The Cat & the Comma Issue # 33

I won’t lie: I do not like winter. While getting cozy under blankets and having warm drinks are both comforts I indulge in, there is plenty about this time of year to hate. It gets dark by 5PM now. Illness is rife wherever you go. I despise the cold. Funny, that, when my mother grew up in the frigid tundras of Canada, despite not having the lungs for it.

All that said, November has come and gone. We are entering into the darkest month of the year. Also, Christmas and all the other winter holidays looming on the horizon. Gods help us all.

Anyway. Let’s talk about November.

Misc. Professional Update

Time has been a bit of a weird soup lately. I got sick for a few days. I had my first serious hiccup with my writing group (since paved over, much to my relief). I watched… a lot of anime. More on that last one later.

But in terms of professional events? Not a whole lot. And I can’t say I have much planned to end this year with, either. I’m winding down and preserving energy to bring into the new year.

One cool thing I did do—last night, actually—was get to talk on another podcast. I love getting a chance to talk at length about my books. I talked with U.R. Holm, a fellow indie author, about livestreaming and ASMLP. It felt good to get to infodump about that book again. You can see the video when it goes live over on Remilia’s YouTube channel, and I’ll be sure to also link it in December’s newsletter. Currently, I am unsure when it’s due to go out.

On a slightly more interesting front, I have been toying with the idea of making a separate penname for more erotic story ideas of mine. As much as I love my family and friends, there are some lines I don’t want to have crossed—nor do I need them to read about certain kinks I may choose to write about. I deserve some distance and privacy, and I think it might be best to separate my ADULT fantasy from my adult FANTASY.

In any case, after a year or so of going back and forth, I am cementing my decision. For the first and last time, I would like to introduce D.W. Katts, my erotic fantasy penname. Socials are in the works. I already have a couple of projects in mind which could go under that name. Unless there are major developments, this is the only time I will be making this announcement or connection between the two names.

Writing Update

I’ve talked the last couple of months about entering into Round Table Mentorship. I wish I could tell you I pulled that off. Unfortunately, between burnout and illness and my laptop charger breaking at a key moment, I just…ran out of time.

But, I did learn how to write a synopsis (I hated it) and I got to put together a substantial query letter (I hated this less), so I can’t say all the work I did was for nothing. I still learned something! And that’s the thought that counts.

Moving onto the things I’m working on… The Distance Between Stars and Salt and the draft I was on sits now at 72,812 words. Which is exciting! I’m getting ready to finish up, print it out, read it over, and take a proper crack at the next draft. That’s what I’ll be prioritizing for December and January before getting prepared for edits. Since RTM fell through, I am hoping to stick to my original plan of self-pubbing it in the summer of 2026. Obviously, my health on the physical and mental front have not been the best, but I am doing what I can to not allow those to get in the way. More announcements as I have them.

Here’s a snippet of where I’m at right now:

Edera’s jaw sets. The rage wells within her again, so strong she staggers. Only her mother’s hand on her cheek and Firien’s claws in her shoulder prevent her from doing something unthinkable.

At last, she sags into her mother’s embrace. Tears swell behind the dam of her eyes. She’s too drained to cry.

“I did not know.” Navilia’s voice is softer now, but Edera catches it all the same. “Saints know how, I would’ve—I would have found a way to prevent it, if I could have.”

The lump is large enough now Edera struggles to breathe. She doesn’t look up.

If you’re intrigued by this project and what comes out of it, you can currently read the whole zero draft—or up to chapter 20 of the first draft—if you become a member of my Patreon! It even is formatted like how I hope the final product will look like.

Last month, I mentioned pivoting yet again from Those Who Emerge from Ashes to focus on something else. That something else has become Flesh of My Flesh, Dark of My Dark, a fantasy horroromance about an abyssal construct falling for the oracle she was supposed to kill, finding her own personhood, and helping said oracle do the same. Despite some hiccups with it, I’m enjoying spinning the project around in my mind. I think I’ve settled on calling it a fantasy horroromance, as that kind of…describes it best. Kinda. I’m still workshopping it. In any case, expect Maltese steampunk, trans women with pink hair, freaky corpses, feral lesbians, temples in the sky, shadow powers, and more. It’s a veritable smorgasbord of all sorts of things that I love and find strange. I don’t have an actual snippet to share, but you can have this moment from the outline:

Finding herself on a knife’s edge, Tereża attempts to bargain with her mysterious assailant and finds it unwilling to back down. Still, she continues to attempt to reason with it, until the assailant reveals it needs her dead as a means to its ends of bringing eternal darkness. Here, Tereża thinks quickly and is able to find an angle to persuade it from; because Tereża has not ascended, there is currently no living sibylla able to wield the powers of [THE RADIANCE], which leaves it an intangible force without a focus. Because of this, killing Tereża currently solves nothing. Finally, the knife drops and Tereża is able to face her assailant.

Finally, let’s bring out the word tracker.

