"Refilling The Well" Preorders coming soon, and the wonders of Neocities and other web platforms- January 28th, 2025 Newsletter
Happy late January, everyone!
January has been pretty eventful, from being selected as a judge for the 2024 Indie Ink Awards to getting a lot of writing done.
“Refilling The Well” Preorders COMING FEBRUARY 1ST, 2025!
My debut poetry chapbook, “Refilling The Well,” will be officially released on February 10th, 2025!
Preorders will be available starting February 1st, 2025. Keep an eye out for preorder links!
3 DAYS LEFT To Nominate “Bloody Fantasia” for the 2025 Indieverse Awards’s PAID Categories!
My book, “Bloody Fantasia,” is eligible to be nominated for 22 CATEGORIES in the 2025 Indieverse Awards!
The nomination period ended early on January 6th, 2025 for FREE categories. However, nominations end on January 31, 2025 for Book of the Year & Best Of (paid) categories!
Wondering which paid categories my book is eligible for? Check out the list below:
Eligible Paid Categories:
Book Of The Year
Best Bookish Artist (Claris Lam - yes, I designed the cover!)
Best Book Cover
Best Book Media
Best Mystery Novel
Best Self Published Novel
All you need to do is click here to go to the awards page, scroll down the page and enter “Bloody Fantasia” in the forms provided!
Thank you so much in advance for your support! Remember, the nomination period ends on January 31st, 2025 for the above categories., Don’t delay with nominating “Bloody Fantasia!”
What Am I Writing Lately?
I mentioned, in my last newsletter, that I finished the fourth round of edits on “Immortalz.” After this, I finished a third round of edits on my King’s Quest-inspired novel. For those unaware of what King’s Quest is, it’s a popular point-and-click adventure game franchise created by Sierra Entertainment (also known as Sierra On-Line).
I also now have a working title for the above book - “A Most Unusual Adventure!”
Is the title subject to change in the future? Yes. But does it sum up how the adventure goes? Yes. The book is leaning into being a comedic adventure fantasy, in terms of genre. And there is one funny scene that I am determined to keep in the final, official version despite all future edits I make to the book.
After that third round of edits on “A Most Unusual Adventure,” I went through a fifth round of editing “Immortalz” - and completely finished all the writing in it! I’m proud of making this progress this month. Of course, there’s still so much to do before the book can be released (book covers, etc.) but I’m glad that the final manuscript is done.
I also drafted an entire short story collection. Yes, I did this within the last two weeks. This collection is a bit more experimental compared to “Stay Magical,” the one I have releasing later this year. This newly-drafted collection has their stories based on fairytales, with a different 2nd-person narrative for each story. I hope to share more details about this later on!
What Have I Done Other Than Writing Lately?
With “Refilling The Well” being available for preorder in a few days from now, I’ve been busy during these past few weeks making sure all final preparations are complete -from scheduling social media associated with the release to making sure the books themselves are completely ready.
In the past few weeks, I also have:
Started making the paperback cover for “Stay Magical,” my upcoming short story collection
What Have I Discovered On The Internet Lately?
Ever heard of Neocities? It’s a website building platform.
Also, some writers share their work on their Neocities websites! One of these was Delovely, which I stumbled upon by accident while browsing websites, and they post poetry and other pieces of writing. They’re quite lovely to read.
Another Neocities site I found was DragonInk, who also posts poetry and prose. They’re also lovely to read.
I also only recently came across writing websites such as celestiasquill on Dreamwidth, which is similar to Neocities, as well as several other web platforms. Was I the last person to know that platforms like Publii existed?
Before you ask, no, I have no plans to create any official Neocities sites - especially since I already have my own author website already. But for those looking for some fun websites to check out, now you know where to find them!
What Have I Played Lately?
I know this newsletter is meant to give audiobook/podcast recs, but in full honesty I haven’t been into listening to audiobooks or podcasts as much as I’d like. I haven’t found any new podcasts or audiobooks that I enjoyed enough to really recommend during the latter half of this month. So instead, you’re getting a game rec: “It gets so lonely here” by ebi-hime, available on Itch.io.
This visual novel features you, the protagonist, in running from something…someone…it’s not quite clear what exactly you’re running from. But then you you find yourself at a crossroads: A path to the sea, a castle, or a village. Which one will you choose?
If you like dark fairytales, this will absolutely be for you. There is, however, a lot of death in this game (no explicit textual or graphical depictions of blood or gore however). Also, without giving away spoilers, you’ll have to play through the whole game at least twice to get the whole story (fortunately, you can fast-forward specific sections of the game the second time around, which makes playthroughs significantly less tedious if you just want to know the story).
I do not usually enjoy playing dark games. This was an exception based on the writing of the game. The art and music are lovely and everything fits well together. There is also a sequel to the game called “The end of an obsession” by the same game developer on Itch.io, if anyone is interested in playing it. I promise that it’s also really entertaining (though, again, there is a lot of death)!
What Have I Been Reading Lately?
I’ll be honest - I got into a small reading slump in the latter half of this month and didn’t read a lot. I would pick up books to read, but they didn’t captivate my interest enough to read the whole book. And if they did capture my interest, none of them were notable enough for me to write a whole paragraph about them.
So, what did I resort to? Reading up Greek myths, as well as German fairytales popularized by the Brothers Grimm.
Other recent reads include:
“The Chinese New Year Helper” by Ying Chang Compestine
“Goddess” by Deborah Hemming
“In The Shadow Garden” by Liz Parker
Thank you for following my writing journey!
I hope you look forward to seeing more of my writing process and work. I also look forward to giving all of you more frequent updates as well, so stay tuned for more!
If you have any questions, feel free to email me at clarislamauthor@gmail.com! I’ll respond within 48 hours (except on weekends and holidays).