Slow Going

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I’m gonna be honest. The Warlock’s Army is going slowly. There have been a lot of distractions, as a family member is in the process of being diagnosed. Paperwork, medical providers, government agencies, preventers of services… It drains my energy. The kids at school are showing a lot of behaviors as well. They may not be following the news of our backsliding democracy, but they know when their parents are upset, and it puts them on edge. There was definitely a generation of learning loss during COVID, and now we have this unnecessary war. I’m concerned that the learning loss will be extended.

But! I am still pressing forward with The Warlock’s Army. In fact, I am circling around the ending. The beginning of the ending? There are two possible ways for it all to come down. I’ve laid the clues for one of them that would circle back to the opening chapter quite neatly. Although giant pinchers are involved so potentially a bit gruesome.

Maybe too neatly. Revel Breed, the warlock in question and father of most of the cast, has always been erratic and doing things that seem random. So a less-neat ending would be for a random action to prove fatal. That would be a shocking twist, for sure. But I’m not a writer who twists just for the sake of shock.

So… gruesome, or shocking? Random or neat? Whichever I choose has to be honest about my characters and their situation, even if it is sudden. This is what I’m working my way up to.

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

Slayers of Old

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This is one of my recent reads. Author Jim C. Hines has been a favorite of mine for a few years, and I always check out his work. Hines is falling back on one of his favorite tricks here, skewering an older favorite TV show. His second series, Princesses, featured fairy tale princesses recast as Charlie’s Angels. Slayers of Old is an urban fantasy, billed as “Buffy the Vampire Slayer meets Golden Girls.” I didn’t watch those series intensely, so I can’t say how exact the comparison is. I do enjoy his take on the end life, if you will, of a chosen ones who had to walk away from the perpetual chaos.

The three protagonists are Jenny, the chosen one who walked; Annette, a succubus with a complicated family life; and Temple, a 99-year-old master wizard whose powers are fading. Jenny, to me, is the most recognizably Buffy. She had a teen squad of support heroes through high school and an older mentor watching over them. After a dramatic turn that I won’t spoil for you, Jenny realized it was more than a little problematic to turn teenagers into living weapons and send them out on death-defying missions. That was when she walked. Once she stopped her heroics, her team drifted apart.

Annette also has gone through trouble in her relationships. Being a half-demon with uncontrollable sex appeal was useful in some ways to her career as a detective. However, her children and grandchildren also inherited this trait. Her son doesn’t want her to tell his kids of their supernatural heritage but as they go through puberty, there’s no way to hide it. Things get messy.

Temple, the wizard, has simply grown very old. He’s having a hard time, not only with the physical symptoms, but just caring enough to get up in the morning. Temple has allowed Annette and Jenny to move into his magical house and turn part of it into a supernatural shop. But as his age catches up with him, the house begins to fray.

The fourth important character is Ronnie, a nascent hero who turns up to harass the supernatural store. It turns out Ronnie is descended from a different heritage of chosen ones. Both his parents are dead, although his mom, Margaret, is haunting his battle van. Ronnie is trying out the family trade for himself. After some initial misunderstandings, he becomes Jenny’s trainee.

Things seem to settle down, but evil is still afoot. One by one, the characters are attacked by a shadowy cult that is trying to summon something they never could hope to control. Jenny, Annette and Temple are forced out of retirement to save the world yet again.

It’s a fun story over all. I have a few quibbles, but I’ll keep them to myself. I don’t know if Hines is planning a follow up, but he usually does trilogies. I’ll be there for it if he does another. You’ll enjoy Slayers of Old, especially if you were a devotee of Buffy the Vampire Slayer or Golden Girls.

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

Woman at Work, March 2026

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What’s Happening? I heard a robin sing a few days ago. A sure sign that spring is unfolding. This is my favorite time of year. I can’t wait for the trees to come back in leaf and daffodils to sprout!

What I’m Working On. The Warlock’s Army is at that place where I feel like I’ll never finish the first draft. That just means I need to focus and think more about how to tie it all up.

What’s Next? I’m talking with Betsy Mott, my cover artist, about the second Standing Stones volume. She’s pretty excited about it, and so am I.

Where I’ll be. There are no current plans for an in person appearance.

Fun and Games. Animal Crossing had an update for the first time since 2022. I am there for it! I’m also playing the remastered Oblivion, this time in the Fighters Guild quest line. Next on my TBR stack is Beyond the Cobbled Road: Fading Light, by Stacey Bureker, an Indy author I met at RadCon.

Welcome spring!

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

How It Went

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RadCon 9B is in the history books. It was a good convention for me. I got to spend time with old friends, which is always welcome. The panels I had proposed went well, with good attendance and audience interaction. Not as over-the-moon as other years, but still a fun time.