And now, stats:

For the month of October, I wrote a total of 2,364 words and an average of 1,182 words per session. And here’s an updated breakdown of what stage of writing I’ve spent what amount of words on, too:

Media Update

As a fever slowly settled over me, I finally finished Metal from Heaven by August Clarke. It is one of my favorite books of the year. It made me cry. It made me absolutely furious. It devastated me. It’s certainly not a book everyone will be able to appreciate, but if you liked Harrow the Ninth or want to drown in lesbians or just. Love weird narration styles, you should give this book a shot. It feels like a fever dream from start to finish, and I absolutely adore it.

Immediately after finishing MFH, I started reading The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson, which is arm-wrestling MFH for my favorite read of the year so far. I love Neema so much. I love the fresh omniscient POV. I love the footnotes. I love the world setup. I love the mystery. I love the dance between kind of “out there” and zany and utterly tragic and gruesome. Justice for [she who shall not be named]!

On the gaming front, I’ve mostly stuck to Pokemon Legends: Z-A this month, though I’ve poked at Pokemon Legends: Arceus as well. Not much has been done gaming-wise.

But on the media front… oh boy. Like I said, I’ve been watching a lot of anime. I started with (re)watching and finally finishing Kaze no Stigma, which is one I’ve been trying to finish for YEARS. Every time I’ve started the series, I’ve ended up losing access to the streaming service before I could finish it. And now, I’ve finally finished.

It was okay. I like the magic system, and the clan dynamics, and Kazuma is interesting enough in his own right. In early episodes, the other protagonist Ayano has a sort of tsundere relationship with him. She’s in high school and several years his junior. I thought it was a crush on her end, so I was willing to let it slide. But then everyone else in the show started wanting to pair them together which is… beyond weird. I really didn’t like that. Also, the series ended on a disjointed note—though this isn’t the animators’ faults. The original mangaka for KNS, Takahiro Yamato, passed away before the manga was completed. Still, for many reasons, the anime adaptation was… iffy. But I finally finished it.

Afterwards, I watched 22/7, which is apparently an anime related to the idol group of the same name? The idol group itself is some big multimedia project. In any case, the show was good! I liked it a lot, to be honest. Had the 13th episode not existed, I would have liked it even more.

After that, I started a comfort re-watch of Ouran High School Host Club, one of my favorite older anime to watch. Yes, it has its issues, but I still have such… a warm feeling all the same.

Speaking of warm feelings, I also started watching Cardcaptor Sakura for the first time ever. I love this show so much. It’s overwhelmingly cute and is perfect for watching to just. Unwind and not feel so compressed.

Finally, to wrap up November, I picked up 365 Days to the Wedding, which is an anime about a duo who work at a Japanese travel company and fake getting married to avoid going to the new branch of their workplace set to open in a year… in Alaska. Predictably, they fall in love in the process. This is one of my favorite shows I’ve watched in quite a long time. I saw myself a lot in Honjoji and her obsession with maps was incredibly endearing. Alas, I am sad it is over.

Blog and Video Update

I didn’t livestream this month, mostly thanks to burnout, being busy, and being sick. I’ll try to do a couple in December to make up for it.

As promised, I did post my thinkpiece on class divides in writing spaces. You can read it here! I am planning a sister thinkpiece of sorts; this thinkpiece focused on extracurricular writing activities like writing groups and writing seminars and now I want a thinkpiece to tackle the actual class divides in publishing. No eta on this yet, though.

The Cat Recommends

I like to use this space to shout out other indie writers, cause I think we could all use a boost from time to time. This time, I’m using the space to shout out A.M. Weald, author of Fimbulvinter’s Fires!

Worlds and hearts will be set aflame…

Within moments of his escape pod crash-landing in a night-clad frozen forest, musician Asher Hollin is frostbitten, bleeding, a thief, and a killer. If not for technology looted from a dead prison guard, he’d be long dead, either from hypothermia or from being attacked by battleaxe-wielding not-quite-human marauders.

Without hope of rescue from those he’d fled, there’s only one choice: keep going. Fight. Survive for those who didn’t. Somewhere out there is food, shelter, civilization. Indeed, just as the darkness threatens to consume him, help comes from an initially unwilling source.

Compassion and a yearning for companionship spark an unlikely relationship, but a lack of understanding of language and culture endangers Ash and everyone around him.

Inspired by the tale of Ragnarök and its harbinger, Fimbulvinter’s Fires combines achillean love stories with first-contact sci-fi, survival horror, and apocalyptic tragedy.

This snowpocalypse contains violence and death, steamy scenes, strong language, deep snow, and high heat. Tread carefully.

You can read more about Fimbulvinter’s Fires here and purchase it here!

The Cat Thanks

One of the perks for higher-tier patrons is shout-outs at the end of newsletters. Special thanks to Ceph and Larkspur. If you want to have your name here with theirs, subscribe to my Patreon!

And that’s a wrap. I wish you well on all of your endeavors and hope you stay safe.

Kindest regards,

Alex