Well, I'm back after another long absence. Raise your hand if you're surprised. No hands in the air? Yeah, I didn't expect there to be. You know the drill: I had a crisis, shut everything down, ran away until I felt better, and came back, shamefaced but determined not to pull the same stunt again.

Anyway, you're not here for my personal woes, you're here for writing! Presumably. I don't know if anyone's still around, actually, but if I shout into the void, perhaps the void will shout back a welcome. 

So. You may be wondering what's with this post's title. Well, it references both my recent mental state and also the states of two of my wips: Chronicles of Mourra and Wonderland. 

Guess what! The plans I had for both? Shattered. On purpose. I picked up both wips, threw them at a metaphorical wall (aka my debilitating writer's block), shuffled through the pieces, picked up the shiniest, prettiest fragments, got a new frame and some glue, and made two different mosaics.

This extended metaphor is getting away from me, so let me speak plainly. Neither of these wips were working for me, so I took what I liked best of them and made something new. Wow, that sounds way easier than it actually was. In reality this took me literal months and serious angst to do.

Let's jump right into it, shall we?

Wow, sometimes I'm mad stubborn. Maybe tenacious is a better word? Pigheaded? Willfully blind? Either way, you'd think after ten years of trying and failing to make a story work I would give up and try something really and truly new with it.

Ok, so I got there eventually. Three weeks or so ago, I was driving to the airport, watching a landscape of olive groves and desert scrub and a packed highway whizz by while suffering the worst allergy-related congestion, and I was thinking about fairy tales. And then, given that I was in a setting reminiscent of CofM, I also started thinking about my wip.

​This eventually led me to realize that my favourite parts of CofM, the parts I thought worth salvaging, the parts that kept me from trashing the entire thing completely, were 1) the characters and 2) an alphabetical glossary/encyclopedia I put together featuring the creatures, places, and notable people of the world. 

Yeah, my favourite part wasn't the plot. I hated the plot. I was in denial about hating the plot. I thought if I just tweaked the plot, added new elements to it, I'd finally find a way to make it something I loved. Nope. Turns out the entire plot is just not something I'm interested in writing at all. Not anymore.

Well, except for this one core thing: a mother willing to do absolutely anything for her son, and the people who help her because they love them both.

Ultimately, I figured out that what I actually want to write is:

• a simpler, more contained plot where my characters have an adventure that personally impacts them and not the entire kingdom/several other kingdoms
• those characters falling in love and/or being in love and being absolute disasters about it
• all the cool creatures and places I'd come up with for the world of CofM
• a story that still draws on my culture and traditions and beliefs

So I came up with a whole new, refreshing, dare I say exciting plot! I will introduce the new and improved CofM soon, so keep an eye on this space/your email for that.

Ok, so I liked the idea of an Alice in Wonderland retelling as I'd imagined it, but...I didn't actually wanna write it? Much like CofM, I came up with the idea of this retelling years and years ago and it never went anywhere.

​Turns out that's for a good reason: I really don't personally enjoy writing big, overarching, complex plots where the fate of the world/kingdom/country rests on the shoulders of a handful of people. 

(I do like reading it. But that's a kind of epic I don't have the inclination to dive into, and it can only be done well if you're committed to it. Newsflash: I am not. It overwhelms me.)

What I do like writing, what I've been successful at writing, are stories that are character-driven and character focused! (Rivener is my only completed novel for a reason! How did I not realize this sooner???)

Anyway, cue my latest emotional breakdown and a lot (a lot) of anger and despair and resentment about pretty much...everything...as well as the realization that another thing that made Rivener successful is that I wrote it while channeling Big Feelings™ into it.

Self-reflection complete, I decided to throw various self-imposed restrictions to the wind and write something that was purely and 100%, no holds barred (ok, lies, some holds barred) for me. 

Which is how Oracle wip ​was born. Like CofM 2.0, I am taking bits of pieces of the original idea and doing something different. Like, really different. I've actually never wrote something like this before. I'm excited for it! Bit nervous about sharing it too, but whatever, I'mma power through.

