I know the ebook already had one, but I mean the hardcover.

I should probably title these things like “cover reveal” and make a big deal out of it right? Well, normally I just do a new cover and then put it on the website for a year or two until the book comes out. I don’t expect it to be an exciting thing people are anticipating, but at least it’s something new checked off my massive list.

This one has been plaguing me for a while, I couldn’t manage to do what I saw in my head, and it’s tricky sometimes to find something that’s close to a scene in the book but can still be giving the vintage, painted treatment and look like an old-school mystery cover. I gave up trying to find stock photos that looked like the image in my head and instead just looked at stock photos and considered what I could do with them. I spent today on it, and now I’ve finally got something.

But first, a word from WAVERLY BARBIE.

I am an extremely normal adult human person, yes.

She has a laptop, tablet, notebook and pencil her messenger bag. I am getting her a little camera. I’m not entirely sold on her head but it was the best option and she’s got more of a smirk than a smile, so that works. I also need to make her a little bear charm necklace.

It’s been in progress for a while, just picking up a piece at a time. I’d planned to have different outfits for her but getting those skinny jeans on was a challenge and so they’re staying lol (seriously THERE IS SARAN WRAP AROUND HER LEGS).

Okay, okay, so: the hardcover!

Here she is.

As usual: no generative AI, it’s a combination of stock photos, filters, and a lot of digital painting.

I might try to do the fifth book’s hardcover scene while I’m thinking about it, just so it’s not left to the last minute.

Besides the local maps, behind-the-scenes look, and vegan recipe (still writing that out), this one also has the novella Haunting at Hayward House, which was in StoryBundle last year, and a short story Too Long to Stop Now that’ll be available to patrons this December, both set after the fourth book.

Yeah I’m gonna max out my page count allowance here for hardcovers at KDP; it’s a big book.

Three posts in just over a week, I know, I’m shocked too, but I hadn’t expected Dweller out yet (I expect Solomon’s Seal maybe in the next few weeks since it was in production around the same time). I’ll probably disappear again for a few weeks until it’s time for the quarterly state of the union here.

And don’t forget to check out Dweller if you haven’t! I’m getting really great feedback about the narrator’s reading of it, which thrills me to know she really “got” Norah’s voice.

It was while working on the third big round of Waverly 4 revisions late Dec/early January that I thought “omg there is so much going on here, I think I need to take notes.”* I was constantly wishing I had Waverly’s big murder board that’s in her bedroom (that actually consists of three boards) where she lays things out or that I might need a proper murder journal.

Somehow the thought spiralled from there to make a Waverly-themed mostly blank journal (cover design inspired by the OG secret diary, of course, but sized 5.5×8.5 and using the Nancy Drew font so it’s matchy with the hardcovers).

I wrote out the timeline from the Port Milton cycle of the killings, including stuff from the Patreon backstory shorts (and a few references to stuff that I intend to write later) and peppered in it are references to the past (along with one thing from the sixth book) with papers and articles tucked in it, coffee stains, and doodles. The only thing better would’ve been to have full colour images, but sadly that would’ve jacked the price way up–this is $9.99 USD, 200 pages.

Obviously one could just get a regular journal from the dollar store if they wanted to go so far as to take notes, but at the very least I had a lot of fun making this. And, my god, we gotta have fun sometimes. I’m already in the red with everything I publish, factoring in time spent, and getting some line art for the first couple of hardcovers in 2023 meant going even deeper in the red, but the end result was something I am very happy to have invested in because I love the hardcovers. I’m working with an other artist right now on some drawings, a couple being printed as die-cut stickers for some patrons, and they’re cute and make me happy (and I am thrilled to support human-made art).

This series occupies my head 90% of the time and I’m happy to have a fun thing to offer readers who are also in that place. My long-time book blogger friend Mel just got into the series–she’s generally a fantasy reader rather than straight mysteries, but she’s got out her sticky notes to keep track of everything.

