Howdy everyone,
I hope you had a fun September! I certainly did.
And it is officially autumn! Bring out your pumpkin spice, your layers, your skeletons! Spiders are already trying to decorate my house and I’ll be honest, I am Not About It.
Honestly, it feels like I only just wrote the September newsletter, but I’m back to say hello and to tender a few updates on appearances, artist interviews, and more. In particular, I’ve been doing some fun writing-adjacent projects that I never thought would be a thing—like being in an Actual Play! (That’s when you play a table top role-playing game, or TTRPG live for the benefit of an audience, basically.) I went to a Ren Faire, Fantasy Festival with some homies and had a blast, and polled the Instagram class to help me pick my next author photos.
We also just passed the 1 Year Anniversary for The Sovereign and Fate’s Bane! I honestly can’t believe that, either. Thank you all for going on those adventures with me, and if you haven’t checked them out yet, I hope you will. They’re bangers, if I say so myself.
However, I also got a concussion this month (at a sword tournament 🙄) and am still dealing with some of the repercussions therein, including not being able to focus on screens/eye-stuff for long swathes at a time. That makes it hard to read, write, work, and make newsletters. I may have to take this in batches.
Alora!
Playing a New Role
I’ve been talking about my new obsession with DnD and Critical Role, etc. for some time now—actually, it’s almost a year, since the Mighty Nein show and CR4 both started last autumn and those were the things that hooked me hard into the whole production of things.
Before then, I’d enjoyed playing 13th Age (DnD-like) with a longstanding table (going on three years, maybe?) and eventually I also discovered some solo rpgs, which I’ve spoken of before. I’ve also talked about how they lead me to making more interesting decisions in my fiction, or even writing whole books.
Flash forward to today and I’m currently playing on three tables: one with my OG gang, one with a few writer buddies (including Tasha Suri who, completely coincidentally, also wrote about DnD in her latest newsletter), and one as part of an Actual Play with Narrative Damage, which collects a bunch of authors and lets us loose on a fictional world.
The first episode is out today!
Playing these games is a bit weird for me sometimes, because it IS so much like writing, but I also find that I escape to it to ease the pressure on my brain when the actual writing becomes too much. I run off to play and end up massively inspired—sometimes enough to get a whole new book (that’s how I ended up with Fortune’s Wake).
I lay awake at night imagining conversations between my character and NPCs (non-player characters) or other PCs (player characters), sometimes to the point of scripting them out so that I have possible dialogue prepped for a moment of role play. I play with my Story Engine character cards to figure out who they are as much as I do for the novels (waiting so impatiently for the physical cards to come).
In a way, I feel the need to understand my characters and their world even more because so much of the play is extemporaneous. I have to be ready at a moment to riff off of an event or a battle or an off-hand comment or—juiciest of all—if one of my fellow PCs wants to have a heart-to-heart. But when I get to the point where I’d rather be working on game characters than book characters, it’s also a moment for me to pull back and see what the novel is missing—whether in the narrative or my application to it. Did I put so much pressure on it that it stopped being play?
Usually, the answer is yes.
Sometimes, I think I’m afraid that having too much fun means the work itself isn’t good. In truth, it’s usually the opposite. So I am always trying to bring the games to the books—or the books to the games, yes—to keep the work fun.
The character in my game with Tasha is Ferro Aulis, a pit fighter (yes) (IYKYK). Check out these sick-ass dice, just perfect for my girl with fists of iron and a heart of gold. Courtesy of Soulforge Dice, of course. We have only played two sessions but already I have a Trauma (TM) because I got possessed by a ghost and my compatriots had to kill me with fire to get it out. 😐
Like reading books, listening to Actual Plays is a great way to study craft. There have been a few episodes of CR4 where Brennan Lee Mulligan has astounded me and as soon as the episode was over, I went back and analyzed how he did gestures all of that. The Archanade party taught me how to use factions and self-motivated baddies and OMG TWISTS. Hawthorne’s Grove taught me how to make people care about mortal peril. Damn. That’s all I’m gonna say. Mostly, these episodes are masterclasses in success with consequences, titrating tension along a very long trajectory. Filling every character with so much, even the “side” characters that you’re filled with fear or joy whenever they show up.
Obviously, these games are a collaboration and having many people to bounce off of changes what could happen, from bad rolls killing a character you were trying to save to good rolls helping you infiltrate a ball.
I can’t always steal that collaborative aspect, but I can steal the twists of fate, and surprise events. I can steal—and to be honest, this is always how I prefer to work—the practice of building a world so sharply that the streets populate themselves. A world that moves of its own accord, and you are truly only a visitor, an observer.
It’s so much harder than it looks. I respect every storyteller who pulls this off, no matter their medium.
I also try to dissect the craft because—simply put, people love it. I love it. I want people to feel the same way when they read my books. (I want to feel that way when I’m writing my books, lol.)
This letter is already going to be a long one, so I’ll leave off here, but I plan on writing more about what it’s been like being part of an Actual Play. In the meantime, you can check out the first episode of City of Whispers, as it drops today.
I’ll also leave you with a couple things if you’re interested in more about the phenomenon that is the surge of interest in actual play and TTRPGs.
Why thousands are paying to watch people play Dungeons & Dragons live
Dr. Emily Friedman
Dr Friedman is an academic who STUDIES Actual Play. For real. And it’s cool.
Emily C. Friedman
This line in particular got me: “Like the cast of Critical Role, I play with midcareer folks first brought together by a shared strange profession that consumes every waking moment, fogging boundaries between colleague and friend, love and work. For the cast of Critical Role, that profession is acting. For me, it’s academia, another profession that transmutes passion into anxiety and unexpected drudgery. For both, securing a livelihood is a major victory, often bittersweet.”
