Down the Rabbit Hole

Happy Wednesday and final day of March!  I love when the last days of the month line up with Wednesdays, so I can post a monthly wrap up literally the day before the month ends. Anyone else enjoying the warmer weather, but not enjoying the Daylight Savings? I feel like it hit me extra hard this year haha I have had such a hard time getting up in the morning, which is annoying since I feel like I got into a good rhythm of waking up at the same time every day. But anyways! Onto a writing update!  Writing: I finished the first draft of book 5 of The Archive Series this month!! It's still crazy to think about and also so exciting! I finished it at the very end of my birthday week too! So, every book in some way, shape or form in the series is finished! That Sunday when I finished it, I literally sat at my laptop for most of the day feeling stunned and unsure what to do next because I couldn't believe I just typed The End. I also almost cried because I'm gonna miss writing abou...

Happy Wednesday!  As I finished writing the final book in The Archive Series, I found myself thinking about what makes an ending a good ending. How do I finish out a story well? I wish I had asked myself this question with the St. Croix Falls series and I wish that I didn't feel like I had rushed to the end so much with that one. But with this one I want to do it well. I want to do better than I did with my trilogy and I want to grow as a writer.  These characters deserve a good ending, my readers will deserve a good ending. One that will tie everything together. And, of course, because I am obsessed, my first thought was Julie Plec and Kevin Williamson (creators and writers of The Vampire Diaries) and the final season of that show. Right before the final episode of the series aired, The CW showed a special extra as a way to say goodbye to the show full of interviews of the cast and crew and looking back on the series. Maybe it was in this special extra or maybe it was in a di...

 Happy Wednesday!  This time last year... we were all in a very different place. For some it was last week, for others it was this week that the world turned upside down. To be honest, the weeks after my 22 birthday weren't my favorite. A pandemic shook the world. Fear and uncertainty took over the lives of many. Even my own family was unsure and cautious those first few weeks. It was literally one of the most stressful times I've ever had. I just remember being such a giant anxious ball of nerves for a lot of March. We had no answers, didn't know what would become of this pandemic. The CDC and government were saying people would die left and right, were making all kinds of doomsday promises. Who wouldn't be rattled? It's crazy to think it's been a year since all of this hit, since all of our lives changed so radically. But here's the thing, for me anyways. I love new years. I love starting a new year. They're full of promises, full of a whole year a...

Happy Wednesday!  Yesterday was my birthday!  I love birthdays. To me, my birthday always feels like January 1st. A new year. A time to reflect on the past year and to look forward to the new one. It's exciting and scary and hopeful.  Cus it wouldn't be a birthday post without a TVD birthday gif lol Last year I don't think I got around to writing a birthday blog post. The day after my birthday, the world went nuts. That was the week when the toilet paper shortage started, the week where the president called a nation wide emergency. Pretty much, the week of my 22 birthday turned out to be the start of a very hard and crazy and upside down year for everyone. My birthday didn't really got the way I had wanted it to. I'll always remember us going out to Panera and Barnes and Nobles and how tense the atmosphere felt. Everyone seemed on edge with a potential virus looming. I was anxious for a lot of the rainy, cloudy day. It's crazy to think of how much of a differenc...

 Happy Tuesday!!  Today's the day! I turn 23 and I couldn't think of a better way to celebrate than to share the cover for Golden Touch! I think this is by far my favorite cover my mom has ever done. It's crazy to think that this time last year Golden Touch was still just a first draft and I was in the middle of writing book 2 of the series. A defining part of my twenty-second year will always be having revised Golden Touch and written almost the entire Archive Series. And now I get to open up my twenty-third year with sharing the cover and writing book the first draft of book 5, the very last book in the series. God is so good guys. I really think He gave me Golden Touch and this whole series a few months before the events of 2020 started. He gave me a story I could get lost in, I could find joy in even during some of the hardest times of the year. And now I get to share the cover and I get to close out the series and I just pray and hope that God will use Golden Touch and...

 Happy Monday! Dropping by on the blog today to let you all know that Amateur Monster Hunters is out today on Havok and free to read today only! So, if you want to check it out without having to pay a monthly fee to get access, I would do it today. Amateur Monster Hunters is all about Henry and Willow and their trek into a swamp to finally find proof that monsters are real. If you're interested, you can check it out right here:  Havok.com! Here's the first paragraph:  “I can’t believe you’re making me do this,” Willow grumbled, blowing a strand of brown hair out of her face. She trudged through the shallow, mucky water. Only Henry would think it was a good idea to spend their weekend stomping around a mosquito-infested swamp searching for something that didn’t exist. He was lucky they were best friends, or Willow would not have been so willing to skip out on normal teenage outings to follow him on his hunts every Saturday and Sunday. *** Also! Check back tomorrow for anot...

Happy Wednesday!  February was a bit of a rough month. I think it was just a combination of seasonal depression and the fact that we had an emotionally exhausting 2020 and the past three months for me have been a whirlwind of even more emotional struggle. I also had something happen that shook my faith a little and made me question a lot of things.  All that created a perfect storm of doubt and fear. On the last Monday of February I was writing in my prayer journal after having read one of Hannah Brencher’s well timed Monday Club letters about depression and joy and the harvest coming out of a time of mourning and weeping taken from a verse in Psalm 126. And maybe it was just the depression talking, but I sat back and thought God will bring the harvest to everyone else but He won’t bring it to me. I thought, I can’t remember if I’d ever gotten a harvest season. A good season where God’s timing showed through and all the hard things I went through has lined up and made sense an...