Excited that The King’s Mate finally got released at the very end of July. Even more excited that we were able to do a print release of what was the very first story I ever had released in the gay romance genre. I got my copies in the mail on Friday and they look gorgeous. 

I truly hope everyone else will think so too. This story was special, and getting to revisit it and expand it for the collection made it more special. When we were trying to get everything rereleased through Purple Horn, it was this series that was the outlier. They needed to be done comprehensively somehow, and I wasn’t sure what to do about the fact that I wasn’t doing a collection in the same way.

Work and new procedures to try to help me recover from my injury just took up too much space in my life to handle getting the series back out there. While I did my usual November writing, it wasn't coherent. I felt a lot like I had lost all my mojo. 

This July I did a secondary writing exercise. That one wasn't writing a novel, but it was concentrated, sustained writing.

The injury is still a problem, one I'm still working on (with yet more, new procedures). But it went well enough that I was comfortable doing the work to get this done. I decided that I would also put out a print edition—individual volumes this time—for those who like to hold books in their hands.

I will work as expeditiously as I can to get the remaining two books out before the end of the year, starting with A Wounded Promise. That story is close to my heart and I look forward to getting it out. 

Hopefully we will see it out by the end of September, and The Rodeo Knight by the end of the year.

My first several attempts at getting published with gay romance were rejections. It’s easy to look at my early success and miss the rejections in the realm of fantasy that spanned years from 2000 to 2008 or so. And it’s easy to miss the early submissions to Samhain and others that were rejected with one line rejections. “This story does not meet our publication needs at this time.” Whichever spin on that was popular at the time. In the intervening years, I’d had some success in writing for gaming companies, which gave me a lot of insight into what those words could mean. I credit an editor for Dragon magazine, with whom I was friendly on Facebook - they were more free about that then—for taking the time to really talk to me about what editorial rejections meant, and what those terse emails might really mean.  
 
Changes in the landscape for game writing shifted my focus, and for a while I only wrote during National Novel Writing Month, a habit for which my little brother wholly deserves the blame (and the credit). I got into a fanfic community, and started writing very regularly. Prompts. Challenges. Eventually, a friend who had moved from that to writing for one of the small gay romance presses suggested I write something. They all knew I wrote stories outside the narrow fanfic world.

So I did. And got rejections, just as I had in the past. It was crushing, even knowing what the words meant. But I remembered the words of my editor friend, who had told me to always insulate myself from the rejections by having more things submitted and waiting, so it was never the last thing waiting to crush me. 

Loving Aidan got rejected, and promptly resubmitted to Torquere Press. I worked on a anthology submission for a sports anthology, taking a sideways take - chess. 

Torquere accepted Loving Aidan. The King’s Mate, my chess story, also got accepted for the anthology. Because of how publication schedules work, The King’s Mate was published first... my first published gay romance.

Now its coming out again. New cover. I’m very excited.

I've been busy. American Pride. The Tendire Gate. The Byte of Betrayal. I didn't stop with those. Most of my catalog has been rereleased at this point, including all four volumes of the College Rose Romances.

Loving Aidan was the first book I ever had accepted by a publisher, so the series that sprang from that story is particularly special to me. Every one of the main characters has been able to surprise me, though never, perhaps, as much as Steven in book 2. 

But none was as difficult to write as Jim Puffton in book 5.

I've been promising this for what feels forever (and really is probably since 2018, which is still a really long time. People are going to start thinking I'm George R.R. Martin with these delays!). But it's here, releasing this Wednesday, July 26.

Forgiving James
College Rose Romances Book 5

I've had several chances to just glimpse success on the horizon and need to start over. Part of that is needing to redefine success. Another part is the uncertainty of life as an author—changes in audience, genre conventions, expectation, and the one hot thing. A large part for me has been press closures and rights recovery. When you combine that with a pandemic, a severe and traumatic physical injury, and a the need to cope with a mental health condition that puts me solidly in the "measures energy with spoons" category (if you know, you know), you end up with everything grinding to a halt. So, with my rights reclaimed from Dreamspinner during the pandemic, and a dearth of those books having been released even while I still had the press, I have been left in a position I hate.

For six months all of my romance books have been out of print.

The College Rose Romances have been waiting on their fifth entry since 2018. The Sam's Cafe Romances slid into obscurity when they went out of print with the rights recovery from Dreamspinner. And of all my miscellaneous shorts published at Dreamspinner, only The Byte of Betrayal had made it back into the world - with a new cover! (and like all the others, it went out with Purple Horn at the end of 2022). 

Getting started again carries with it costs. Some monetary, some energy and time based. With an ongoing struggle to write at all, I have debated for a long time giving up my lifetime dream. Just considering giving it all up was making me miserable. So I catalogued the costs again... and delayed.

The delays are done.

This past week, I worked to figure out the logistics - ISBN numbers, a bank account, a kdp account in my name, and so forth. And I put out The Tendire Gate. And because some things have gotten smoother and there's a whole lot to rerelease, I put out American Pride for good measure. A hefty dose of angst too, with The Byte of Betrayal.

These are all old stories and I know I'll need to release new ones too. There's a plan for that. The College Rose Romances has a volume five, Forgiving James, which is complete, but I can't release it until the rest are back out. Sam's Cafe Romances has a spin off... two novellas telling the story of Brandon and Brice, Brian's brothers - The Stouten Duet. Those are also written, but need editing. And I have a costumed hero story too. 

Stuff is in the works. There's a new dawn. I have a plan. The stories are coming back out. 

There will be new stuff too, I promise.