Hello, friends!

September is my birthday month, and it's been a flurry of activity over here for quite a lot of August. My birthday is actually on Friday, so I'm trying to make a gargantuan push on my tasks this week so that I can take my birthday off and spend some time relaxing with my husband this weekend.

I hope you've all had an amazingly fun and productive summer!

As for me...

What's being covered in this Newsletter?

Deep-Dive Topic of Interest

This month, I wanted to talk about what tools I use in my writing and art practices! This is a common question people ask creatives, and I've been asked before, so I figured I'd throw my hat into the ring.

Upcoming

Events, Timelines, Crowdfunds, Promos, Releases, Reminders... What all is going on? Let’s break it all down!

Current Goals in September

This hasn't changed much from last month; there is a lot going on, particularly centered around Aloe, Such Sweet Sorrow, and crowdfunding. September and October are busy season, as well, and the events coming up will be announced below!

What I Worked On In August, Anyway?

What did I work on? What went well? What didn’t go well? The recap helps me quantify what I’ve done this month, and also shows a bit of transparency to what I’m working on week-by-week. August has been exceedingly busy, so let's get straight to it!

Deep Dive - What Tools Do You Use For Your Creative Processes?

The deep dive was really, really long, so I posted it as a separate article here. Let's get back to our scheduled programming—

What's Coming Up?

Events, Timelines, Crowdfunds, Promos, Releases, Reminders...
What all is going on?

Uncanny and Uncouth needs ARC readers!

Uncanny and Uncouth is a collaborative anthology that several writers have been working on, led and curated by Vanessa Perry at Mythmount Press. We’re gearing up to search for ARC readers! This is our first call. We’re aiming for sending the directions out on September 14th and the ARCs on September 17th.

It’s speculative fiction, and a healthy blend of sci-fi, fantasy, and horror, all with a gothic twist! If this sounds like your kind of jam, please fill out the form here!

I'll also be showing off the cover I made, along with the rest of the writers in the anthology, on September 7th!

Current Open Commission Slots

I'm going to do something a little wild — I'm leaving commissions closed through September. As it stands, I haven't had time to build my new commission restructure, and I'd really like to take some time to do this so that it's easier for me to take on new clients. In an effort to consolidate my commissions to one singular place, I’m moving my stuff onto VGen. This also makes it easier to search for me, and I can show where I am in a workflow to clients waiting on their work easily and effectively.

I currently don’t have much on there. So, in order to get this built and done right, I will be leaving commissions off the table and reopening them in October. You can follow me on VGen to see when commissions open, otherwise keep an eye on the newsletter or socials! I will post when they officially go live. I have a waitlist open for small interior book design things, if you don't need them right away. I'll take them on as I can.

Releases

October 1 - Uncanny and Uncouth Speculative Anthology
This is a speculative fiction anthology organized by Vanessa Perry at Mythmount Press. There are a lot of heavy hitters with beautiful prose and compelling storytelling involved. I have two stories in it — Sanguivore and Gaps In The Mist. I also worked on the cover!

October 23 - Aloe, Tales From The Night Garden Vol. 2

Aloe is the second book in the Tales From The Night Garden trilogy, and was successfully crowdfunded in June of 2026. It’s currently in the middle of final edits. Backers will get a special early release September 18th, but October 23rd is when the book is available widely! I’m excited to release this out into the wild.

November 16 - Rainbow Lights and Winter Nights

This is a charity anthology that is raising money for The Trevor Project. My supernatural romance novella, Yule Parlay, is one of the stories involved! Only on Amazon; the story will be released as a standalone sometime in 2027. You can pre-order the anthology here!

