautiful. And the tune itself seems to be based on “Audrey’s Prayer“–there were a few later themes spun off of that, which I adore.

But something about Angelo’s demo just hit me really hard. I cannot describe how much the music from that show means to me; I had chronic insomnia as a child, so I used to listen to it at night to relax. To this day, my morning alarm is “Falling“. When I’m stressed, the music I listen to goes from my massive 16-hour 90s playlist to Tiffany’s self-titled debut album to Julee/Angelo/Twin Peaks music when I’m at my worst. The loss** of them both in 2022 still hits me hard.*** So Angelo’s quiet, rougher demo was just so beautiful and heartbreaking, it was perfect for the scene, and I ended up ugly crying the whole time. But last night and now tonight, I finished it at 5K. It flowed fairly smoothly and has some really good passages.

It’s finally put together everything for me–the scene clicked a lot of final pieces into place for me now, that makes sense of the past and will come into play later. And, of course, it’s taken me several books, several years, several hundred thousand words, to figure out I just really wanted to fix something from the S2 finale, in a way that literally no one will see the connection to but me. But his point of view was truly heartbreaking in a way I had not been entirely prepared for; Waverly’s view is so narrow that even knowing his history, I still need to write from his actual point of view to get the full picture.

They are not scenes I can share with anyone, not even Patreon (I might, if I can clean it up, be able to share the first one soon), but I need this backstory written for the current series timeline.

So that’s my days for the rest of this week and maybe next, unplugging at night before bed, working 10-12 hours during the day and breaking it up with some housework, and then checking in late at night and hopefully getting to work a little on my own stuff. By July I should no longer be running around having a constant panic attack over the everything April/May causing me to be so behind.

And just know that I hate to report this offline stuff really helps. Ugh.

BTW I have a bunch of current and upcoming deals at Kobo, for those who shop there.

Here’s Shawn being cute with my bra tonight:

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*Setting this to post as proof of life and I’ll drop links on social media later.
**”The World Spins” always leaves me in tears (it’s also the final chapter song for Beneath the Pines, Waverly 7) and I completely understood why when I found out Julee often cried while singing it.
***I link all the time, but if you’ve never seen Angelo talk about creating Laura Palmer’s Theme, it’s wonderful.

I had tried to write blog post last week and I was getting on my own nerves so never posted it. I’m not sleeping, which is partly my personality and partly stress because I’m so behind with everything due to events this spring, and it’s harder to watch what I’m saying with my outside voice. I have tried, again, multiple times to post this and I keep deleting paragraphs.

A couple of us have been watching the StoryBundle stats update every morning, hoping for a miracle. It jumped up eleven sold overnight, so we’re hoping the Fear of Missing Out will give it a kick with just two days left.

I have been…frustrated, to say the least, by the High School Group Project Dynamic present here. I have a very small following but worked hard to hustle and promote everyone. Others…could not even be bothered to tell their followers about it. 🙃

I have had to cut a lot out of this post because my frustrations are better expressed in DMs. A lot of us really tried to promote everyone and have fun. Others did try to boost. And then there were dismissive remarks from other quadrants, and dragged heels at being asked to mention it at all, and it’s just heaped on more stress the past few weeks.

We’ve sold far less than the other bundle I was in, and I know this is very much first-world problems with everything going on in the world, but after rent/utilities, taxes, business expenses, private health insurance, and pet needs, on average I have about $120-$150/month to live on (sometimes more, sometimes a lot less). For groceries, for non-covered medication, for buying the odd movie on sale, for donating to charity (outside the $10/month I give to Amnesty International), for paying back taxes. Book sales have tanked the last several months; patrons are cancelling (largely due to their own job losses–I get it). I’m really scared about how things will look a year from now.

I needed this to do better. Especially coming off how demoralizing April’s new release was, when all but one friend could not even be bothered to acknowledge the book that day. I am disappointed for others, too, but yeah, I really needed something.

I have just deleted another paragraph here as I’m struggling with balancing honesty vs whining. This is far more negative than I intended but, you know, this is my blog–very few people read it and I’m allowed to be negative here after I’ve tried to be fun and enthusiastic everywhere else. (I have thoughts about not being passive aggressive when talking about our work as creatives or treating it like a chore/thing we’re ashamed of, and I am not ashamed at all of this bundle–I am just disappointed in people.)

