Since I haven’t published anything all year, I figured I should at least make one blog post.

What’s new? Not much. Still struggling to keep up with life (though I got at least one diagnosis that explains a lot and am working on getting tested for another). Still dealing with chronic illness issues on top of it. Lots of doctors, therapists, and appointments.

I’ve been struggling with the state of America too. I vacillate between wanting to chuck it all and just write because the world (or my world, at least) might end soon and wanting to make smart, responsible decisions because the world might not end, but it might be a lot shittier for people who don’t have a good amount of money saved up.

For now, I’m doing what I can. Which isn’t a lot. But it’s enough to slowly build up my savings again, just in case I need to move abroad (I did get my UK passport just in case).

Here’s a list of writing-related updates:

• Calling my work gothic: I decided to rebrand as a dark erotic gothic fantasy author. Nothing about my writing, itself, will change, except maybe I’ll try harder to add atmospheric gothic elements to more of my stories when they make sense. Hell, I’ve called my work gothic fiction a handful of times before, before switching back for whatever reason. Gothic fiction has always been at the heart of what I write and the closest I come to a cohesive genre. I figured it would be easier for potential readers to more quickly grasp my body of work if it were all explicitly aligned under gothic fiction.
• Almost finished with a new erotic short. It’s, like, 95% written. But it’s been 95% written for months and months, so we’ll see when or if it ever gets published.
• Restarting my Ream account: I decided to dust off my Ream account and start posting drafts in there again. I might start in November. We’ll see.
• I have a small backlog of shorts and one novella that are also almost finished. The plan is to finish what I can this quarter and then drop whatever I haven’t finished indefinitely to focus on my big 2026 project.
• I’m planning to write a novel again. Not The Crow Prince this time, or the expansion of Losing Control. I’ve switched to trying to expand Dark Lord’s Conquest because it’s the most marketable story in my arsenal that I genuinely love, and it has series potential. Will it actually happen? No idea. But the plan is to try and start working on it in 2026.
• Thinking about my marketing plan: When I think about slaving away on TikTok videos or Instagram posts (because I can’t help belaboring these things), I just do nothing instead. It takes me so freaking long to make one Instagram post, I already know I wouldn’t keep up. Not without hiring someone or deciding, “Fuck it,” and doing the absolute least. I’m talking cycling through the same looping video over and over again while I speak and using the same exact image for all of my Instagram posts. Because I don’t want to focus on the imagery. I want to focus on the damn ideas. So I’ve been thinking about alternatives to social media for discovery instead. Old-fashioned blogging and SEO. Goodreads tactics. Signing up for ARC reviews. Paid newsletters. Paid ads. Expanding and rebranding my books so more readers want to pick them up in the first place, and maybe some influencers will too. Collaborating with other authors. Bookfunnel newsletter builders. Blog and podcast tours. Hiring a PA. Stuff like that.

I don’t know how to end this blog post. I don’t feel the greatest as I write this, but I do have good days. Clearly, I’m still interested in and hopeful about my writing, despite everything. I will try to spend less time in my own head and more time writing. We’ll see if that gets me anywhere.