My book table also did well. The crowd is different every year and they go for different things. This year there were a lot of families with younger kids. Their reactions are always cute and fun to see. There was less interest in Minstrels of Skaythe and more interest in Cleodora and my short story collections. I made a good profit and sold maybe 2/3 of what I had brought with me. In fact, I sold the very last copy of my very first novel, The Magister’s Mask!

Some of my frustrations with the con runners did persist. I had paid for the artist alley table (after some struggle) and was supposed to have two dealer badges, but they weren’t ready at the start of the event. Indeed, we never did get those badges. I got along with my panelist badge, and my husband had a plus-one badge for our kid who ended up not attending.

That was a small thing, easily handled, and it doesn’t make me reconsider attending. SF conventions can be hectic and tiring, but it was worth it and I plan to be back in 2027.

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

Too Political, Redux

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I am at RadCon this weekend, so I’m sharing an after-con report from a couple of years ago. This really expresses the advocacy I like to do around the arts as resistance.

The great wheel turns. The political forces we thought we vanquished have again reared their ugly heads. Writers and artists have been threatened with bans and harassment all along, but the danger grows more imminent with each day.

What are we to do? Should we stop writing/art before we get attacked? We could take down old posts and images, clean up our online presence to avoid offending the harassers. Then just keep our heads down and try to get through each day.

Or should we keep up our art, as a way to defy the authority? Our stories may give hope and courage to those who resist. More than that, they may keep us sane by releasing our anxiety into an artistic form.

Whatever we decide, it is definitely informative to pay attention as these events unfold. The incoming faction claims a overwhelming mandate. Cabinet nominees are grossly unfit for office, an open insult to the institutions of government. Politicians, pundits and billionaires bow down to the monster they helped create.

Will the institutions fight back? If so, how? It might seem we are helpless, watching from the sidelines as it all unfolds. But this is all material we can use, from the single word to the big confirmation fights in the Senate. We can watch, and let events spark our creativity.

I have said before, all stories are political. Writers and artists should continue to create work that reflects our times. We can satirize the hypocrites. Blame the guilty. Call for a better future.

We must. And, here we go again.

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

Strange Games

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With just a week until RadCon, I’m pressing pause on The Warlock’s Army to focus on convention preparations. I’ll be deciding what to bring for my artist alley table, printing up price sheets, and so forth. But before then, I have a couple of video game recommendations for you.

The games are called Strange Horticulture and Strange Antiquities. They are a combination of role playing, story, and logic puzzles. They both are set in the Victorian village of Undermere, with a mild Gothic horror feel.

In the first game, Strange Horticulture, you inherit a plant shop in Undermere. (Surely this is the setup of about 1/3 of all horror stories, inheriting an unknown property.) But these are no ordinary plants in your shop. Some have medicinal or mystical abilities. As customers come in, you try to figure out which plant they need from clues they give you. As the game progresses you get drawn into the murderous schemes of a cult.

In the second game, Strange Antiquities, you are the apprentice to an occult master. As he gets called way for increasingly urgent matters, you get left in charge of the shop. Again, patrons approach seeking magical items and you have to figure out which ones they need. And, again, there is a strange cult with murderous schemes.

In both games, your decisions will shape the outcome of the developing story. You can make what you think are kind or noble choices, only to have a dark outcome. And you can make what you think are harsh or cruel choices, only for them to lead to a happy ending. It’s fun to replay them both and see what turns out differently.

The games have been acclaimed for the design of characters, plants/items, and setting. The music is mild, yet menacing. It has a slower pace compared to a lot of adventure games. You can take as long as you need to think about the clues and decide on plot turns.

The puzzles are sometimes tricky, but with low stakes for failure. The games will not let you give anyone a completely wrong plant or item. Instead, you have a “fear meter” that fills when you make mistakes. If you mess it up too many times, you have a mental breakdown and have to solve a different sort of puzzle in order to recover.

These two games are a great change of pace from typical video games. I recommend them if you’re up for more of an intellectual challenge, but still with an intriguing story and role playing elements.

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

Woman at Work, February 2026

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What’s Happening? It’s our semester break as I write this. Elementary schools have semester breaks? I guess so!

What I’m Working On. The Warlock’s Army proceeds apace.

What’s Next? My spring publication will be the second Standing Stones volume. I’m about to commission cover art for it. As with the first of these, I haven’t settled on the final title yet. I just need to find a good rhyme for ‘stones’ that actually is relevant to the novella.

Where I’ll be. RadCon science fiction convention! I’m on panels and in their artist alley. There continues to be a slow response from organizers. If they can’t respond to emails, I’m going to show up and we can settle it there.

Fun and Games. Of course, Animal Crossing is eternal. I’ve also played through Strange Antiquities, a combination logic puzzle and flexible story format. Currently I’m reading The Everlasting. Next on my TBR stack is Jim C. Hines’ Slayers of Old.

