Shaking Things Up

where we switch to sundays & i stop limiting myself

Hello friends,

I think I am going to switch these Substack letters over to Sunday. Mostly because I like the way it feels to curl up in the morning or evening with a beverage and scroll through my own subscriptions to wind down the week.

Part of me is playing around with the idea of a midweek thread post here to engage more conversation, but honestly have no idea what I would want to talk about. Let me know if you have any ideas in the comments!

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This Week I…

• had a Zoom catch up date with a dear friend

• had a virtual writing date with one of my besties

• worked on my first draft of my first dark academia novella

• put down three books that I had been trying to read all month and started They Drown Our Daughters

• listened to Dua Lipa, Hozier, and Miley Cyrus on repeat

• had a therapy session

• updated my blog and made the home page prettier

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Dark Academia Novella #1 Update

I have finally started working on the first draft for my first novella. It’s a whole different feeling now that I have the plot outlined and the major beats planned out. It’s simultaneously exciting and nerve wracking. I know the first draft is just for me, NO ONE will see this part, but it’s still a fight with my inner perfectionist and editor that wants to make it Right the first time.

Sometimes I catch myself wanting to just mood board, write vibes, but I am so ready for y’all to come into my world. My chat with my dear friend Allison really helped shake me loose in terms of limits I was putting on myself. Trying to make things just so accurate when it finally made sense that this was my world, and I can literally do whatever I want.

Is this going to keep me from having doubts? Nope. Is this going to make everything easy peasy? Also nope. But hopefully it will give me more freedom and in the long run, give my characters the freedom. Because let’s be honest, they tend to run the show.

And speaking of running the show, I’m late for a date with a revenge seeking bisexual disaster brunette who is ready to throw down some murder plans.

Until next time, dear hearts
-A