So Wonderland is now Oracle, and it is no longer an Alice in Wonderland retelling. It does still have...little callbacks to Caroll's stories though? I think for the most part it's not enough for anyone to pick up on unless you're really looking for it, but it does bring me joy, and it facilitated this new plot, so I'm going with it.

It also has the most unhinged characters I've written to date. Everyone is sort of awful, but in a fun way! Like CofM 2.0, stay tuned for more about it. This post is already long as heck.

My memory's terrible, because it wasn't until I was perusing my own blog that I remembered one of my goals for this year was to write my Rivener AU. Nope, that's not happening, unless something changes! Which it might! Who knows! Certainly not I!

Also, Glitch wip is still stalled and not going anywhere. My other goals are also...no longer my goals. I shoulda known better than to aim for them because that's almost a sure-fire way to guarantee I won't do them. Me? Keeping promises to myself? Not letting myself down? HAH. 

Ok, so it's only June. Who knows what the rest of the year will hold for me. 

Anyway, thank you for your attention, if I've managed to hold it this long. (Mind letting me know that I'm reaching actual human minds?) As ever, happy reading and writing. Hope you're doing better than I am, but if you're not. Well, nothing bad lasts forever. Take care babes. 

I don't know how many of you remember, but I briefly posted about a new project of mine that was tentatively titled Chimken Tendies (based on a very silly inside joke). I talked a lot about it with two of my friends and this wip has since grown massively. I finally have a better working title for it too! It's now being called the Glitch wip, which is fitting for the direction I'm hoping to take the story in! Before I dive into that though, let me re-introduce it to you!

(I'll be posting a wip intro under my books once I have one ready!)

Set several hundred years into our future, body modifications are becoming more common for those who can afford them, and many of the diseases we're familiar with have been completely eradicated (including most forms of cancer) thanks to various corporations' efforts and research. The technology for prosthetics has also come a long way and become more affordable and advanced. 

One of the biggest corporations involved with all that is the LeMarque Foundation, a family run organization hailed for their incredible medical breakthroughs, known for being leaders in the field of bio- and gene-modification. They are, of course, shady as hell.

This project of mine is not only my first attempt at writing cyberpunk (and sci-fi)! It'll be my first time writing something with aliens. They don't come from outer-space though. Instead, they're interdimensional beings from an entirely separate plane of existence. Ok, so not entirely separate, because they've often purposely (or accidentally) crossed over into our reality, and are the source of many fairytales and mythologies, especially those pertaining to any kind of shapeshifting or physical transformation!

Which brings me to the characters:

Sacha | A bodyguard for the LeMarque's son and heir, Etienne. She's a cyborg, and due to shenanigans, is technically the LeMarque's property (at least, the tech parts of her are, and she can't survive without those). Her service to them is in payment of her debt to them. She takes her job very seriously but has a secret fondness for her charge which she does an all-too-good job of hiding. When on duty, she often wears a mask to obscure the lower half of her face.

Etienne | The son and heir to the LeMarque's, he kicks off the story by running away the day Sacha's out for repairs (which is the only reason he managed to get away at all). A sweet if naive kid, he hates his parents and can't stomach being around them after he discovers the secret behind their company's success and the horror of the mantle they're planning to pass on to him. 

Cipher | A shapeshifter and one of the most skilled of the very few shapeshifters that have been identified. He has the ability to change every part of his body down to his fingerprints (although not DNA, and he's limited to human forms). He's a direct descendant of the aforementioned aliens, though he has lived his whole life in our plane of existence, Ostensibly, he's a government agent. In reality, he's got no choice about it. He's on loan to the LeMarques to be Etienne's doppelgänger until Etienne is found and brought back. 

So why is the working title Glitch? Well, because it's going to be dealing with the intersection of humanity and technology, and both Cipher and Sacha have bodies that in different ways...glitch. [Cue evil laughter here]. This story will also be exploring a lot of themes related to agency, family, identity, and class warfare. There will be no romance between the main characters! There may be a revolution, or the start of one, though it won't be the main focus. It will probably be a standalone.

But wait, there's more! Glitch  is actually—drumroll please—the spiritual prequel to Rivener 2.0! Maybe even literal prequel, if I can manage to sprinkle references to Glitch into it. But basically, my plan is for Rivener 2.0 to take place in the same world, only much, muuuuuch later on. We're talking about a thousand years later!