In-Person Events

September 12 - Sip and Story
5pm - 9pm CST
@ Tardigrade’s Bookshelf, Appleton WI

October 2 - Brews and Baubles Market
5pm - 8pm CST
@ Il Bar, Kimberly WI

October 3 - Boozy Bookfair
5pm - 9pm CST
@ Badger State Brewing Company, Green Bay WI

October 24 - Aloe Launch Party!
11AM CST
@ Author Apothecary, Oshkosh WI

Virtual Events

Hosting #TBBChat on Bluesky - September 5th at 6pm CST
Hosting #TBBChat on Bluesky - September 26th at 6pm CST
#Sustember Prompt Game on Bluesky - Sept 1-30

Promos, Sales, and Crowdfunds

Aloe’s Crowdfund Surveys go out August 21 - If you backed Aloe, thank you so much for helping me bring my story to life! I’m still on track for my release schedule. The post-campaign surveys are anticipated to go out August 21st. This may be slightly earlier, but I want to give myself time to read through and implement my editors’ notes before I start sending out the surveys! Please keep an eye on your e-mail.

Such Sweet Sorrow Crowdfund Campaign Launches October 29 - Such Sweet Sorrow is a grief horror, and it is near and dear to my heart. I wrote it over the course of the last month of my brother’s battle with cancer, and the months of aftermath when I was dealing with my own grief and big emotions. It’s a standalone novel, and I’d highly appreciate it if you kept an eye on the crowdfund! You can follow the campaign here now! Please do this — I need followers in order to launch! Also, if you like to support indie authors, there are 38 other campaigns within The Book Bazaar - many of them horror, and many of them queer.

Google Calendar Link

Want to keep up with the events happening, but everything is too overwhelming? I hear you. That’s why I have an event calendar that you can add to your google calendar! Check out the invite here.

September's Goals

Top Overall Goal - Such Sweet Sorrow Book Trailer/Campaign

I still have quite a bit left to do for Such Sweet Sorrow before the campaign launches! Some of the biggest outward-facing things are a book trailer with an animated sequence I've been working on. This will only be about 45-60 seconds long, but that is a lot of work to do especially around edits. I'm honestly wondering if it would be shippable as an animatic, instead of a full animation, because that would get done so much quicker.

I also need to draft some e-mails ahead of time to send out during the leadup, launch, and ending of the campaign. I'm super behind on this. So, my main goal is to catch back up to myself and get these things polished to the point that I am happy with them. We'll see what happens!

Top Writing Goal - Aloe Complete!

This one is actually the closest to achieving, because I hit chapter 21 on Saturday. This means that I have 12 chapters left with big picture notes, and then I need to do one more pass, a read through, and formatting.

If I have time to, I will draw some more illustrations for Aloe's interior design, but this is lowest priority, and only if I can actually get ahead of my required deadlines. I have a lot more to do on the edit passes, but it's going quick and I am really happy with how the manuscript has shaped up.

Top Art Goal - Such Sweet Sorrow Poker Illustration

I know that two of these are technically for the same project, but the poker illustration is actually for a reward for the campaign, and I'm considering it removed from the campaign. I need to record myself drawing it, as well, so that I can share it with a read-through of the first chapter during the campaign. On top of everything else going on, this is an ambitious goal to get done by the end of September, but I believe I can get it there.

What Did I Work On Last Month, Anyway?

Week-by-Week Breakdown

Week 1 - 1st through 8th — I mainly worked on writing tasks this week.

For Such Sweet Sorrow, I painted the book cover and documented that process for Patrons as the monthly "thing." (My Patreon is very vague on what I offer for rewards, because I don't like to promise something that I cannot deliver.) I also finished editing Chapter 4 and started in on Chapter 5 (something I will inevitably go back and re-read when I start working on this again.)

For the Uncanny and Uncouth Anthology, I finished out the peer workshop reads for others' stories and shared the ARC form a few times on Bluesky and Substack.

For Aloe, I talked to Julian and got an ETA on when I would get the manuscript back, and then made my editing schedule so that I can do one pass on minor notes, one pass on major notes (cuts/large overarching issues), and a final readthrough by September 15th.