Let’s all get through the last of winter safely!

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

Getting There

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Last time I checked, The Warlock’s Army had reached 350 manuscript pages. That’s 95,000 words — pretty close to my goal of 100,000. I am definitely leading up to the crisis that ends the story. Not all details are secured, but I know I’ll get there.

Jeniana has been terrified that her adopted family will find out she’s written a letter to her birth mother, Mektilde. She doesn’t want to hurt them, but she has so many questions about what it means to be born a witch. But then, her father asks if it’s all right for him to write to Mektilde. So often in fantasy novels, the parents of a young protagonist seem required to be irrationally mean. I’m working on this scene to be the opposite of that.

On the other hand, Cassander and his brothers are definitely at odds with their father, Revel Breed. They’ve been grounded for days, kept away from their magical training. Revel has been favoring Cassander (in a manipulative way). That allows Cassander to access some of the family records. What he’s finding is very upsetting.

Revel, however, is going to do what he always does when things get uncomfortable: he’s going to take off and leave Cassander in charge. Oh, what shall Cassander do with this opportunity? (evil grin)

The story is going well, in other words!

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

The Enchanted Greenhouse

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My latest read is The Enchanted Greenhouse, by Sarah Beth Durst. It’s a cozy fantasy, a genre that is quickly becoming my go-to haven from the times we live in. It’s also a sequel to her award-nominated The Spellshop, which I read and enjoyed in 2025.

The Enchanted Greenhouse follows Terlu Perna, a character mentioned briefly in The Spellshop. In the Crescent Islands Empire, sorcery is strictly controlled. Only fully accredited sorcerers are permitted to cast magical spells, even though it’s widely known that anyone with the knowledge and materials is able to do so. Terlu, lonely in her position as a librarian in the very back of the Great Library, broke the law by casting a spell to bring a spider plant to life as a fully sentient being. When her crime was discovered, she was sentenced to be transformed into a wooden statue and placed in one of the main halls as a warning to other venturesome librarians.

This somewhat overlaps with The Spellshop, since one of the major characters was this exact spider plant, named Caz.

The unfortunate Terlu spends six years as a statue before awakening suddenly in a snowy wood. Freezing and frightened, she finds her way into a magical greenhouse. Actually, it’s a sprawling complex of greenhouses, each one magically spelled to create a specific biosphere with its own flora (and a few smaller fauna). After wandering for a while, she encounters Yarrow, the gardener who’s taking care of all this. He’s been the island’s sole inhabitant after the sorcerer who created the greenhouses became paranoid and sent the rest of Yarrow’s family away. Later he died, leaving Yarrow alone and in charge.

It turns out Yarrow had sent to the Great Library for help, and one of Terlu’s friends there shipped her to this remote island with precise instructions for how to restore her. Despite having asked for aid, Yarrow is freaked out by having company. It takes them a while to even talk to each other. When they do start talking, Terlu learns that some of the greenhouses are starting to collapse. Yarrow begs her to use her sorcery and save them. Terlu is terrified of being caught breaking the law and returned to being a statue. The author does a good job of showing how they each are traumatized. Yet, these are basically good people, so they start to poke at the old sorcerer’s notes looking for solutions.

The great thing about this book is how colorful and magical it all is. People come in all colors, shapes and sizes. Magical creatures abound and people are used to seeing them. The greenhouse itself is full of fantastic vistas and so many fun touches. There’s a whole other set of sentient plants with their own ideas about it all.

Not-so-great is how these two lovely people can circle around and convince themselves that they aren’t falling in love. A few plot turns were not well developed, and others were fairly obvious if you had read The Spellshop. For instance, that the empire has fallen and no lawgivers are going to come after Terlu for her illegal casting.

This is a fun, light read. It is very, very cozy. The conflicts are all family related rather than swords-and-thunder. If that sounds nice, The Enchanted Greenhouse will be a good read for you.

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.

I’m A Source!

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A fun thing I found out at the tail end of 2025 is that this very blog of mine was used as a source for another website. The site is RPG Story Tellers. As the name implies, they are a gathering of information that GMs can use in world building for campaigns. If you’re interested, you can check out RPG Story Tellers for all sorts of intriguing material.

The specific article is “The Eternal Flame.” It covers various ways that dragons have been depicted in legends, mythology, and in more contemporary treatments over the 20th and 21st Centuries. Those who’ve been following Wyrmflight for a while know that this blog was all about dragons from 2012 to about 2018. RPG Story Tellers specifically cites my “on the “Dragons of Earthsea” sequence from 2014.

I’ve been linked back a few times, but it’s always exciting when my skill is recognized. Now, if I can figure out how to get them to review some of my books…

Have you read one of my books? Then it would be great for you to leave a review! Meanwhile, if you’d like to learn more about me and my work, check out my blog, Wyrmflight, or follow me on Bluesky.