So Glitch wip is actually me setting up the world to be what it is in Rivener. Initially, Rivener was supposed to be more of a fantasty post-apocalyptic story than a sci-fi one. I've moved away from that entirely though. Kai's shifter abilities are actually a result of the evolution of shapeshifter genes mixing with the bio-mods that happen during Glitch's time. And this does mean, unfortunately, that the world of Glitch is one barrelling towards an apocalypse. [Cue more evil laughter].

Now I'm not a science person, and though I will be doing a little research into these concepts, for the most part (or at least, in the first draft) I'm gonna just have fun and hand-wave away any big questions of how all this is possible. Hello, we've got aliens. 

Anyway! I'm super excited for this wip! I haven't written any new content for it, I've just been thinking and talking about it, and waiting for the story to finish brewing in my head before I try and write it. But this is the last of my major updates, and I hope you enjoyed reading and following along with me on this. Check out the pinterest board I have for it, for more glimpses into the characters, world, and aesthetic. 

If you have any questions or thoughts on this wip or anything I'm writing, please do not hesitate to hit me up. I'd be ecstatic to hear from you! Also I do my best story-building in conversations with people. 

Until next time, happy reading and writing! 

❝ i dreamed about magic and dragons and flying to neverland and i knew if i wanted it hard enough i could go and i dreamed an old, cracking voice softly saying "after thunder, golden showers" and a young, lilting voice singing "and 'round the corner there may wait/a new road or a secret gate/and though i oft have passed them by/a day will come at last when i/shall take the hidden paths that run/west of the moon east of the sun" and there were fireflies i chased laughing in the dark and there was a swarm of mosquitos but they were golden and dancing in the light and they did not bite me and it was magic, magic, and i want it back. ❞

Hello hello, it's been really long while. Am I back? I don't know. I still haven't written any more of my books, but I no longer feel like my writing ability and creative drive is locked in a doorless safe buried far underground, encased in cement, out of my reach. So hopefully!

I do have some updates though:

• the wip I'd temporarily titled Chimken Tendies is now to be referred to as the Glitch wip!
• i put an indefinate pause on redrafting Rivener and instead
• i am planning an AU! It started as a convo with my friend, wondering how Wren and Kai's story would play out if the main antogonist, Cormac, found and took Wren under his wing when she was young. It's a darker story, but one I'm really excited about!

I hope you're all doing well! Comment below and update me on your lives and writing! Ask me questions about my wips! I may not be writing but I'm definitely thinking about my stories all the time. I reply, I promise, just slowly, and I love hearing from you.

Until then,
​Happy reading and writing!

So I'm a certified night owl and I do some of my best (and also...worst, let's be real) work between the hours of midnight and 4am, when I'm not working and don't have places to be in the real morning. Such was the case with my new work-in-progress Chimken Tendies. (I will be taking no questions about the working title at this time 😃) 

Anyways! I was scrolling through TikTok when I saw a POV video of a guy acting as 'your' (the viewer's) bodyguard, judging your choice in boyfriend. My heart went tha-thump. My hands started twitching. My overworked computer fans started pre-emptively whining. And I had an idea. 

I'm a huge fan of tropes and archetypes, and I also really love subverting or otherwise twisting those tropes and archetypes. The concept of bodyguards has long been a delight, but also one I have...never written? Somehow? It's a delicious dynamic, and it's a crying shame that I've never put my spin on it!

So I went on tumblr, yelled exuberantly at a friend, added a few other narrative tropes into the mix, and arrived at Chimken Tendies, where Etienne, the very wealthy scion of a very shady family runs away the one day his loyal bodyguard, Sacha, is on leave. His parents (are terrible people) want him home primarily so no one can try and use their son against them, so they hire a shapeshifter named Cipher to double as him. Sacha must, of course, guard Cipher as though he's the real Etienne, all the while worrying about her original charge, and trying to teach Cipher how to be more like Etienne. Cue misadventures (so far indistinct). 

Here's what I have so far of this ridiculous fun!