What a Year, right?

so

        November 25, 2025

What a Year, right?
Thinking about this time last year, new project progress, upcoming events, and ODIN!!!

            I anticipate this being my last newsletter of 2025. Maybe I’ll surprise everyone, (myself included) and have something to send out in December, but I’m trying to be honest here. December is wild busy, and we all know it.
This time last year I was working so hard to get Still Chosen ready to publish. In late November, 2024, we had everything pretty much ready even though the publish date wasn’t until January, but there were still a lot of little things to finalize and OH YEAH the final cover needs to be uploaded and HEY apparently Ingram might start printing preorders 30 business days before publication and WAIT there was a typo on page 224 and DEAR GOD why are we doing this???
Clearly it all worked out, and I’ll wait to reflect too much on the whole process until the one year anniversary, (my book might get a birthday party. We’ll see.) But I’m still baffled we managed to pull it off.
This was the “in progress” pic I got from cover artist Greta Sandquist. She painted it on orange board, and I had to trust the process. But the end result was beyond anything I had hoped for. The finished painting is now prominently displayed in my living room.
If you purchased / read Still Chosen in 2025, thank you. It’s nearly impossible to put into words the gratitude I feel when people have ready my book. But please know it means the world to me.
ANYWAY. On to other things! I’m working on finishing the first draft of my new project by the end of the year. There’s still a whole ¼ to go, but I think I can do it! And once the first draft is done, I will finally feel comfortable sharing more details about it. For now, I’ll just leave you with this:
Suspicious? Possibly.
I’ve got two events left before the end of the year! I’ll be signing/selling books at Dragon Tale Bookstore in Menomonie, WI THIS WEEKEND (11/29) as part of Small Business Saturday! The following week I’ll be at the Booked Eau Claire Boozy Book Fair at the Brewing Projekt. If you’re around, please say hi!

Finished Reading: All 7 Dungeon Crawler Carl books by Matt Dinniman. My husband says I have a problem. I say, my only problem is that there aren’t more books yet. It’s gonna be a loooooong wait until May, 2026.
Current Read: Bones by K.L. Speer
Movie I Enjoyed: I really liked Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein! The whole movie was beautiful to look at, and I enjoyed a lot of the story choices they made.
No intro needed. ODIN!!!!!
The ball is that big so he can find it, since he’s mostly blind.
If you aren’t already doing so, you can also find me on:
Instagram @stephaniewritesstuff
BlueSky @stephwritesstuff
Tiktok @stephaniewritesstuff
FB @Stephanie G. Olson
-Steph

                            Don't miss what's next. Subscribe to My Awesome Newsletter: