August Newsletter and Updates
What's new and what's hot in today's writing world.
Hello, dear readers and fellow writers! I hope all is well in your corner of the world. As for me, I’ve been super busy with getting these books ready to publish. I’m on track to have the last twisted/dark fairy tale release in October—Little Red Riding Hood—and it looks like Blooming Camellia will come out shortly thereafter. The rest of the year, I’m looking to get Air and the Crown done, and launching a Kickstarter for the second Behind the Red novel. I hope you’ll hop in on that one, as I plan to offer some great rewards. I’m shooting for releasing that one towards the end of 2026. I’m also trying to get Air and the Crown done by the end of the year. Really looking forward to releasing that one for you all.
I know I had plans for more releases this year, but as usual, life has taught me one thing: I cannot do more than I’m physically capable of doing. I’ve had to dial back my releases, and if I happen to finish a book, I’ll schedule it to release after I’m done. Luckily, my publisher is pretty flexible like that.
In 2026, I plan to release Rainbow Daisy (Part two of Kink in the City), Dark Honey (Book One of Joe Town Bound), Voiceless (Book One of Transcendent Voices), and Sea of Stars (Book One of Silken Bonds), as well as Book Three of Legacy of the Phoenix and Scarlet Release (Book Two of Behind the Red). There may be more, it all depends on how smooth my day job goes, and how much time I have for writing, as well as how often the inspiration hits for the right story.
A Note About AI
So, it is all the rage right now for people to throw accusations of AI usage around like wildflower seeds. I’m going to state right now, I am 100% against generative AI. Let’s get that out of the way first of all. But things like using em dashes, en dashes, hyphens, semi-colons, and ellipses are not automatic indicators of AI. Full stop. Does AI over use em dashes? Sure does, but that’s because AI was trained on other writers works, and they used em dashes. It can only spit out what it is taught by the training of them on the books that used regular punctuation. Those things are standard forms of proper punctuation, and while some authors don’t use them at all, some use them a lot, and it doesn’t mean they use AI.
All that said, I take no issue with using AI as a tool. It is a tool, and it is a tool that will be around from now on. Anyone who uses Grammarly, ProWriting Aid, or AutoCrit is using assistive AI. Even the spell checker in Word is a type of AI. So, if you find AI helpful, then use it to get that perfect sentence, or find when you repeat start sentences with “He” four or five times in a row. You wrote the ideas, and you get to decide what to change. It is different from feeding a prompt of 100 words to a computer, and having it spit out 100k novel, throwing it on Amazon as is, and calling it a day.
Even in marketing or other areas, AI can be helpful. AI is supposed to do tasks no one wants to do, and it is supposed to take the burden off people and let them do creative tasks instead of menial ones. So, I have no issue if someone uses AI in this manner; so, they are using it in a way that doesn’t take work from creatives and instead gives them more time to work on their own creative works.
So, yeah, AI is here to stay. And to ignore it is to ignore progress. Can it be used improperly? Yes. Unfortunately, it can. However, it cannot ever replace the human spirit. It cannot replace the spark of life we put into our works when we create them. It doesn’t know when we break the rules of grammar on purpose to make a point. It doesn’t add small final additions to the picture like a human hand. And it cannot beat a human editor putting actual eyes on a piece of writing.
The Sun Shown
As I slowly slide,
Slipping to a sunless sea
from the sunlit sands,
So my soul sees and hears
The sound of stars.
So, spirit, this for you
I sail on a ship of sacrifice
over the sunless sea,
Sea spray sullying my shirt
Sighing, I see the sleeping stars
in the sea of my soul.
So as sadness and sorrow
tries to swallow me,
I say my sight for the last sign.
So I seem to be in the sunlit sand,
No sorrow or sadness do I seek.
So the sun has begun to shine
on the silent and sleeping stars
in my selfless soul with my secret spirit.
~Reflections of the Shadow Dancer~
Avern. So far, we’ve got one book. I know, it’s an extremely slow release schedule for Avern. There’s a good reason, though. The worlds are complex and it takes a lot to craft an interesting world for everyone to enjoy. So, for today, I’ll talk about one of the areas of the continent that everything takes place on. Are there other continents? We have yet to see.
The Firana t’Kalima (Firekin Elves) - The Firekin elves are xenophobic. Based in the San T’shi desert at the southeast corner of the continent, they are used to a very harsh environment. In the shadow of the mountains, they get little rain, and the only individuals they will trade with are their Wraith neighbors. Note, Wraith is the name humans gave the race of people that are native to the desert. Their own name is in their language and not pronounceable by the human tongue. The Firekin Elves broke with their siblings many years ago, and they only wanted to be left to live alone in the desert they call home. They are known to fiercely defend their homeland with inventive long-range weapons, some magically imbued to cut through the caustic desert winds of the desert. They are masters of close-range combat as well, using the sand itself against intruders. Rarely does someone survive an encounter with them.
Writing is going well, but man is it hard getting time to get anything done! I work full time, and by the time I get home, I am tired out. It doesn’t help that I have hypersomnia, and I’m already tired all the time. I’m working on getting everything done for the year, and boy is it tough these days. As many of you know, I also work at an unidentified position with the Publisher I go through, and that takes up some time too.
However, if you follow my blog on the website, I’ve been posting about my weight loss journey, and it’s been wild so far. I had to buy new underwear, and my pants are too big after losing almost thirty pounds. I haven’t been hopeful about my weight for many years, and I’ve always been heavy ever since I was a teenager. It was like teenage years came, and I blossomed. Everywhere. So for me, after weighing nearly three hundred pounds for almost fifteen years with NO change and being in continuous calorie deficit… Zepbound has made the difference. With my medications and hypothyroidism, I’m not on the same playing field as others, and I know that. But the judgement that comes with being in a heavy body is so terrible. If you haven’t dealt with it, I don’t think there’s a way to truly understand it.
I’ve been appearing on a podcast, and I’d like to recommend you check it out, it’s called Around the Table with Authors of the Resistance. Click below to check it out.
What’s going on in your world? Have you read anything good lately? Let me know in the comments, I would really like to hear from some of my awesome readers.
