August is always an exciting month for me because of my birthday, but this year, I endeavored to keep celebrations lowkey and relaxed. Besides having dinner with my family and husband, I played tabletop RPGs with my friends and spent my free time reading my favorite books: horror, romance, and graphic novels. However, I also started preparations for an upcoming October book festival by ordering copies of The Devouring and crafting signage for my table. Overall, I’m keeping busy!
News & announcements
Starting tomorrow, September 1, I am raising the prices of The Devouring—both eBook and paperback. Earlier this year, I read this Patreon post by Claudie Arsenault about why she’s raising her prices as an indie author, and her reasons resonated with me. On top of that, I want to be paid what I think my art is worth, with all the hard work, early mornings, late nights, tears, and creative brainpower I put into it. And finally, I want to increase my chances of stocking my books at brick-and-mortar bookstores. Right now, The Devouring’s paperback price doesn’t make that possible due to a complicated formula of discounts and fees behind the scenes.
Writing update
First, I want to assure you all that I’ve fully embraced my new writing mindset after July’s revelation. I focus on completing X writing sessions per week and don’t worry about word count at all. Am I writing more slowly? Yes. But am I making more time for myself and other things I love? Yes! And that’s the goal: balance.
During the first half of August, I made some progress on the second pass of What the Iron Gave Us, my romantic urban fantasy. I improved and expanded on the prose in the first three chapters, to my great satisfaction. And yes—I decided this book will be an urban fantasy, not a science fantasy like I’d originally intended. I kept waffling back and forth on how advanced the technology should be and decided I want the setting to be contemporary with the here and now. In other words, I couldn’t be bothered with the “science” part of “science fantasy.”
Anyway, as I wrapped up Iron chapter 3, I found myself drawn once more to my vampire novella, The Heart Is a Weapon. I realized I didn’t want it to languish in limbo when it’s closer to its final draft—and, therefore, publication. Yes, I’ve decided it will be the next book I publish, though it’s too early to set a date yet. After reviewing the alpha reader feedback, I decided to re-outline and rewrite the entire story, shifting it from the supernatural thriller I had originally written into a proper horrormance (yes, horror + romance). This required a drastic shift of focus from external plot events to character emotions and relationships.
So far, the rewrite is going well. I’m only two chapters into the third draft, but I’m much happier with the direction of the story and the way the characters, and their relationships, are depicted. I plan to keep working on this draft until it’s finished—tentatively aiming for the end of the year, so expect more updates about Heart next month!
Recent delights
- After the excitement of the FIFA World Cup this summer, I’ve decided to collect and reread Eyeshield 21, a manga I read when I was in my late teens. I remember enjoying it immensely but can’t recall everything that happened, just the emotions I felt while reading it. I plan to read 2-3 volumes of the 37-volume series per month. I already have the first six on my shelf, and the first two read.
- This month, I’ve been playing The Thaumaturge, an isometric, “choices matter” RPG set in Warsaw in 1905. I wish it used a different combat system that I actually enjoyed, but the story, the worldbuilding, and the investigative mechanics more than make up for it. (Plus, I can turn on auto-battling to skip and auto-win combat.) It is sparking ideas for a future WIP involving a woman and her pact-bound demon partner, but it needs to wait in line behind all of my other projects!
A. M. Shilling 
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