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The Blackbriar Coven: Draft three has been completed and sent to my editor! Woohoo!

The Bed and Breakfast Between Worlds: Draft three of this book has also been completed! It feels pretty great to finally get both of these books to a place where I’m ready to show them to other people. Once my editor gets The Blackbriar Coven back to me, I’ll send this one to them.

Untitled Short Story: This is a story I started in June and put aside to focus on novels. I spent this past week working on it and finally finished the first draft. I’m not entirely sure if the final version will look anything like this first draft, but I’m happy to be done with it for the moment.

Salt in the Blood: As you’re reading this, I’m probably working on this book. This is the second book in my Grey Witch Chronicles, and I’ll most likely finish out the year with this one. The title still might change, but I’ll figure that out later.

I finished both Tea You at the Altar and Alchemy and a Cup of Tea by Rebecca Thorne, the third and fourth books in her Tomes & Tea series. It’s been fun getting to explore this world, so I’ll most likely pick up the other quartets once they’re published.

I’ve also finished The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar. I expected this one to involve a lot of fairy tale elements, or perhaps turn out to be a retelling of something. I was thrilled to discover that instead of that, it was full of folk songs. Sure, most readers will still pick up some fairy tale vibes, but that simply supports my own idea that fairy tales and folk songs have similar roots, and intersect frequently. This book turned out to be a retelling of one of my favorite folk songs, which pleased me immensely.

Phill and I decided to celebrate Halloween this year by giving ourselves the day off and doing fun things together, which includes tasty treats, games, and books. We’ve been celebrating Jolabokaflod for years, which is an Icelandic Christmas tradition. We adapted it for Halloween, choosing appropriate books for each other. Phill chose The Brotherhood of the Wheel by R. S. Belcher for me, and for him I chose Horseman by Christina Henry. I’m only a few chapters in, so I’m still not entirely sure how I feel about it.

We finished the first season of Wayward Pines, which went in an interesting direction. It’s based on novels by Blake Crouch, and I’m curious how the two compare. There were definitely a few story things that didn’t make a lot of sense, but I’m not sure if those were things the show changed or if they exist in the novels as well. Either way, we still enjoyed it, and will continue with season two.

We’ve also been watching a few Halloween movies, including the miniseries Over the Garden Wall, which is a requirement for this time of year.

LotRO’s Harvestmath has been in full swing, so I’ve been alternating between enjoying it and playing Little Witch in the Woods.

I started this game a couple years ago, when it was still in early access, and really enjoyed it. Now that it’s fully released, I decided to come back to it and start over, which was a good idea because a lot changed.

The story follows Ellie, an apprentice witch who is on her way to the city to complete her training. On the way, her train stops due to a hazard in the road, so she takes the opportunity to explore the nearby forest. She finds an abandoned witch’s house and stays the night there, only to find out the next day that the train left without her. This suits her fine, though. There’s a nearby village covered in mysterious prickly vines, and she takes it upon herself to help the villagers get rid of the vines and restore the buildings damaged by them. From there, she helps them summon back villagers who fled because of the vines.

There’s a lot of potion-crafting, befriending villagers (and cats), repairing, expanding, and decorating the witch’s house, fishing, and exploring the forest, cataloguing the various flora and fauna found within.

On top of that, there’s the lingering mystery of what happened to the witch who used to live in the house. Did she cause the prickly vines? If so, what was her goal? Where is she now?

I’m excited to see where the story goes.

I’ve been listening to Josienne Clarke’s newest album, Far From Nowhere, since it released this past month. I’ve been a fan of hers for years, way back when she was still performing with guitarist Ben Walker (I’ll always regret that I didn’t get to see them in concert before they split up).

Anyway, I considered sharing a song from the new album, but I keep coming back to this one, which might be my favorite of all her songs. It feels appropriate for the season, and my brain has connected it to one of my favorite fantasy series, which I think of every time I hear it.

Here’s everywhere we’ll be selling books for the month of November:

November 8: Shire Post Mint Festival in West Fork, AR (this one was originally scheduled for October, but was delayed due to rain).

That’s it for the moment! We’ve been looking at adding more events, especially after the holidays, so I’m sure I’ll have more to report in the future.

In this section I like to share words from languages I’m learning. This month I’ve chosen more Irish words.

I post once a week on Patreon about all sorts of things: writing, books I’m reading, things going on in life. Once a month I also share sneak peeks of whatever book I’m working on. It would mean the world to me if you considered joining.

I am also on Ko-fi, which is sort of like Patreon, but with one key difference: you’re not locked into a subscription. Ko-fi allows patrons to donate however often they’d like to creators they follow. No subscriptions if you don’t want them, no commitments, and you have control over when and how you donate. At this point my Ko-fi page exists solely to allow one-off donations.

I decided to try Substack, since I’ve seen so many people join it recently. I’m curious to see if I like it, if it’s any better than some of the other platforms out there, or if maybe it will be worthwhile long-term. Time will tell.