Week 2 - 9th through 15th — Admin-Heavy Week

Like the subheader says, I spent a ton of time on Admin Work this week. Some of that was time spent rebuilding my task-list and series bibles in Obsidian, in order to cancel a subscription service that I was paying a decent amount for. It's interesting to note that, actually, because that tells me the specific window that I've been using it — it's been about 2 1/2 weeks. I also created a cover for Three Tiny Terrors— a collection of short stories that I've written this year that will be a reward for the Such Sweet Sorrow crowdfund campaign — and looked into Lacuna formatting software. (I can format just fine in Affinity, but sometimes it would be nice to make things slightly easier on myself.)

For Aloe, I closed the ARC form, verified the readers, and contacted the ARC team. I also got the manuscript back early from Julian (on the 12th) and edited chapter 1.

I promised two different friends that I'd beta read for them this month. I got through one— a short, 25k romance. I started the second (but I ultimately dropped the ball and didn't finish it.)

For Such Sweet Sorrow, I finished editing chapter 5 before putting it aside to focus on Aloe. I also marketed this very heavily this week. I sent in the cover to do a cover reveal with readindiefantasy.com and re-did my hero image on the Backerkit teasers.

Week 3 - 9th through 15th — The Week of Overwhelm

I started working really heavily on Aloe edits this week. I got through the entirety of chapters 2-10, which ended at roughly 39,462 words. I also did some research on Obsidian plugins for my series bible, for when I'm done with edits and can put my brain towards re-building the file system.

For Such Sweet Sorrow,I finished building out the campaign for critique and implemented changes based on that critique. I also added achievements to the back-end.

For the Uncanny and Uncouth Anthology, I posted cover sketches for feedback and began rendering the cover. I also did one last edit pass through both of my short stories.

I made sure to take a break and went hiking with my husband this weekend, as well.

Week 4 - 23rd through 29th — Holy Edits, Batman!

Aloe took up most of my brain this week. As the subheader says, I leaned even heavier into edits this week. I edited chapters 11-20 (a grand total of 48,614 words after that pass). This was so much to do!

For the Uncanny and Uncouth Anthology, I finished the cover and requested feedback, then dialed in the little extra bits of change that people requested. We brainstormed the blurb for the back as a collective, and we posted feedback on the anthology intro by Vanessa.

I also took care of some admin tasks. Most of this was really small breaks from other things; but I signed up for BlueHost to start building a WordPress site. I'm still waffling on moving my site again — there's nothing wrong with my current backend, but I don't need half of the features, and no matter what I do the shop just does not work— but I've used WordPress in the past and I think I just need to pick a lane and stick to it. I also outlined my newsletter, but didn't get much of it written.

30th and 31st — Nub of the Week

I was behind on my newsletter thanks to how much I edited the previous week, and so I spent all day on the 31st writing it.

I slept a lot of the day away on the 30th; trying to be better about not driving myself into the ground, but I need to get through some of my deadlines first.

The Vibes

In terms of Good Vibes, I'm really happy with how this month went. I feel like I'm strongly interwoven into my online communities and am making good friends in the writing sphere, and I'm also inspired and am working hard on things that I really love to do. This is all amazing. I'm also heading into busy season, event-wise, and I absolutely LOVE meeting readers and people who enjoy my work. I'd like to do a book tour one of these days, but I don't think that's really all that feasible with my budget. That being said, I'm in a positive mindset and a good mood going into September.

In terms of Bad Vibes, I really want to take a break. I've been working very, very hard this year, and it's been rough in August specifically. I took two days off this month — that's weekend days included— and my workdays have been from waking up around 6am to roughly an hour before bed at 9:30. I over-committed, and I need to remind myself of this after this busy season is over, so that I don't do this again next year.

Overall vibes of the month have been good!

So, that's all today! As always, a final reminder:

I offer art services and have my books and merch for sale directly through me!

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And, if you're looking for anything else — Socials, Pre-orders, info, etc.

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Thanks for reading, and I hope you all have a fantastic month!