Sticky post: Recent Releases

StickyIseTher (Light-ish Novellas), The Healers' Purpose (Book 3)

Welcome! Here are the newest releases. (I’m trying to be concise for once. Can you tell?)

Healers / Balance Academy Series Book 3: The Healers’ Purpose

Amazon US / UK / CA / AU – print and ebook
Gumroad – ebook (EPUB, MOBI or PDF)
Barnes & Noble / Nook – ebook
Rakuten Kobo – ebook
On Goodreads – rate and review

Content Notes / Trivia

Released mid-August 2022

Fantasy novella (“light-ish novel”) Book 1: How I Became a Therapist in Another World

Amazon (ebook): US / UK / CA / AU
Gumroad – ebook, pay what you want

Content Notes / Trivia

Released late November 2022

Book 2 is coming soon. Looking for beta readers for book 3 of Therapist! Email wheel.of.a.different.color at gmail dot com or message u/ofthecageandaquarium on Reddit.

The finish line always feels weird

IseTher (Light-ish Novellas)

The first draft of the fourth/”last” book of Therapist is done. Which means that I just wrote… back of the envelope calculation… about 130,000 words in six months. October through March. I’ve written or edited every day since Christmas Eve.

What? Truly. What?

Only the first book is out so far; the second is waiting on title design; the third is with a beta reader now. I guess now I’ll set this aside for a bit and, most likely, work on my unfinished non-A&K project in the Healers-verse before coming back to edit this one.

I say “last” in scare quotes because the one thing this series has in common with Healers (except for a level of earnestness that is truly unbearable for most) is the number of loose ends left lying around for potential side stories and sequels. I’m conflicted about the idea of adding extra hashtag-content for an omnibus edition. I’d rather just release some extras online or put together a compilation later. The omnibus should just be an omnibus, I think. It’s probably bad business, but whatever. I don’t like the idea of pressuring people to rebuy something they already have.

Anyway, it’s been a hell of a lot of fun, and I look forward to getting it out there whether or not it has a reader base. Just to get it out there. Just in case.

MVP: Catherine, unless it’s Dedue

Uncategorized
  1. As soon as the cover titles are done, Therapist book 2 will be ready to release. (No pressure, ha) The first draft of Book 4 is progressing fine. I don’t want to put a particular timeline out there because not everything is under my control, but I’m optimistic.
  2. Finished the Blue Lions / Azure Moon playthrough of Fire Emblem: Three Houses. I think this game has eaten my brain mostly because of its focus on character interaction. Also, I’ve always liked tactical JRPGs. Two great tastes, etc.
FE3H Azure Moon spoilers

One… more… dollar

Checking In, The Healers' Road (Book 1)

I bumped up the price of The Healers’ Road to $2.99 US from $1.99, where it’s been for … a while (couple of years?). So all three of the current Healers books are set at $2.99. It’s just based on Amazon’s floor for 70% royalties – at $1.99 I make 70 cents per ebook, and at $2.99 it’s about $2. I’m not a huge fan of the Zon overall, so I’m not saying their system is particularly fair or great, but I am too tired right now thanks to Mystery Not-Covid Cold or Whatever (with bonus day-job stress) to get into the whole wall of text.

Basically, ~$2 seemed nicer than 70 cents. And if you’re interested in reading the book and that dollar makes a difference, I will gladly send you a copy by email for zero dollars. I’ve always said that, and it continues.

Writing update: Therapist book 4 has passed 10k, which means it’s… a quarter to a third of the way done? This novella thing is wild. On a whim, I also skimmed through my Healers-verse side project the other day, and … I still really like it? Once Therapist is done, I might come back to that before deciding what to do with Agna and Kei. As long as I keep working on something, anything, really, it’s serving its psychological purpose here.

Gaming, which is all my brain has energy for today: Fire Emblem: Three Houses spoilers for about 2/3 of the way through Azure Moon.

Truly what the fuck, Dimitri

Two wolves, as usual:

Checking In, IseTher (Light-ish Novellas)

One is worried about burning out

The other is excited about seeing a project through in fewer than 4 years for once

Just started Therapist volume 4, the last one I’ve planned out. I keep saying that because I’d like to leave the door open for other stories or projects in the future, but I will have finished what I set out to do.

There’s more road ahead: books 2 and 3, written back to back, still need edits and beta reads. But I think I’m good for it. I’m on day 65 of writing every day, averaging about 1,300 words a day; 85,000 total across this series, a little bit of Healers, and some errata. Reminding myself that I’ve done longer streaks than that. Just not lately.