I have tremendous respect for the curator, who not only put together a stellar lineup of books but actually read them all, which I understand not all curators even bother to do, and promoted the hell out of this despite so much stress she had this spring. She runs a quality small press and has just launched her first Kickstarter to help fund an upcoming anthology, so please have a look at this wintery gothic project Hauntings & Hoarfrost and consider backing (I did!).

I have sworn off group projects, yes, but I will do another if she asks me, because she’s just one of those people.

There are just two days left to get SO MUCH MURDER at StoryBundle.

Here’s hoping for that final FOMO boost. 🤞

Amidst all the terrible (seriously, Shawn was sick, Ninja was at the emergency vet on Monday–it just never ends) there is something pretty cool I can show you!

I’m part of a new StoryBundle collection of supernatural detective stories, curated by one of my favourite people, Margaret Curelas at Tyche Books. I have read several of these books–I have worked on some as an editor, some as an artist, some as both, and I count some of these folks among my friends. I’m thrilled to bits to have Waverly in such good company.

This is a pay-what-you-want situation–pay at least $5 and get four books. I’m in the bonus list, so drop $20 or more, decide how much is going to us and how much to StoryBundle, and you’ll get all eleven books including mine.

Here’s Margaret:

I love detective stories. Reluctant detectives, cynical detectives, detectives who drown their sorrows in a bottle of cheap whiskey. I also love ghost stories and all things uncanny, which means some of my favorite books feature supernatural detectives—those lucky few who investigate flickering lights and strange noises in supposedly empty houses. Those who make deals with trickster gods. Those who navigate multiple worlds and realities.

The Supernatural Detective Bundle contains several stories about ghosts and their unfinished business—some sad, some creepy, and some malevolent. Others are about otherworldly creatures like vampires and gods and their intricate machinations. All the stories are about the people called upon to risk their lives and sanity to solve that strange death, protecting their family, friends, and, incidentally, the world.

To find out more about the eleven books in this bundle, click here, and make sure to click on each cover for a synopsis, reviews and preview of each book!

Margaret has been a huge supporter of the Waverly Jones series, so when she invited me to this, I could not say no. Is Waverly a supernatural series? That depends on your perspective. Waverly is certainly haunted. And I know some folks interpret her hallucination of Meadow as an actual ghost–which is an interpretation I’m quite fine with. Waverly is written very close first person, which leaves a lot of room for readers to see things she doesn’t.

But I was not content to leave it at that, so in addition to The Killing Beach, I’ve included a bonus novella I wrote specifically for this release, called Haunting at Hayward House. It’s about 23K words, set after Silent All These Years (although I kept spoilers to a minimum), and will not be available digitally elsewhere, although I plan to include it in the next hardcover.

Next to The Crossroads Butcher—the serial killer who murdered her sister—Waverly Jones’s greatest foe might be the local Heritage Advisory Committee.

While she hasn’t directly run afoul of them, they’ve long tried to get on her good side in the hopes of going through her to gain the good graces of her mother, the descendent of Port Milton’s oldest family and owner of the Milton Estate. Even though she hates everyone anyway, Waverly particularly hates the committee—but their money spends the same as anyone else’s, so when they ask her to look into the supposed haunting of a local murder house, she tacks on a lot of extra fees for the irritation and then agrees. As soon as the cheque clears.

It isn’t only ghosts she’s alone with at the house: a group of twentysomething true-crime podcasters are also staying in the hopes of finding evidence of a haunting. Waverly is certain there’s a more mundane explanation, but when one of the kids goes missing in the middle of the night, she considers revising that assessment. Because the doors and windows are all latched from the inside, yet there is no trace of the missing person—nor is there an easy explanation for lost items appearing in unexpected places, humanoid shadows that disappear when Waverly looks directly at them, or for the rising certainty that they are not the only ones in this haunted house…

This is available for a limited time only at StoryBundle.com. If you could share with your various networks, that would be greatly appreciated by all involved!