Hi there, fellow wallowers,

For the first time in 5 years, I have a new––free and publicly available––story out!

At the start of the month my short story CoverLetter_Version5 went live at Small Wonders. I was the issue's headliner, which I still cannot believe. And people said such nice things about it that I'm still feeling a little verklempt.

Anyway, let me tell you about my month...

It started with a literal flood. Vermont got hit hard. Luckily, my house was fine. The surrounding area did not fare as well, and it still feels a little bit like an apocalypse around here. Our local lake and dam recorded a water height of at least 79 feet.

The floodwaters have mostly receded at this point, but they've left a ton (probably literally) of muck behind. It's full of sewage and chemicals and other terrible stuff, and it's going to take a long time to deal with.

I wrote about climate grief in last month's newsletter, and yeah. That.

Aside from cataclysmic events, I taught a 3 week high school writing course and trekked down to Boston for Readercon, where I got to hang out with some of my Viable Paradise friends and listen to John Wiswell read from Someone to Build a Nest In, which comes out next year. It was wonderful.

Works in Progress

I just sent another round of revisions to my agent. This time, the focus was on cutting some of the word count that crept in during my major revisions last month. I managed to cut 9k from the draft, bringing it under 125k for the first time in a while. 😂

The Way We Haunt Now production is underway. Audio files have been trickling in from returning cast, and I just closed the casting call form this morning, so I'll be spending the next week or so reviewing auditions and selecting new cast members.

Finally, with Mage, All But Dissertation revisions back in my agent's hands, I'm planning to turn my attention to my magic embroidery WIP next month (which is, I have just realized, tomorrow). Destination: historical romantasy!

July Reading

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I didn't read very much this month. Aside from a couple of stunning novels I got to beta read, I read precisely two books:

• T. Kingfisher's Nettle & Bone hit so many of my favorite things: bones, dogs, cranky old women being cranky and important at the same time, and complicated sibling relationships. I highly recommend it!

• Judy Blume's Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret is a classic. I have a soft spot for classic MG and having never read Blume before, I was curious. It wasn't really my thing. I think I'm more of a Beverly Cleary fan. Is there another Blume I should really try before giving up???

Here's hoping August has more chill than July did.

Until next time,

Thanks for wallowing with me!

Courtney