Sure, plenty of people write 5,000 or 10,000 words every single day. We call them Real Serious Authors. Let’s note that I’m not one of those. I’m just some asshole with a keyboard. I’m working on establishing better habits like outlining and consistency. I’m learning how to put together a story that moves from point A to point B in a linear fashion, but also gives enough (but not too much) time for the story to breathe. It’s really hard, y’all. Hah.

Not really Fire Emblem: Three Houses spoilers; just rambling

February: January II

Checking In, IseTher (Light-ish Novellas)

Therapist volume 3 has one more chapter left in the first draft. I think I have the skeleton of an outline for volume 4, which should be the last, at least in this hell-bent sprint I’ve been doing. (55 days of writing every day, totaling about 65,000 words across various projects. Which is a slightly-slower-than-Nanowrimo pace.)

I’ve accepted internally that at least some of this is a way to get my mind off the not-catastrophic, just-moderately-annoying, probably-permanent health stuff I’ve been dealing with. I’m pursuing medical care as far as I can, but day to day, sending myself off into a mostly-fluffy fantasy story sure beats stewing in my own worries.

One of the themes of volume 3 is how escapism can become unhealthy. Self-own.

More: Fire Emblem: Three Houses (minor Golden Deer House spoilers)

Two notes: print and WTF

Checking In, IseTher (Light-ish Novellas)

Just two things before I forget, it’s been a long day:

  • Took print off the agenda for Therapist. I did a print layout, but the spine is so tiny that I can’t get a reasonably readable title to fit on it. It feels like a silly outcome, but oh well. I plan to continue with ebook releases and then put together a print edition if (when!!) the four novellas are done. An omnibus would be comfortably book-sized.
  • In the anime roundup, I forgot to mention another back-catalog series we started: Kemono Michi: Rise Up. Boy, where to even begin. Pro wrestling. Magical animal loving. Isekai. Yeah, I guess you begin there. Nearly every character is wholesomely dumb as a bag of hammers, especially the lead, who lives to a) pet every animal b) cause cartoonish bodily harm to anyone who harms animals and c) nothing else, that’s all, that’s the whole list. This was Spouse’s choice (as a pro wrestling fan), but I’m surprised how much it’s made me laugh. Who knew?

Why am I neck deep in romcoms

Checking In

Writing update: According to my notes, I started writing Isekai Therapist 2 just before Christmas, and yesterday I hit the end of the first draft. So it’s going well. In no way have I set aside Healers; it’s still brewing in the back of my mind. The change of pace continues, is all. And honestly, at this point I only have 4 novellas sketched out (#4 and #5 collapsed into one, I don’t think it’s going to condense more than that). At this pace I could have all four off the table in appreciably less than a year. Weird.

Game update: Got a new controller, continued Garden Story, it’s cute. Continuing my usual refrain, I’m not particularly good at Zelda-likes, or anything that needs reflexes. But it’s going fine. I seem to be ~90% of the way through the story. I think there’s just a final dungeon left, so I’m collecting all the collectibles and such.

Anime update: How did I become a person who keeps up with the current seasons, seriously? Within the last year. Very strange.

Continue reading Why am I neck deep in romcoms →

Meanwhile, 100 years later

Checking In, Recs

Somehow today feels like a hundred years after the last time I posted, one week ago. Maybe just from returning to work? It didn’t even go badly, heading back after the holidays. I don’t even know.

Just noting a couple of little things to check in:

  • Started writing a little bit of Healers 4? I don’t have the whole thing outlined in detail, which is exactly how I ended up meandering for years before finding my way two out of the last three times? I’m making the exact same mistake again? Hooray!
    It’s okay. I mainly wanted to try out some scenes and see how they felt. I have notes. I have themes. I have… some conflicts. It’s cool. Ish.
  • Got to beta read another excellent book; there are so many talented people out there!! aaahh! Another one that I hope to put on the official “read” list eventually, as well as plugging up to the sky on my teeny tiny little platform.
  • I thought I’d do more base-building in No Man’s Sky, but it didn’t grab me after all, so I set the game down. At least for now.
    Yet. Another. Switch controller is developing a bad stick — it was already pretty bad, but I could deal with it during most of No Man’s Sky — so I have only barely started another game, Garden Story. It’s a pastel-cute Zelda-like. Just for maximum contrast, I guess.
  • Anime nerd update:
    • Finished The Little Lies We All Tell. It continued to make me laugh? There were a few feels at the end? Who knew. Glad I tried it on a whim.
    • I think I mentioned Heaven’s Design Team already. If not, well. Heaven’s Design Team is effing adorable and surprisingly informative, and continues to be delightful. We’re coming up to the end, though, nooooo.
    • Following my spouse’s suggestion, we have started watching My Roommate is a Cat, which is uh… hashtag relatable, let’s say
      It’s about a (full-time, though) mystery novel author with extreme social anxiety who adopts a cat. You get about half the episode from his POV and about half from the cat’s POV. There are gentle hijinks, and more realistic cat behavior than you usually see in fiction. It makes a great wind-down show now that we’ve finished Laid-Back Camp. (except for the movie, still gotta watch that)
    • Finished my second watch of my aggressively weird extremely gay darling Sarazanmai, then started The Aquatope on White Sand. All I know about Aquatope is:
      • There were accusations of queerbaiting (two episodes in, and I see why)
      • It’s about an aquarium
      • That’s it
        Actually not a great pick for watching on the treadmill — it’s pretty and slow — but oh well.