@melissahaydentea

I can’t put this book down! I am loooving the characters and the case Waverly’s investigating. Dang. Fiction Mystery has a MFC that’s my kind of character! Damaged. 💜 #booktok #books #fiction #mystery

♬ original sound – Melissa Hayden Tea

I’ve worked really hard with this series, despite it being entirely Waverly’s POV, to fill the town with people who seem to live and breathe even outside her perspective, to have the cases feel like they happened to real people, for everything to be extremely grounded and like you could search for articles about these crimes and find them online.** The journal is part of that.

If you need a copy, you can grab it at Amazon.*** (Also can be used for a regular journal, of course.)

I’ve got a busy work week ahead of me with projects to send off and taxes to finish, and my place is a mess, so I’m off to do some chores and take a stab at this week’s tutorial.

Tomorrow is also Twin Peaks Day! I’ll be live-tweeting**** over at Bsky because I love the pilot so much.

It does feel necessary to acknowledge the thing that started it all, after all.

____

* I don’t do notes with anything. Future books are all kept in my head and although I keep meaning to build a story bible, I never get around to it, so I have to reread bits to refresh my memory.

** Mel mentioned to me she kept wanting to google the cases for more information. Honestly so do I and occasionally I have to remind myself I made all this up lol.

*** Yes, yes, I know, and you do you if you’re boycotting. I don’t sell enough print of anything to justify the expense of setting up with Ingram, and going through D2D would require me to increase the price of everything by at least $5 across the board so that I still make $2 per print book. I’m not doing that to a handful of readers just so one or two people can feel morally superior.

**** I’m still calling it that, whatever.

I certainly did not expect the last couple of days to be as sad as they were, but David Lynch’s work was–regardless of it not being age appropriate–such a massive part of my childhood, I have imagined this is how normal people felt when Mr. Rogers died.

I think the feelings are heightened by how many others feel it–my Bluesky feed was overwhelmed with by people posting similar disbelief and sadness and tributes. Then every time Kyle MacLachlan says something, I just start ugly crying, whether it was his initial post about the news or today’s opinion piece.

My own much simpler reflection was posted to Patreon, far less eloquent but processing the need for art in a time of rising generative AI usage and squeezing the life out of creators that we see around us. I think that, too, is why I was hit with just profound sadness.

I openly, rather loudly, absolutely loathed The Return. I felt so disappointed and betrayed, I’m now writing a twelve-book grudge series and dedicated The Killing Beach to a fictional character–that’s how intensely mad I was. But to quote myself at Patreon here: I would rather art that I find deeply imperfect but that is saying something or doing something unique than milquetoast trash made in an attempt to appeal inoffensively to the highest number of people. I want art with edges that cut me instead of being so filed down I can no longer feel the texture. I need art that stays with me and changes me and leaves me with questions I have to find my own answers for.

I am so grateful to have grown up with his work and influence. I am grateful my media wasn’t censored as a child and I could imprint on it as hard as I have–even though I was in my thirties before I could watch a scene with BOB without covering my eyes. I am grateful for the stuff I loathed because spite fuels me and now I have a series in progress that brings me tremendous joy.

Lynch’s family has asked that everyone take ten minutes to mediate tomorrow (January 20, so possibly today when you read this) at noon PST, so 3pm EST which is my time, to reflect and spread peace, in remembrance and appreciation for his birthday. Tomorrow is, of course, day one of the newest shitshow in the US, so I’m unplugging to get work done and will set a reminder timer. Of course I can’t mediate, I never have been able to, but I’m going sit down in my Twin Peaks t-shirt and will make an effort to be grounded in the present and focused.

I am, at least, finally starting to feel like myself again, and hope that my brain is on the mend from burnout, because it’s awful to be sad and not writing. Feeling nostalgic, of course, so I’m writing a little Waverly backstory scene that’ll go up for Patreon.

This year will be terrible and I have no real solutions or answers, other than create what we can, care for those we love, and celebrate what we’ve got.

(the gif and title is, of course, from one of the Log Lady intros to Twin Peaks back in the day, which are a little bonkers but memorable)