The Actual Play with one of our featured artists, Soulforge Dice!
Books
Warmongers
Word count: 86,302/160,000. (😶)
Speaking of pressure!
I finished the present day storyline! What a doozy. I am very proud of it, and simultaneously know that it still needs work. But since I essentially was rewriting that entire book basically from scratch, I’m pleased. You can see the final word counts in the gallery below—
don’t read too much into the chapter titles. seriously.
It’s come to about 86k, which is longer than maybe my editor would like it if we’re targeting 150k, given that it’s half the book. I don’t know how close we’ll land to that, because I want the work to breathe just a little. I want the world to feel rich and lived in, and that means…words.
However, I have already begun a quick read through and I have found some places to cut, places that feel a bit slow again—not as slow as the first draft, but certainly in need of more oomph. I might even have a couple solutions.
I’ll continue this read-through in parallel with the next phase, the second storyline. I’ve had the brilliant idea, though I don’t know how long I will stick to it, to write the whole thing longhand. The secondary reason will become clear why eventually. The primary reason, is my eyes; I’m old and I need less screen. I may just be swapping it out for finger pain, though. (Is there no winning? Truly, writing is one of the great inefficient physical tasks.)
One thing on my mind at this phase is the voice of each character. Starting to separate the two protagonists out of “my” voice and into their own. Differentiating them. It won’t happen properly until the third or fourth draft, when all the big pieces are settled and I can spend time on the lines.
As it is, the first draft of the second storyline felt better on my initial read-through and from my editor, but reading through the outline of what I wrote, I’m not satisfied, especially with the first half. The second half—whoo doggy, hold on to your pants, it’s good stuff. (So out of my whole first draft…only 25%. 😮💨) It will be slow going as I re-outline, strategize some battles, re-negotiate some reveals. I’m trying to get it done by mid-November now.
And just for fun…check out this work-in-progress sketch of the girls! Which is to say, deeply traumatized and exhausted middle-aged women. A heretic deserter and the God-King of War, courtesy of the artist, Dhaan. I will not be normal about them.
Envision them as you read this sneak peek of the first chapter. 😘
Fell Runner!
Bet you forgot all about this little guy! I haven’t!
In addition to just getting edits at the beginning of the month, we’ve also been having cover discussions. I’ve just finished the edits and we’re shooting for a summer/autumn-ish release next year. I even wrote a nursery rhyme to remember the names of the mighty fells.
Fortune’s Wake
In case you missed it, Fortune’s Wake is officially out! About a month gone and it’s gotten a lot of love, which feels amazing. It’s a flat out adventure story just like the kind I loved to read growing up. A friend of mine essentially called it “The Witcher for the rest of us” which is what I was going for. There are still signed hardback copies at Forbidden Planet!
As always, if you pick it up and enjoy it, a review on Amazon would be great—even if you didn’t a book from there, it’s where many do.
Given the schedule I’m under at the moment, I don’t know when it’s going to happen, but I would really like to write some more in this world. A few more adventures for Kova and Sayre.
Forged in FIYAH
is ALSO out!
Or pre-order it here (UK)! (UK always gets tordotcom books later, don’t ask.)
(Wow, a lot of F titles, haha.)
Some great things have been said about this anthology, but mostly I’m just really proud that there’s a showcase of some really great modern, working, living Black spec fic/SFF authors. We’re not a monolith, nor are we only relegated to a narrow subset of real-world after-school special style narratives.
TWO starred reviews, this one from Publisher’s Weekly: “With not one false note, this wide-ranging anthology is sure to impress.”
Even though FIYAH magazine has had to shutter itself, there are still ways to support a thriving landscape of SFF that’s a bit less…stuck in the past ideas of what fantasy should look like.
Events
- MCM ComicCon London
- Oct 24 - 11:15 AM - Writing Fighting with Miles Cameron and Emma Burnett (we will have swords!) (we will be using them to demonstrate our points!)
- Mayyyybe I will be doing another thing, a live DnD session, but I don’t have word on that yet, so check my event page for changes.
- In Conversation with Alix E. Harrow (The Slantwise Histories, The Everlasting) @ Waterstones Trafalgar - 18 November 2026, 7 PM - SOLD OUT (stay tuned for any changes - sometimes they change to bigger venues and open up new tickets!)
- Alix is a dear friend of mine and actually read through Fate’s Bane as a beta reader and helped me fight for the ending. I am so excited to spend an hour giving her shit on stage.
- If you have any questions you want me to throw at her, email me or leave them in the comments. I’ll see what I can do.
ICYMI
Other things you might have missed during the month include this post I wrote about the what we’re entitled to as writers—but also, not as writers but people, you know? There’s also second installment of the artist vs author interviews, this one coming in from Soulforge Dice. It includes a sweet discount code for subscribers. 😉 The next one will come in a couple of weeks.
What I’m Reading/Listening To
I always struggle to read when I’m at this point of a project(s) but I have picked up a few things I’m excited about:
- Red Sword by Bora Chung - a birthday gift from a friend who knows me well. Very well. That ending? Phew.
- The Demon Star by Jesse Aragon - haven’t read it yet, but a friend told me “Hey, Cherae, this is fucked up, I think you’ll love it.” So. You know. Gonna try it.
- “The Burren” by Ben Howard
- “Solea” by Faeloria
Okay, I think that’s enough for this month. Thanks for reading. Thanks for being here. I love getting to pull all of this stuff together for you every month. But my eyes are starting to hurt again.
Until next time, go have some fun. There are no prizes for misery.
Stay sharp,
C. L.
Thanks for reading. If you like these ad-free, AI-less posts, please consider supporting my work by sharing, becoming a paid subscriber, dropping a tip in the tip jar, or buying a book or subscription for a friend.
