Status Updates:

Year end/beginning finally behind me as I'm working on developing good practice for 2025.

What's Next:

The Wizard's Cat​
It's like watching ice melt but the story is slowly, slowly coming together. My new writing practice sees a little bit more of it revealed in each session. Some day I might get back to my mega-word count days. Operative phrase: some day.

Future Ishmael​
I think more and more about what that might look like with Ishmael and Zoya striking out on their own, Pip and Natalia each working in their own spheres. I have no idea how that might play out. We'll see.

Tanyth Fairport​
Back burner all the way. Eventually we'll get the audio issues cleared up. Some time we'll have more stories.

What I'm Reading:

I'm reading a lot still. I've been inspired to dig in a bit deeper in my writing by all the stuff I'm reading.

This month I've gone back to the cozy litRPG niche. I found books 3 and 4 of Beware of Chicken, siphoning both of them up over 3 days and went looking for more. I found Haylock Jobson's Heretical Fishing.

It's a classic isekai fantasy of young man being sent to a new world by the proverbial, random 10-ton truck. When he finds himself in this new world, he takes the opportunity to abandon his previous life of unsatisfactory, unbridled capitalism in favor of a life spent just sitting around fishing.

Of course, in this new world, fishing is considered heresy and looked down on by untold generations of the population in general. Predictably, hijinks ensue.

Haylock Jobson's light-hearted take on the cozy corner of this genre niche has me already chewing through book 2 and looking forward to book 3 as soon as I've finished.

But as always, don't take my word for it. Maybe grab a sample of book1 and see if you might like spending a little with Heretical Fishing.

Looking Ahead:

If you read the blog or listen to my podcast, you might have heard me talking about Practice as my word of the year. It's coming together. Slowly, as I said above, but I'm seeing it forming up.

Part of it shows up in doubling down on techniques that work like a solid morning routing, my Obsidian Daily Note sheet, and the Wall Calendar of Doom. I'm also trying to be more aware of where and how I spend my time.

One of my major problems has been the disquieting habit of days slipping into darkness, unnoticed and unremembered. I'm working on that as part of the new emphasis on practice.

We'll see how well some of the new efforts work out over the next few weeks. With any luck at all, I'll have some new habits - and better news about the Wizard's Cat - by then.

Until then, safe voyage.

-NL

Remember ​
I update the blog every month on the first so if you're wondering what's happening, you can check there to get an interim report until the next one shows up in your inbox.

Beta Readers:

Every so often, I put out a call for beta readers. These are people who are willing to read the work in progress in a short period of time with only the briefest of notices.

I'm going to be fine tuning this process going forward but if you'd like to be considered for future works, then click this link.
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​It puts a tag on your address in the email list. You don't have to check anything. The ConvertKit people (who store the addresses) will handle it and then take you to a page to tell you that your preferences have been set. By clicking that link you're done.

And thanks.

Fine Tuning:

Would you prefer to get ONLY new release notices?YES, PLEASE​

Note: Newsletter people will get New Release notices, too, but
I've had several people say they preferred to only hear from me when I
release a new book so I'm trying to accommodate them.
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