That’s it. Working on establishing a habit of writing some fiction every day. Even a little bit. It’s been going well for a couple of weeks now. Time to continue.

16 / 16 / 16 / 71: A room-sized pile of feelings about asexuality, and a few other things

Recs

Two ramblings about media today, since I’m still on holiday staycation. No unmarked spoilers.

First: Finished the main quest of No Man’s Sky, at about 90 hours. I did make it to the center of the galaxy the slow way. I’m moderately salty about how I played out the rest of the quest — I had accidentally spoiled myself to be ready for A Thing, got through that, and then A Thing happened again and I wasn’t ready for it the second time. But meh, I got through it again and regrouped and embarked on the Full Freeform Messing Around / Time to Make My Own Fun Until I Get Bored and Wander Off phase of the open-world game.

Second: Finished reading the 71st and final book of the year, At the Feet of the Sun by Victoria Goddard, the sequel to The Hands of the Emperor. And before I launch into my enormous pile of Thoughts and Feelings about that book, I also wanted to remind myself that I read a 72nd that hasn’t been logged yet — I had the honor of beta-reading a book that is as yet untitled. When it is published, I’ll reread the final version and log it then, so it will show up in that year’s count. But still, I don’t want to overlook it in the year-end review.

So: At the Feet of the Sun. I’m going to keep this as spoiler-light as I possibly can while diving into The Pile of Thoughts and Feelings. Remember how I went into the first book knowing only that it was about bureaucracy, and was delighted to find that it was also about character and culture? The second book is pretty much all character and culture.

And IMO, it’s a romance. — Hold on. This requires some elaboration.

As few spoilers as I can, mind you: Representation meets Craft

One more for good measure

Recs, Uncategorized

Unexpectedly, I finished one more book before the new year: The Hands of the Emperor by Victoria Goddard. I didn’t think I’d finish this one so soon, but a few things lined up:

  1. Time off for the holidays
  2. I got sucked into the story far more than I expected
  3. I hit a point in No Man’s Sky that’s 90% loading screens and maps, so I fell into a pattern of reading while the loading screens loaded*

I had no idea what to expect, going into this one. It’s one of r/cozyfantasy’s regular recommendations — probably on the top ten — and all I knew was “story about a bureaucrat who wants to make the world a better place.”

Yep. It’s that. It’s also about colonialism/imperialism, cultural assimilation, and good governance, has excellent characterization, and worldbuilds without tiresomely explaining Magic Systems(tm) at the audience.

It’s also not cozy, in my opinion. I admit, I have developed a fairly restrictive impression of “cozy” from the community: “takes place in a cottage in the forest, there’s a lot of tea, there are no world-destroying stakes, and NO BAD OR CHALLENGING EMOTIONS EVER, OR HEADS WILL ROLL.” I don’t mean this to be denigrating. Cozy mystery has a long and successful history. It’s just that, but with magic. Magic, She Wrote.

There are a lot of emotions in this story, despite/because of the fact that it’s about an outwardly starchy bureaucrat. Few of the emotions are fluffy or easy. And though the day-to-day focus of the story is on one character and most of the story takes place in two general locations, it very much has ramifications about the larger story-world. That’s… a big part of the point. Making the world a better place.

So I’m kind of surprised that this community latched onto this book, but I am very glad they did, because I rabidly enjoyed it. I finished the first book on Christmas Day and started the second shortly after. (I did not figure out the twist at the beginning of the second book until… maybe 75% of the way through the first? This is why I don’t read mysteries)

There is a long stretch that basically boils down to Kip Tells Off Some Naysayer, Everybody Clapped, which…. eh, but it’s capped off with a set piece that I absolutely loved at the end, so it didn’t break the book for me.

Anyway, consider this a recommendation.

NMS elaboration (Spoilers)