Hi All!

Hope you're having a good day / week / month? I'm not one for chit-chat, so let's dive in!

Flying through the revisions and edits for my sapphic cozy mystery romance set on an ERP project, I'm hoping to have it with the beta readers week after next, for a possibly-maybe-I-hope release date of end of October?!

Never before have I gone through rounds of revisions and edits in such a short period of time, and I feel like I've really levelled-up as an author (though I still have a way to go compared to prolific authors who can edit a novel in 6-10 hours. Yes, hours!).

I've also been busy preparing a sale for Your Knowledge Or Your Life, this one is going to be more involved than anything else I've ever done, and is requiring a lot of juggling, BUT I think it will be worth it. It's coming towards the end of August, but I'll confirm a few days before!

And while we're talking about Your Knowledge Or Your Life, I've started getting reviews on Goodreads, they're a mixed bag, some readers love the book, some are more lukewarm, but (fingers crossed), so far, no one is hating it.

I also spotted the book "in the wild" on Instagram, and let me tell you, to actually know for real that someone I don't know is reading the book is absolutely terrifying!

Getting the books noticed is really the hardest part, and that's why having readers leaving reviews and talking about them to their friends / families / coworkers / librarians / pets is so important. If they don't know it exists, people can't buy a book they might end up loving.

This month has been rather disappointing with several DNFs, but there was one book that made it on my "keep for now" shelves, and that was "On Rotation", by Shirlene Obuobi. I saw it in an airport bookstore when it first came out and had made a note to give it a go. Only* three years later, I did!

If you like watching Grey's Anatomy (the early seasons), I think you'll enjoy this. One thing I particularly enjoyed was the footnotes in the paperback version, about med school in the US and Ghanaian culture and traditions.

* Not a dig or passive-aggressive or anything, I'm genuinely proud that this book stayed on my TBR pile for only just shy of three years, that's mighty impressive** for me!

** See previous newsletter describing books that have been on my physical TBR pile for 20+ years. Don't judge!

Book edits and publishing tasks sort of took over life since the end of June, so not much life news to report, except that I'm planning on making fresh damson* ice-cream (as soon as they are ripe)!

* a small tart plum that's never eaten raw - I'd been making jam from it, but given that I still have jars from three years ago, I thought I'd give a go to ice-cream.

How about you? What have you been up to? What have you been reading? Have you shared this newsletter with anyone?